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Update Activities

Introduction

Update activities, using their connection, update an object in an endpoint and are intended to be used as a target to consume data in an operation.

Creating an Update Activity

An instance of a connector Update activity is created from a connection using its Update activity type.

To create an instance of an activity, drag the activity type to the design canvas or copy the activity type and paste it on the design canvas. For details, see Creating an Activity Instance in Component Reuse.

An existing Update activity can be edited from these locations:

Configuring an Update Activity

Certain connectors have a variation of these steps for their Update activity and are documented explicitly. For many connectors, follow these steps to configure their Update activities:

Step 1: Enter a Name and Select an Object

In this step, provide a name for the activity and select an object. Each user interface element of this step is described below.

Common Update Activity Configuration Step 1

  • Name: Enter a name to identify the activity. The name must be unique for each connector Update activity and must not contain forward slashes (/) or colons (:).

  • Select an Object: This section displays objects available in the endpoint. When reopening an existing activity configuration, only the selected object is displayed instead of reloading the entire object list.

    • Selected … Object: After an object is selected, it is listed here.

    • Search: Enter any part of the object name into the search box to filter the list of objects. The search is not case-sensitive. If objects are already displayed within the table, the table results are filtered in real time with each keystroke. To reload objects from the endpoint when searching, enter search criteria and then refresh, as described below.

    • Refresh: Click the refresh icon Refresh icon or the word Refresh to reload objects from the endpoint. This may be useful if objects have been added to the endpoint. This action refreshes all metadata used to build the table of objects displayed in the configuration.

    • Selecting an Object: Within the table, click anywhere on a row to select an object. Only one object can be selected. The information available for each object is fetched from the endpoint:

      • Name: The object name from the endpoint.

      • Description: The object description from the endpoint.

    Tip

    If the table does not populate with available objects, the connection may not be successful. Ensure you are connected by reopening the connection and retesting the credentials.

  • Continue on Error: Select to continue the activity execution if an error is encountered for a dataset in a batch request. If any errors are encountered, they are written to the operation log. The default value is unselected.

  • Save & Exit: If enabled, click to save the configuration for this step and close the activity configuration.

  • Next: Click to temporarily store the configuration for this step and continue to the next step. The configuration will not be saved until you click the Finished button on the last step.

  • Discard Changes: After making changes, click to close the configuration without saving changes made to any step. A message asks you to confirm that you want to discard changes.

Step 2: Review the Data Schemas

Any request or response schemas generated from the endpoint are displayed. Each user interface element of this step is described below.

Common Update Activity Configuration Step 2

  • Data Schemas: These data schemas are inherited by adjacent transformations and are displayed again during transformation mapping.

    Note

    Data supplied in a transformation takes precedence over the activity configuration.

    Many connectors use a REST API and JDBC driver. Refer to the API documentation, as available, for information on the schema nodes and fields.

  • Refresh: Click the refresh icon Refresh icon or the word Refresh to regenerate schemas from the endpoint. This action also regenerates a schema in other locations throughout the project where the same schema is referenced, such as in an adjacent transformation.

  • Back: Click to temporarily store the configuration for this step and return to the previous step.

  • Finished: Click to save the configuration for all steps and close the activity configuration.

  • Discard Changes: After making changes, click to close the configuration without saving changes made to any step. A message asks you to confirm that you want to discard changes.

Next Steps

After configuring a connector Update activity, complete the configuration of the operation by adding and configuring other activities, transformations, or scripts as operation steps. You can also configure the operation settings, which include the ability to chain operations together that are in the same or different workflows.

Menu actions for an activity are accessible from the project pane and the design canvas. For details, see Activity Actions Menu in Connector Basics.

Update activities can be used as a target with these operation patterns:

A typical use case is shown below using a Dynamics 365 Sales Update activity in the Transformation Pattern. In this example, the Dynamics 365 Sales Update activity (Sales Update) generates a response structure that is received by a transformation (Sales Update Response), whose output is then written to a variable by a Variable Write activity (Write Sales Update Response) and a message is then logged by the Write to Operation Log script:

Common Update operation

To use the activity with scripting functions, write the data to a temporary location and then use that temporary location in the scripting function.

When ready, deploy and run the operation and validate behavior by checking the operation logs.