Setting up a batch in Ascent Capture

To use this interface, each AC document name within a batch which is to be passed to Ebase must correspond to an Ebase form with the same name (See Name conversions), and each AC document must use the AC XML Release Script. This release script will generate one XML file per AC batch processed.

The AC XML Release Script should be configured as follows within the XML Release Script setup dialog:

each AC document field must be mapped to an Ebase field in the Document Settings tab (See Name conversions)
on the Document Storage tab:

specify a release directory to hold the created XML files. This will be specified as the input directory for the ProcessACXML program.
tick the Release Image Files checkbox and specify a directory to hold image files. This directory is used to display the scanned image files from an Ebase form and must therefore be accessible to the Ebase Server

On the Image Format tab, specify image format TIFF - G3. This specifies the format of the generated image files which may be displayed online
On the Custom Batch Settings under Namespace, specify prefix ufs and namespace www.ebasetech.com

Name conversions

When converting from AC document and field names to Ebase form and field names, the system will automatically:

Convert from lower case to upper case
Replace spaces and forward slashes with underscores

Transmitting XML documents to Ebase

Ebase provides a program ProcessACXML to read XML files created by the Ascent Capture XML Release script, convert these to the Ebase batch XML format, and pass them to the Ebase batch system for execution. The input directory for this program must be the release directory for XML files specified above. (See Processing XML from Files for more information)

Viewing image files from an Ebase form

The images of the scanned documents can be displayed online from an Ebase form. A pre-requisite for this function is that the released image directory specified above is accessible to the Ebase Server web application.

When an XML document is received by Ebase, a system variable $SCANNED_IMAGES is created for each form processed which contains the file location of the multi-page tiff image file containing the scanned pages. If it is required to display this image file at a later date, this file location must be stored in a database as part of form processing. Then when the database record is retrieved later, the image can be displayed using the FPL display command (See FPL Script Command Syntax for more information) or the API WebForm.displayUrl() method.

Here is an example of an order form. This is first created online by the customer (form CREATE_ORDER) and is then processed internally (form PROCESS_ORDER):

Set up a database table e.g. orders to contain the received order document. This should have an additional VARCHAR column e.g. scanned_images to hold the location of the image file.

The order document is scanned, passed to Ebase, and form CREATE_ORDER is executed. As part of the forms processing, a record is inserted into the orders table containing the scanned_images value extracted from Ebase system variable $SCANNED_IMAGES. An example of the script code to do this is:

FPL:

if [ $BATCH_MODE = 'Y' ]

set SCANNED_IMAGES = $SCANNED_IMAGES;

endif

insert ORDERS;

API:

if (system.variables.$BATCH_MODE.value == "Y" )

{

fields.SCANNED_IMAGES.value = system.variables.$SCANNED_IMAGES.value;

}

resources.ORDERS.insert();

where SCANNED_IMAGES is a form field. The check of system variable $BATCH_MODE ensures this processing does not occur if the CREATE_ORDER form is run by an online user.

At a later date, the PROCESS_ORDER form is run. This form reads the record from the orders table and displays it to the end-user. An action button is added to the displayed page with text 'View original document'. When this is clicked, a script is executed:

FPL:

display SCANNED_IMAGES;

API:

form.displayUrl(fields.SCANNED_IMAGES.value);

This results in the image file being displayed in a popup browser window as shown below:

Browser requirements

To view a tiff file in a browser as shown above requires a browser plug-in. The latest version of IE includes this. However, an open source tiff viewer and plug-in is available from www.alternatiff.com. This is used in the display shown above.