Migrating Automations v1 to v2
Files.com has two kinds of Automations. A v1 Automation runs one action from one trigger. The action is Copy Files, Move Files, Delete Files, Create Folders, Import Files, or Run Sync. A v2 Automation runs a graph of nodes, and it is what every other page in this section describes. Your existing v1 Automations continue to run unchanged, and you can convert each one to v2 in place when you are ready. The conversion is one way, and a converted Automation stays disabled until you enable it.
What Changes
| Area | A v1 Automation | A v2 Automation |
|---|---|---|
| Ownership | Owned by the site or by the Folder Admin who last edited it, and run with that owner's permissions, so an edit that moved ownership to a user without access to every path it references made it fail, and disabling the owner stopped it | Owned by the site or a Workspace, never a person, and unaffected by changes to any user's account |
| Shape | One trigger and one action | One trigger and a graph of nodes, with branches, conditions, and an Error path on every node after the trigger |
| Revisions | Edits replace the configuration | Every saved change to the graph creates a Revision, and each run records the Revision it used |
| Retries | A retry starts the run over | A retry resumes at the failed node and reuses the completed nodes' outputs, and a finished run can be rerun from any node |
| Errors | One error message per failed operation | An error type for each failed item, rules on each node whose action is Continue or Propagate, and an Error path that receives the failed items when the matching rule is Continue |
| Run status | Success, Partial Failure, Failure, Skipped, Queued, Running | The same, plus Canceled, and a status for each node |
| Run detail | A list of operations | The graph of the run with each node's items, timing, errors, and journal |
| Webhook body | Ignored, with the URL's parameters available as tokens | A JSON body becomes the run's data items |
| Always Serialize Jobs | A setting on file action and webhook Automations | Not a setting |
| Incoming Email trigger | Not available | Available |
| Manual runs from the API | Start the run | Start the run and can supply the files or data to process |
| Log records | Operation, path, destination, status | The same, with the node's ID and type and the error type added |
What Stays the Same
Every setting a v1 Automation has, apart from Always Serialize Jobs, exists in v2, on the trigger or on a node. The folder path and pattern syntax, the Exclude Pattern, the two overwrite options, Flatten Folders, Ignore Locked Folders, the destination tokens, and every schedule option, including time zones, Holiday Region, and Saved Schedules, are unchanged. An Automation with a File Action trigger still cannot be started manually, and a Move File node with several destinations still copies to all but the last destination and moves to the last.
Converting an Automation
You convert a v1 Automation with Convert to V2, or through the Files.com API. The conversion retains the Automation's ID, name, Workspace, schedule, webhook URL, and inbound email address, and it produces Revision 1 of the v2 Automation, with one trigger node and one action node. An Import Files Automation with several URLs becomes one Import File node per URL and destination. The converted Automation is disabled after conversion.
The conversion is not performed, and the Automation is unchanged, when the Automation has runs queued or running, or when the converted graph would fail validation because a destination or Sync it references no longer exists or its import settings are invalid.
We recommend reviewing the converted graph in the Builder before you enable the Automation. The Automations list shows each Automation's Version, V1 or V2, and a converted Automation's details page shows its Type and its current Revision. Runs recorded before the conversion retain the format they were recorded in.
Creating New Automations While Both Kinds Exist
The Automations list offers New Automation v1 and New Automation v2. Create new workflows as v2 Automations, because every capability of a v1 Automation is available in v2 and a v2 Automation can be extended with more nodes later.