Altova MapForce 2025 Professional Edition

In FlowForce Server, global resources are not stored in one XML file as in desktop applications. In FlowForce, each resource is a reusable object that may contain file or folder paths or database connection details. Resources can be copied, exported, and imported, and are subject to the same user access mechanism as other FlowForce Server objects. This means that any FlowForce user can use any resource in their mapping functions if they have the required permissions.

Once you have created a mapping with global resources in MapForce, you can deploy it to FlowForce Server. At deployment time, if you want your mapping to use global resources, select the Use Resources check box in the deployment dialog box. If you do not select the check box, any global resources used by the mapping will be resolved, based on the currently selected configuration. If you have selected the check box, the mapping function will require resources in FlowForce Server as well. The screenshot below is an example of a mapping function deployed to FlowForce that requires resources to run. Notice that the first parameter gets the default file path from a resource.

In FlowForce Server, it is the mapping function that uses the global resources, not the job. The mapping function reads the path of the first input file from the resource. This means that all jobs using this function will use the same path unless you override the path from the job configuration page.

You can also deploy global resources to FlowForce Server as standalone objects. This means there is no need to deploy a mapping first in order to be able to deploy a global resource. For more information, see Deploying Resources to FlowForce Server below.

For information about consuming resources in FlowForce Server, see the FlowForce Server documentation.

Deploying resources to FlowForce Server

You can deploy global resources created with MapForce to FlowForce Server. Upon deployment, you must choose the configuration with which the resource should be deployed to the server. If you need all configurations of the same global resource on the server, you can deploy this global resource multiple times and select the desired configuration each time upon deployment. You can also change the name of each global resource on the server and choose the destination container on the server.

You can deploy global resources to FlowForce Server at the same time when you deploy the mapping or separately. To deploy global resources to FlowForce Server, take the steps below:

1.Run MapForce.

2.Click the Manage Global Resources toolbar button. Alternatively, go to the Tools menu and click Global Resources.

3.Click Deploy To Server. This opens the Deploy Global Resource Configuration dialog box (see screenshot below).

4.Enter the connection details to FlowForce Server (server, port, user, password, login method). These parameters are the same as the ones required when you deploy mappings to FlowForce Server.

5.Select a configuration from the Configuration list. This list includes all configurations from the current Global Resources Definitions file. Note that only one global resource configuration can be deployed at a time. You can deploy the same resource multiple times, with a different name, if you need all the configurations on the server.

6.Select a target path where the resource should be saved on the server. Click Browse to select a target FlowForce container or create a new one if required.

7.Click OK.

You can see information about deploying the global resource to FlowForce Server in the Messages window.