The file/project management feature is ok for single morph projects and quite simple. You can publish your morph project and then use the “open from server” button to open your saved project and run it.
The problem comes with more advanced project when you have to work with multiple folders and files. For example imagine a project which needs different folders containing different files of data. If you don’t have these folders / files, your project will not work. In this case EM Desktop has big limitations.
The file manager is a feature enabling users to upload and download files but it’s not directly linked to the workflow editor. It’not easy to use in a daily situation. What an end user would like : it is to publish the project AND all its dependencies. And of course you want to open this project AND all its dependencies.
I was wondering how to manage these dependencies. Why not create a new format, equivalent to zip, containing projects, folder tree and files. What may be more simple : when you “Open from Server” or “Publish”, there would be an option to open a folder or publish a folder. In this case it would download / upload the whole content of the folder.
What do you think ? How can you manage an Easymorph “container” including one (or more) project and a full folder tree, like a docker container ?
However, there may be some problems implementing this is practice. For example, if the files are on a network drive with a mapped drive letter. How would EasyMorph identify if the drive is just mine or a shared drive? And if it can identify it as shared, should it copy them to the server or assume the server has access to the shared drive to access them where they sit?
Project can also be extremely complex with lots of calculated file names and paths or that are dynamic based on parameters. So working out the dependencies could be difficult here also.
Maybe i’ve got an idea. A file manifest (a way to select files wherever they are, , coping with the issue you mentioned, mapped with an existing server folder, created if not, kind of…) and persistent in the project. A click and all this stuff is send to the server or different env as well
I’ve got issues about env as well. How to make project promote to prod without dealing with filepath mess.
@RJO is right : maybe a guideline & best practices to deal efficiently with this kind of issues ?
My topic is initially far more simple. Today we can publish a project and retrieve it. I was wondering if it could be possible to publish and retrieve a project and its “local” folder tree (that you can use using relative path), because for complex projects, you usually create folders at the project level and use relative paths. I was not thinking of other sources like other network folders or even cloud sources. At least it would be good to retrieve all the folders and subfolders where the project is. For example you have a tree like this :
PROJECT folder
Project.morph
input folder
output folder
parameter folder
in this case I would be happy to publish and retrieve the whole PROJECT folder, which is not possible today. It’s a bit like a repo content to push and pull, rather than just one file.
Consider the “Inc5000” example in Easymorph. You would want to retrieve the whole content and not just the .morph project. if you only get the .morph project, the project will fail because it needs the csv file and also the .sqlite file :
I know, I know — I’m always asking for more. But the Easymorph team is so brilliant that of course I keep asking for more. From a tiny feature… to a full suite of productivity and CI/CD tools?
We need tools to work smoothly between the server and the desktops, in a proper sec/dev/ops workflow.
It’s the same for connection repositories. The server repo sometimes needs to step in, including substituting user credentials for database access.
In a multi‑environment setup, moving from integration or pre‑production to production only makes the issue bigger (which connections should be migrated, which files and directory structures must be transferred or modified?).
The problem you’re raising — and which I completely understand — can only be solved by the team. And honestly, I think we have the best one in the world. So let’s be demanding!
