Dyanamic parameters in processing source files

Question

I have this requirement of dynamically processing source files from different folders, based on the input we provide. Is it possible in owb 11.2? If so, how can we achieve that? your help would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks,
Prabha

Answer 1

Okay, that's what I thought.
To be honest, I think you're going to have trouble making the mapping that pulls from the source file truly dynamic itself. Because the generated output of mapping of this type is a SQL*Loader file (assuming you're not doing external tables, but flat-files), which by necessity, has the path to the file to be loaded hard-coded into it.
But I think you could put in place a work-around.
As long as the structure of the file isn't different, and it's only where it resides that's dynamic, your problem really just comes down to getting the file to the static location the mapping is expecting. There are plenty of ways to do this.
Assuming you know the new location each time, you could do something like writing a simple batch file at the OS level (could even take params like the location of the needed file), and dropping IT into the process flow before the mapping. The batch file would just move, and possibly rename, the file into a static location that the mapping is expected.
Likewise, you could probably even do the same sort of this with a PL/SQL proc using SHELL commands.
Does this help at all? I think your approach should not be trying to make the mapping/flow dynamic, as you may not be able to. Instead focus on moving/handling the file in such a way first that the mapping doesn't need to be dynamic anyway.