Kofax RPA Quick Start Guide - Robot File System

1.1. Prerequisite

Please make sure the Windows service WebClient is enabled on the machine(s) where the Desktop Automation Service is running.

 

2. Configuration

2.1. Configuration in Tomcat

Configure the web.xml file located in webaps\rfs\WEB-INF folder in the Tomcat installation folder. Below parameters need to be configured: 

mc-path, mc-username, mc-password, data-path. You can set allow-absolute-paths to either true or false. Restart the tomcat server after editing this file. 

 

2.2. Configuration in Management Console

Open the Management Console and go to Admin > Settings > Robot File System Server. Select Use RFS Server and specify the URL of the Tomcat server where you set up the RFS server, for example, http://myserver.my.domain:8080/rfs. Leave the User and Password fields as they are. 

In Management Console, under Repository > Robot File System, configure the robot file system shares. There are two different types of shares:

• Volatile share : this is a share called "robot" that is created for the duration of the robot run. This folder is deleted when the robot completes is execution or is closed in Design Studio. There is no extra configuration needed for this share to be created/deleted.
• Permanenent shares: these are shares that point to existing folders/other shares and they don't depend on the robot run. Therefore they can be used by multiple robots (e.g. robot #1 downloads files and saves them in the share, robot #2 uses these files). These shares have to be configured in Management Console; depending on the configuration used you can have:

1. Permanent share relative to the data-path configured in Tomcat (see section 2.1 above):

In this case, a folder will be created in the data-path folder and its name will be as specified in the "Path" field in the RFS configuration in Management Console:

 

2. Permanent share that uses an absolute path:

This option can only be used if allow-absolute-paths parameter is set to true in Tomcat's web.xml file (see section 2.1 above)

The content of the share is the same as the folder specified in the RFS configuration, "Path" field.

2.3 Configure Access

1.Give access to RFS for Design Studio.

Copy the access token from Design Studio > Help and enter in the Authorizes Access Token tab in Robot File Sytem configuration in Management Console:

2. Give access to robots uploaded in Management Console

Copy the access token from Repository > Robots > Right-click > Get Resources Access token. Paste the access token in RFS configuration window Authorized access token. 

 

You can also give access to the share to all Robots from a project by selecting 'Project Scope'

2.4 Optional Configuration in Desktop Automation (DAS)

By default when RFS is used a new mapped drive is created on the DAS machine and the letter used is S:

This can be configured on the DAS Configuration tool > Windows tab:

3. How to use RFS in Design Studio

Create a Robot with Desktop Automation (DA) step and configure your Desktop Automation mapping. In the DA workflow, there are Read and Write action steps that allow file access via RFS (to read the complete description of these steps, please consult the User Guide).

Content must be passed between Robot and Workflows as binary parameters.

When the robot is running, a new Drive letter S:\ mounted for Volatile share on the DAS machine. This drive will be deleted when the robot has stopped running. 

More Information: 

Robot File System has been introduced in v10.6 of Kofax RPA and provides shared storage for RoboServers, Design Studio instances and Desktop Automation agents.