How to: Create and Install a Specification Flow Template (DriveWorks Documentation)

How to: Create and Install a Specification Flow Template

The ability to create Specification Flow Templates has been included in DriveWorks as a standard functionality, with a built-in exporter.

This article will demonstrate how to create a Specification Flow Template, then export and deploy it for other Projects and users.

Specification Flow Template has the file extension of .drivesft

When creating Custom Specification Flows we recommend using the Run Macro Task in your Specification Flow states, to assist with Project management.

Creating a Specification Flow Template

The steps below will guide you through the process of creating a Specification Flow Template (.drivesft):

In the Task Explorer menu, Navigate to Stage 5: Specification Control - Specification Flow, and Select it to display your current Specification Flow.
Next, create and customize the Specification Flow to your exact requirements.
Once you have completed your Specification Flow, click Export Template from the Command Bar and the Template Exporter will launch.
In the Template Exporter enter a Title for your template
The Title will be displayed as the Template name in the Template list, of the Load Template dialog, once it has been installed.
Optionally enter a description for the template. Click Next.
Enter a File Name for the template and browse to a location to save. Click Save.

You now have a Specification Flow Template that you can distribute and install.

Create a Description File (Optional)

A Description File allows information about the template to be displayed in the Load Template dialog.

Locate the .drivesft file that is to have the Description added.
Using Windows Explorer rename the .drivesft extension to be .zip.
Right click the file and select Extract All, follow the wizard to extract the contents of the zip file.
Extract the files to a new folder so all contents are separate to any other files.
In the location of the extracted zip file create a folder named Description.
In the Description folder create a file named index.html.
Open the index.html file in a program such as Notepad.

Copy the following html into the index.html file:

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
	<head>
		<meta charset="utf-8" />
		<title>MySpecFlowTitle</title>
		<style type="text/css">
			html {
				font-family: 'Segoe UI', Verdana, Arial;
				font-size: 12px;
			}
			h1 {
				color: #3f5f7f;
				font-size: 12px;
			}
		</style>
	</head>
	<body>
		<h1>Specification Flow Template Title</h1>
		<p>Specification Flow Template Description</p>
	</body>
</html>

Edit the text Specification Flow Template Title to be the Title required at the top of the page
Edit the text Specification Flow Template Description to be the Description required
Place new lines of text in between <p> and </p> tags.

Images

Images can be included in the index.html file by encoding them to base64.

Use a Web Service such as Base64 Image to convert an image to base64.

Once you have the base64 code of the image, replace the text INSERT BASE64 HERE below with the code:

<body>
		<h1>Title</h1>
		<p>Description</p>
        <img src="INSERT BASE64 HERE" />
</body>

Ensure you include the quotes around the base64 code.

Save the index.html file and close the program used to edit the file.
In the template folder you will now have the following items:
- File - [Content_types].xml
- File - TemplateFileName.xml (this will be the name (not the Title) given to the template when it was exported)
- Folder - Description
Select all items, right click and select Send To > Compressed (zipped) folder.
It is important the zip is created this way so the contents are not placed within a sub folder.
Rename the zip file.
- The name of the zip file is required to match the name of the xml file that has the TemplateFileName (see step 9 above).
- The extension of the zip file is required to be changed to .drivesft.

Installing a Specification Flow Template

If a template is not displaying in DriveWorks after being installed, check that the installer or version of DriveWorks is the one currently being used, as templates are version specific.

If there is an error in the templates data it will not display.

The steps below will guide you through the process of installing a Specification Flow Template (.drivesft) :

Double click on the new .drivesft file and the DriveWorks Install Template wizard will automatically launch.
Choose whether this template should be made available to either the Current User or for Everyone (who has access). Click Next.
The DriveWorks Install Template wizard will then launch and complete the task to install the template for the
users selected.

Please follow this link for further reading on File and Template locations.

Loading the Custom Specification Flow Template in DriveWorks

Once installed customized Specification Flow Templates can be loaded into other projects by following the steps in the Load Template section.

Uninstall a Specification Flow Template

To uninstall a Specification Flow Template please follow the steps below:

Open File Explorer and navigate to the folder where the Templates are stored in DriveWorks.
C:\>ProgramData>DriveWorks>[version number]>Templates>SpecificationFlows
From the SpecificationFlows folder, select the template you want to uninstall.
Right-click and select Delete or press the Delete key on your keyboard.

The selected Specification Flow Template will no longer appear in the list of available templates when following the steps to Load Template (restart of DriveWorks maybe required).

DriveWorks Pro 21 How to: Create and Install a Specification Flow Template