Release Notes

Universal Controller release 7.4.0.0 contains the following high-level features. For a complete list of all the included features and fixes, please refer to the Universal Controller 7.4.x Maintenance list.

PLEASE NOTE that this release UC 7.4.0.0 removes support for Java 8 and support for Oracle 12c, Oracle 18c, and MS SQL Server 2012.

Backward Compatibility Warning

Customers using the LISTADV API for Task Instances should be aware that an error in the JSON formatted response was corrected by defect D-11110 in UC 7.3.0.2. Resolution of this issue may break backward compatibility for customers using this API. For JSON responses, the output tag was changed to outputs. Customers are advised to review their usage of this API when upgrading.

Architecture

Backlog

Title

Description

B-15907

Preferred Controller always Active

This feature lets one node in the cluster be designated as Preferred which will cause that node to always assume the role of the Active node when it is running.

B-16884

Add timestamp to message at beginning of rolled log file.

Timestamp information has been added to the messages that appear at the beginning of a rolled logfile.

B-16088

Outbound Webhook registration for built-in system Universal Events.

This feature provides a subscription mechanism for built-in Universal Events.

Either Webhook URL or a Task / Workflow can be specified as the Event Action.

Data Pipeline

Backlog	Title	Description
B-16916	New String and Output functions for processing delimited (or CSV/TSV) variable values and output with Recurring instances, etc.	A number of new functions have been introduced to allow processing of variables and output results that contain delimited comma or tab delimited strings.
B-08438	Allow for Automatic Output Retrieval for Remote File Monitors	Remote File Monitors now support Automatic Output Retrieval.
B-17019	Add `${ops_recurrence_count_minus_1}` built-in variable for Recurring instances.	New built-in variable to compliment ${ops_recurrence_count}. Allows for conveniently working with zero-based indexes.

Lifecycle Management

Backlog	Title	Description
B-04714	Ability to disable promoting with follow references	A new System Property `Promote By Business Service Permitted` (default = true) controls whether the “Promote By Business Service Membership” dialog is displayed in the Bundle Definition Form. This feature cannot be enabled while there are existing bundles which have this option defined.
B-06674	Report Promotion	Reports can now be promoted between UC instances.
B-09387	Widget Promotion	Widgets can now be promoted between UC instances.
B-08454	Dashboard Promotion	Dashboards can now be promoted between UC instances.

Platform Support Changes

Backlog	Title	Description
B-16110	Java 17 support	Universal Controller has been validated to support Java 17.
B-16844	Upgrade Oracle JDBC Driver (21.9.0.0, ojdbc11.jar, orai18n.jar, xdb.jar, & xmlparserv2_sans_jaxp_services.jar)	The bundled JDBC driver for Oracle has been upgraded in this release.
B-16845	Drop Java 8 support	Java 8 is no longer supported.
B-16967	Build updated version of Universal Network Library (sb_universal.jar) to support TLS 1.3	As of 7.4.0.0 UA (Universal Agent) supports TLS 1.3, as part of UA 7.4.0.0, support for TLS 1.3 the UC (Universal Controller) components required to support TLS 1.3 communication with UA components have also been upgraded to support TLS 1.3.
B-16859	Update Microsoft SQL Server JDBC Driver (mssql-jdbc-9.4.0.jre11.jar).	The bundled JDBC driver for MS SQL Server has been updated in this release.
B-17029	Update MySQL JDBC Driver (mysql-connector-java-8.0.32.jar)	The Bundles JDBC driver for MySQL has been updated in this release.
B-16994	Drop support for Oracle 12c, Oracle 18c, and MS SQL Server 2012.	Oracle 12c, Oracle 18c, and MS SQL Server 2012 are no longer supported.
B-16099	Controller tracking of OMS maximum message size configuration.	The OMS client library has been updated to allow for supporting a larger message size. In conjunction with this, a system property, Universal Template Extension Maximum Bytes, is now available for configuration in cases where your extension archive(s) exceed 6 MB. Refer to the property description for more information on what you should take into consideration if you increase the value of this property.

Security

Backlog	Title	Description
B-09235	Display "last logged on Date / Time" after Controller logon	A new System Property `Show Last Login` (default = true) controls whether the last login date / time is displayed on the console when a user logs in.
B-15904	Allow users to access their own audit history	Users without the `ops_admin` or `ops_audit_view` roles are now allowed to view audit records generated by their own activities. This is controlled by the `Audit Owner Read Permitted` property.
B-15805	Agent Level Credentials Required Option	New Agent definition option `Credentials Required`, allows more granular control over whether credentials are required for specific agents. This new option complements the existing System Property `Agent Credentials Required`.
B-15946	Credential, Script, SAP Connection, Database Connection, Output Path, and Variable Path functions supported in Environment Variables field (Windows, Linux/Unix, and Universal Tasks).	Tasks that support setting environment variables (i.e. Windows, Linux/Unix, Universal) can now use the Credential Functions to populate environment variables. Embedding function tokens within the Environment Variables field only supported on distributed (Windows, Linux/Unix) agents 7.4.0.0 or higher.

UIP (Universal Integration Platform)

Backlog	Title	Description
B-15949	UIP: Universal Extension - Automatic inclusion of resolvable credentials for Credential Functions embedded within Script fields (Script Functions, SAP Connection Functions, and Database Connection Functions are also resolved)	For Script-based Universal Templates, we resolve and parse the Universal Script from the template, and automatically process the embedded credentials found directly within the Universal Script, or found indirectly within an embedded script data. For Extension-based Universal Templates, there is no Universal Script, therefore, the top-down dynamic processing of embedded credentials was not supported. If you want to embed credentials within the content of a Script field, you were required to add a Credentials field to the Universal Template and use the credentials functions to point to that Credential field. The purpose of this enhancement is to dynamically process any embedded credentials within a Script field, regardless of whether the credential is included as a field on the template, or not.
B-16766	Universal Template - Add 5 Additional Boolean Fields	5 additional Boolean fields have been added to the Universal Template.
B-15968	Universal Events - Global - Agent Event	New built-in, global Universal Template, for publishing Agent state events.
B-15855	Universal Extension - Extension Progress Indicator	New Progress field for Activity and Task Instances lists, which displays as a Progress Bar. Supported by workflows automatically based on number of completed tasks within the workflow. We have maintained our textual-based progress display for workflows, however, it is now labelled as Workflow Progress. Supported by Extension-based universal tasks through a new update_progress function available to extension developers. The Progress, as a textual value, can also be obtained through the Task Instance APIs.
B-13118	Universal Template - Database Connection field type	Database connections can now be added to Universal Tasks via a new Universal Template Database Connection field type.
B-16006	Universal Template - Dynamic Choice Field - Clear choices on dependent field value change	When a field that a dynamic choice field depends on changes, the currently populated choice(s) are cleared, as they may no longer be valid.

User Experience

Backlog	Title	Description
B-16744	User Preference for Automatically Expanded Lists	A new System Property `Expand Lists Automatically` controls the system default as to how List / Detail views are presented when opened by a user. This can be overridden via the User Preference `Expand Lists Automatically`.
B-16918	User Preference to Control LH navigation Auto Collapse	A new System Property `Navigation Auto Collapse` controls the system default for automatically collapsing the LH Navigation Menu Tree. This can be overridden via the User Preference `Navigation Auto Collapse`.
B-16029	Order Run Criteria and z/OS Step Action Task Selection by Name	Both the query for listing tasks in a workflow for Run Criteria, and the query for listing z/OS tasks in a workflow for Step Actions, have been changed to order by task name.
B-16775	System Property to Control Default for "Resolve UAC Variables" in Scripts	A new System Property `Script Resolve Variables` controls the default value of the `Resolve UAC Variables` check box when creating new Script definitions.
B-08438	Allow for Automatic Output Retrieval for Remote File Monitors	Remote File Monitors now support the `Automatic Output Retrieval` option.
B-17131	Calendar Preview to Show Calendar Days of Previous Months.	A new System Property Calendar Preview Past Period In Months controls number of months (going backwards) to show all Custom Days defined for a calendar in a Calendar Preview.

Web Services API

Backlog

Title

Description

B-16767

Composite Trigger List Component Events

New Web Service API provides same information as the List Component Events for Active Composite Triggers.

B-16961
B-17022

Forecast: Workflow Forecast... command through Web Service API

New Web Service API to get the forecast details for a workflow. This API closely matches with the current UI command and exposes all these options as query parameters.

B-16013

Web Service API : User Impersonation

This feature allows the use of a fixed service account that can pass the user's login name as a parameter to retrieve / update information in UC on behalf of that user.

Users with the ops_admin role, the ops_user_admin role, or the ops_user_impersonate role are able to specify an X-Impersonate-User HTTP header, in additional to their authentication header/parameter, when invoking Universal Controller web service APIs.

While users with the ops_admin role can impersonate any user, users with only the ops_user_admin role or the ops_user_impersonate role, must explicitly declare which users can be impersonated.

The user form has a new section titled User Impersonation where you can specify Allowed Impersonation Users.

Workload Analytics

Backlog	Title	Description
B-05459	View/Edit Actions associated with an instance directly from an Actions tab on the task instance form	Task Instance records now show the defined Actions from the Task Definition in a new “Actions” Tab.
B-08571	Display exit code in workflow monitor when hovering on task	The Task’s exit code has been added to the Status displayed when you hover over a Task Instance in the Workflow Monitor. In the following example the Task Instance has a Status = SUCCESS with an Exit Code = 0.
B-16872 B-17075 B-17076 B-17077	Workload Simulation	Users may have a new workflow, or a migrated workflow, for which they wish to validate the execution in the Universal Controller without actually having to execute the underlying operation of each task instance. To facilitate this, a new framework for simulating a workflow, or alternatively, simulating a specific set of tasks within a workflow has been introduced. In order to designate a task for simulation, you enable the Simulate option from any task form. If enabled at the workflow-level, all tasks within the workflow will inherit the option and run in simulation mode. By default, when an instance is running in simulate mode: The instance will complete with a status of Success. The instance will complete with an exit code of 0 (or 200 for the Web Service task). The instances Status, Late Start, Late Finish, and Early Finish events are not published to running task monitor instances. The instances Actions are not executed. A simulated instance will transition through the same Status changes as a non-simulated instance, and honor virtual resource limits, mutually exclusive constraints, execution limits, etc. Furthermore, authorization constraints, such as permission to execute on a particular agent, or execute using particular credentials, are also validated in simulation mode. It may be necessary to customize aspects of an instance running in simulation mode, for example. Change the end status from Success to Failed. Change the exit code. Add a simulation output template. Add simulation variables that would normally be populated when an instance completes, such as `ops_trigger_*` variables populated by a completed monitor instance. Enable publishing of Status, Late Start, Late Finish, and Early Finish events. Enable execution of Actions by action type.
B-06436 B-16938 B-16939 B-16940	Workflow Instance Gantt Chart View	Workflow Task Instances can now be viewed as a Timeline. The View Timeline… menu item will be available from the Workflow task instance menu in the Workflow Monitor and View Blocking Ancestors graphs.
B-11390 B-16961	Forecast: Evaluation of variable run/skip criteria.	The Forecast feature will now attempt variable resolution for Run / Skip criteria. The enhancement will introduce two new possible designations for the assigned Run/Skip Evaluation. Run* The forecasted task is tentatively scheduled to run based on the variable data available at the time of the forecast but is subject to change at run time. Skip* The forecasted task is tentatively scheduled to skip based on the variable data available at the time of the forecast but is subject to change at run time. If a parent workflow is evaluated as tentatively skip (Skip) then no further evaluation is performed and its children are marked as tentatively skipped. If a parent workflow is evaluated as tentatively run (Run) then its children are further evaluated. You should assume that if the parent is marked tentatively run that this applies to its children. However, additional evaluation is performed to provide visibility as to whether the children, if they have Run/Skip criteria, would be run or skipped (tentatively or not). The `Not Evaluated` designation can still be assigned when an unresolved variable is detected during the evaluation of variable-based run/skip criteria. Additionally, in the user interface, the Run/Skip Evaluation will now appear with colored styling for improved readability. This applies to the trigger Forecast List, the workflow Forecast List, and the workflow Forecast Graph.

Workload Automation

Backlog	Title	Description
B-06973	Allow variables in the Database Connection Definition	The Database Connection definition now supports variables in the Connection URL field.
B-03168	Task Monitor support for Late / Early Tasks	The Task Monitor task has been enhanced to allow monitoring of Early / Late Tasks.

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