Howdy out there in automation land!!! Hopefully you are spending some time with family and friends and recharging your batteries this time of year. With some down time what better way to spend it than reading and enjoying the automation blog! Also a great time to upgrade that 3.X CPO development environment to the latest in 3.5. I am giving you a DOUBLE video blog today! So having said that I think this could be an appropriate movie poster... especially since I have always been a huge Van Damme fan:
So what kind of cool things can we see in 3.5?? Here is a quick list for you to mill over:
GIT Integration for your Automation Packs. This allows you to export/import/manage your automation packs with any kind of GIT. Internally I use a version of Git Lab but have tested with Git Hub as well. Makes your content authoring and deployment very easy.
You have to...
1. Install GIT to all your CPO App Servers -> https://git-scm.com/download/win
2. Create a GIT target
3. Export/Import via the Automation Packs area
It's that easy!
JSON Based Activities -- Great for web activity!
Personally I love these for working with all the REST APIs I do. I used to lean more on XML but honestly, now, I push for JSON whenever I can. These give you the awesome ability to pull data seamlessly from those JSON messages. For external testing and learning JSON path, I love http://jsonpath.com/ . While I do not overly cover json path here, you can also learn it at http://goessner.net/articles/JsonPath/index.html#e2
Variable Types - Give your CPO an Object Oriented kick!
If you ever wanted to write OO in CPO, now is the chance!! It is easier than using target types but similar in nature... watch the VODs to learn more.
So in short, watch these videos... learn about CPO 3.5 and upgrade!!!
The first VOD is on GIT integration only.
The second VOD is on Variable Types and JSON activities.
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Play recording (21 min 17 sec) |
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Recording password: cY5YPpjv |
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Play recording (23 min 14 sec) |
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Recording password: kNsiEHf3 |
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Standard End-O-Blog Disclaimer:
Thanks as always to all my wonderful readers and those who continue to stick with and use CPO. Big things are on the horizon and I hope that you will continue to use CPO and find great uses for it! If you have a really exciting automation story, please email me it! (see below) I would love to compile some stories and feature customers or individual stories in an upcoming blog!!!
AUTOMATION BLOG DISCLAIMER: As always, this is a blog and my (Shaun Roberts) thoughts on CPO and automation, my thoughts on best practices, and my experiences with the product and customers. The above views are in no way representative of Cisco or any of it's partners, etc. None of these views, etc are supported and this is not a place to find standard product support. If you need standard product support please do so via the current call in numbers on Cisco.com or email tac@cisco.com
Thanks and Happy Automating!!!
--Shaun Roberts
