MaximoDev Blog

Load failure codes in Maximo with MxLoader

Tue, 07 Apr 2026 00:00:00 +0000

MxLoader 6.2 was the last version with a built-in support for failure codes data loading. Unfortunately this version does not support REST APIs. This post describes how to load failure codes using MxLoader 8.5 with the latest versions of Maximo (including MAS Manage) that only support REST protocol.

I will use the following small failure class hierarchy C1 as an example.

CL1 - Failure Class 1
- P1 - Problem 1
  - C1 - Cause 1
    - R1 - Remedy 1
- P2 - Problem 2

Force table refresh from automation script

Fri, 27 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0000

The most common technique to force a reload of an MboSet (and thus refresh a table on the UI) is to call the MboSet().reset() method.

context = UIContext.getCurrentContext()
wcs = context.getWebClientSession()
wcs.getDataBean(“assetmove_t”).refreshTable()

In some cases you don’t need to reload the MboSet or you just cannot do it because you haven’t yet saved the MboSet. In such cases you have to work at UI level using the DataBean.refreshTable() method. This will force a reload of the data in the UI from the underlying MboSet in memory.

Conditional expression variables

Wed, 25 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Maximo conditional expressions use an SQL-like syntax allowing to replace the value of a specific attribute using the “:” notation.

For example, you can have an expression like this:

exists (select 1 from workorder where wonum=:wonum)

At run time, the second wonum is replaced with the value of the wonum attribute for the current record.

The value of an attribute of a related object can also be referenced using the following natation.

IBM Maximo 7.5 manuals in PDF format

Sat, 28 Feb 2026 00:00:00 +0000

We all know that Maximo has moved to OpenShift platform and is evolving to a more web-based documentation system but sometimes I feel a little bit old and I prefer to study in the “old way”.

In this page I’m sharing to old IBM Maximo 7.5 documentation in PDF format. I know it’s quite old but 99% of the information is still valid in MAS Manage application.

Installation

Installation Guide (IBM WebSphere)

Save disk space in doclinks folder resizing images

Sat, 28 Feb 2026 00:00:00 +0000

If you are collecting a lot of photos with service requests or workorder you may start wasting a lot of disk space in the DOCLINCS folder.

Here is a small script I have developed for one of our clients to resize JPEG files in the doclinks folder using ImageMagick open-source software.

Download the application from the ImageMagick website. I have downloaded the Windows x64 portable version ImageMagick-7.1.2-15-portable-Q16-x64.7z file. Extract the archive on one of the application servers.

MIF vs OSLC vs REST vs JSON APIs

Wed, 18 Feb 2026 00:00:00 +0000

I’m copying here a very insightful explanation by Steven Shull on MoreMaximo forum about of the different types of REST APIs available in Maximo. It is (as always) really well written and worth posting here as well.

MIF is the abbreviation for the Maximo Integration Framework. All the integration possibilities (flat file, table, SOAP, REST, etc.) and the components (external systems, enterprise services, publish channels, etc.) fall under this umbrella.

If you have existing integrations, you may need to make some minor adjustments like switching to API key for authentication instead of basic authentication for SOAP/REST. And you should test for behavioral changes between the versions. But most of your existing integrations should continue to work as written and I wouldn’t recommend changing without additional reasons.

Maximo Query Manager application

Wed, 11 Feb 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Maximo allows to create predefined queries in applications that can be used to filter records based on specific criteria and reuse them in Start Centers. However, there are some limitations in the capability and manageability of these queries. In this post I will describe how to create a Query Manager application to centrally manage application queries.

Application

Open Application Designer application and create the following app:

Application: CX_QUERY
Description: Query Manager

Binary and text files handling in MxLoader 8.5

Mon, 05 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0000

MxLoader 8.5 has some improvements regarding the capability to upload and download files from Maximo. REST and OS services behavior is now aligned and upload/download is fully supported.

MxLoader provides two special tags to manage files:

FileTxt - to be used to upload/download text content (long descriptions, automation scripts, report design, etc.)
FileEnc - to be used to upload/download text content (item image, attachments/doclinks)

Downloading files

To download files you must specify the FileTxt/FileEnc tag in the header. MxLoader will recognize that you want to save the data in separate files instead of using the Excel sheet to store the data.

Exception handling in automation scripts

Fri, 07 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Writing automation scripts in Maximo is easy and almost every Maximo specialist has some ort of skills to develop customizations using Python/Jython scripts. Every error in your code will be handled by Maximo and displayed to end user as an error message. However, in some cases you need to handle exceptions in order to explicitly manage errors.

Lets consider this little piece snippet of code

woSet = mbo.getMboSet("ALLWO")
wo = woSet.getMbo(0)
wonum = wo.getString("WONUM")
woSet.close()

The mbo here refers to an ASSET and the ALLWO relationship is used to get the woSet MboSet with all work orders related to the asset. The script then fetches the WONUM of the first record in the MboSet.

String index out of range error when reloading Logging settings

Mon, 03 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Today I clicked the Apply Settings action from Logging application and I have received the following error: BMXAA5189E - Failed to load logging settings from the database. String index out of range: 0

After a long search I have discovered that it is caused by a misconfiguration of the logging appenders. click Manage Appenders action from the menu and ensure all appenders have the “.log” extension in the File Name. After fixing this you will be able to reload logging configuration.

Maximo script library

Sun, 02 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Maximo automation scripts became more and more powerful during the last years so we heavy rely on these capabilities to extend Maximo features and fulfill customer needs. When the amount of script code grows, it’s easy to end up into some sort of spaghetti code so you need a practical way split the code into reusable pieces. Modular programming and structured programming was adopted in software development since the late 1960s so we MUST definitely embed this technique in our developer’s toolset.

Implement complex workflow logic using Condition Launch Points script

Sat, 20 Sep 2025 00:00:00 +0000

The Maximo condition node allows to specify an condition in SQL format in order to drive the workflow in different ways depending on some custom logic.

In some cases the logic that has to be implemented can be quite complex and not easy to implement using SQL syntax. In this case we can use an Automation Script with Custom Condition Launch Point.

In the example we will look into the work orders tasks for a specific description - I know it’s a silly example :-)

Avoid editing of a child table

Tue, 16 Sep 2025 00:00:00 +0000

In some cases you need to prevent the editing of a child table (add/change/delete) in a Maximo application. For example, you want to prevent adding or changing records in the “Multiple Assets,Locations and CIs” table of the Work Order Tracking application when a work order is in status INPRG.

The probem can be easily solved with an automation script on the Initialize event of the WORKORDER object that checks the status to the record and uses the MboSet.setFlag() method to mark the child MboSet as READONLY.

Adding Advanced Search menu to a Single Page app

Sat, 13 Sep 2025 00:00:00 +0000

The Maximo Single Page applications are simplified and provide a quicker way of visualizing and editing data. The Labor Reporting application is a good example of such kind of application.

However, you may notice that custom Single Page applications do not provide the Advanced Search feature like the Labor Reporting app.

To add the Advanced Search menu to a Single Page application to just need to perform three steps:

Ensure that the SEARCHMORE sigoption is defined

Speedup Maximo scripts development with VSCode plugins

Sun, 17 Nov 2024 00:00:00 +0000

When developing automation scripts I always like to have a shared filesystem with all the latest automation scripts. This allows me to use code editors or to better navigate across the entire code and eventually use source code versioning tools like Git or CVS.

One technique I usually use is to use Notepad++ and edit the script locally and then copy-paste the code into Maximo. Sometimes this is really annoying and time consuming so a searched for a better approach.

Display custom icons in application's list view

Sat, 16 Nov 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Last week, a client asked if it was possible to display a warning icon on asset records based on certain business rules. Initially, this request posed a challenge, but I was able to find a solution to implement it effectively.

The technique is based on a non persistent attribute populated an automation script that evaluates the business rules. The piece of the trick is to add the non persistent attribute in an icon control in the list view of the Assets application. Lets see all the steps.

How to get application name in automation scripts

Sat, 16 Nov 2024 00:00:00 +0000

IBM claims the you can use the implicit variable ‘app’ in automation scripts if you need to know the name of the Maximo application that is currently running. Unfortunately, this technique works only on the main object on which the application is defined.

As an example, try to define the following automation script on the “before save” event of the SPAREPART object

if app == 'ASSET':
  service.error("cx", appname, [])

If you open the Assets application and try to update records in the Spare Parts table, you will see that you the error message will not be triggered because the ‘app’ variable will be empty. This is because the main object of the Assets application is ASSET and not SPAREPART.

Long-running Cron Tasks and Admin Mode

Sat, 12 Oct 2024 00:00:00 +0000

There are many blog posts in the Maximo technical community describing how to develop an automation script and schedule execution using a cron task (link1, link2).

However, a custom cron task may run for a long period of time and this may block the system when trying to enable administrative mode. In this case you will see a long list of BMXAA9680I Crontask is running messaged in the “Turn Admin Mode ON” dialog.

Setup password expiration in Maximo

Tue, 19 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

I was recently struggling understanding how enable password expiration in Maximo when using native authentication.

This IBM TechNote explains very well how the standard Maximo expiration configuration works but there is a very tricky sentence: In the case of a user belonging to any groups not containing a password expiration, the user’s password will never expire.

So i decided to run this query to check the password expiration setting for all the security groups.

Improved record change tracking using Audit feature

Sun, 10 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

In a previous post, I demonstrated how the Maximo audit tracking can be used to display the updates made on a record enabling the audit and adding a “history” tab in the application. This technique is quite common but has a major drawback; it displays all the audited field in a row even if only one attribute was changed. When there are many audited fields it is very hard for the user understanding what was changed.

How to create follow-up Work Order with script

Wed, 06 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Maximo provides a useful action in many applications to create a follow-up work order or a linked service request from many applications.

The same result can easily be automated using the WO.createWorkorder() or the Ticket.createWorkorder() API methods.

The standard WO2WO or TICKET2WO crossover domains can also be used to copy some attributes from the source object to the new one.

However, sometimes you need more control to automate the initialization of the new record. In this cases you may use more powerful versions of the createWorkorder() method.

System as-built documentation with MxLoader

Sat, 28 Oct 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Many large clients require to deliver an as-built document as part of the deliverables to be produced before the go-live. This is typically a Word document where all the Maximo configurations must be listed and described. I think this document has little real value for several reasons:

It costs a lot of time and effort to be built
It is a manual activity based on a lot copy-paste operations and so it is subject to user error

Maximo data archiving solutions

Thu, 09 Feb 2023 00:00:00 +0000

If you are using IBM Maximo from many years, you may start experiencing performance degradation navigating the user interface, searching for data or performing some transactions like changing the status of a record or routing the workflow.

This is often caused by the accumulation of historical records in the Maximo database. There are some system tables in Maximo that never stop growing like WFASSIGNMENT, CRONTASKHISTORY or LOGINTRACKING. Other tables store business data but may not be relevant to the business. Why do you have to keep the history of statuses of work orders that were closed 5 years ago?

Handling workflow from automation script

Wed, 25 Jan 2023 00:00:00 +0000

If you need to handle workflows (start, stop, route, etc.) from an automation script you can use the following two Maximo API classes: WorkFlowService and WFInstance. Here are few examples.

The WorkFlowService.initiateWorkflow metod can be used to start a workflow:

from psdi.server import MXServer
# get the workflow service
wfSrv = MXServer.getMXServer().lookup('WORKFLOW')
# start the workflow
wfSrv.initiateWorkflow("MYWF", mbo)

To stop an active workflow you can use WFInstance.stopWorkflow method:

from psdi.server import MXServer
# get the workflow service
wfSrv = MXServer.getMXServer().lookup('WORKFLOW')
# get active instances for the current mbo
wfSet = wfSrv.getActiveInstances(mbo)
# stop the first workflow instance
wfSet.getMbo(0).stopWorkflow("Stopped")

To route a workflow I have used the WorkFlowService.completeAssignment method. Here it is a little more complex since we first have to get the right WFAssignment record to the current Mbo and user.

The perfect MAXADMIN start center

Mon, 23 Jan 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Being efficient in our job should be always a top priority. As Maximo administrators and developers, we are logged many hours on the web interface and navigating around the UI. A properly configured MAXADMIN’s start center is one of the important things to set up. Here is a typical start center of one of my clients.

Favorite applications

The left side of the start center is dedicated to a set of links to the most commonly used administrative applications. The list is quite flexible depending on what applications you are actually using a lot.

Accessing UI methods from automation scripts

Mon, 19 Dec 2022 00:00:00 +0000

In Maximo 7.6.1.1 IBM has greatly improved the service implicit variable to provide a lot of useful methods to interact with the user interface. Two good examples are:

service.openURL(String url, boolean newWindow)service.launchDialog(String dialogId)

For a full reference of the service methods refer to this page.

There is very important method that can be used to get a reference to the current user session:

wcs = service.webclientsession()

This will return a reference to a WebClientSession object. Explore the JavaDocs to find out what can be done.

Useful queries for users monitoring

Mon, 19 Dec 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Today aI want to share two simple but useful queries to be created in the Users application.

The following where clause will list all active user sessions excluding system:

SELECT * from maxuser WHERE 
userid in (select userid from maxsession where active=1 and issystem!=1)

I always add a result set on MAXADMIN start center with this query to see how many users are logged on the production environment or how many developers and testers are connected to a development server.

Scripting Best Practices for Performance

Sun, 30 Oct 2022 00:00:00 +0000

This post is a copy of a PDF file published by IBM. I’m republishing it here to make it more accessible.

Scripting allows users to extend maximo business logic using Python/JS or for that matter any other JSR 223 compliant scripting language. All the script code gets compiled to Java bytecode and are cached as part of Maximo runtime caches. So when the script is invoked – it’s the cached bytecode that is executed by the JVM using the JSR 223 bridge. Since the scripting code executes in the same thread as other Maximo business logic (written in Java), a poorly written script code can impact the performance of the system negatively. We have listed below a few common mistakes that we have seen. In general, we need to follow the Maximo performance guidelines as scripting in the end is equivalent to Maximo custom code.

Set long description from automation script

Mon, 24 Oct 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Today I have discovered a strange behavior when setting long descriptions from an automation script.

You know that almost every DESCRIPTION field in Maximo has a corresponding “Long Description” field that is a CLOB attribute that can hold big amounts of text. This is driven by the “Long Description Owner” checkbox in Database Configuration.

When this flag is selected, a non-persistent attribute named DESCRIPTION_LONGDESCRIPTION is created and can be get/set as any other attribute.

Budget Monitoring with Maximo

Mon, 10 Oct 2022 00:00:00 +0000

The Budget Monitoring application was introduced in May 2007 as part of the IBM Maximo 7.6.0.8 feature pack but its potential was largely underestimated by the user community. The application may seem complex and may be daunting at first, but in reality it is quite simple to configure for basic use, allowing later to extend its use to implement a more mature maintenance cost management process.
In this post we will explain how it is possible, in a few simple steps, to create a budget and start monitoring costs related to maintenance by aggregating them by expense items.

MxLoader file is untrusted

Wed, 21 Sep 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Microsoft has recently added a security feature to protect unsafe content downloaded from the web to execute malicious code. If you have recently downloaded MxLoader from my web site you may have seen the error: Microsoft has blocked macros from running because the source of this file is untrusted

To unblock MxLoader you must right-click on the file and select Properties.

Then you have to select the Unblock checkbox and click OK.

Display custom message from automation script

Wed, 29 Jun 2022 00:00:00 +0000

There is a well known technique to display a custom error message from an automation script. It requires to create the custom message in the Messages dialog of Database Configuration application and then to trigger the display of it throwing an exception by setting errorgroup/errorkey or using the service.error method. This technique is well described in several blog post so I’m not going to repeat it: Maximo Scripting, My Geek Daddy.

Having defined a message mxdev.msgid, it just requires one line of code to display it from an automation script.

MxLoader wizard

Fri, 21 Jan 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Do you know there is a wizard into MxLoader? You can invoke him clicking on the MxSheet Wizard button on the toolbar.

Joking apart, the MxSheet Wizard button can help you in creating your own MxLoader sheet choosing an available Object Structure and picking up all the attributes that you want to manage. This is actually based on an idea of John Green from Peacock Engineering who shown me their own improved version MxLoader with a built-in designer.

SQL skills

Fri, 21 Jan 2022 00:00:00 +0000

One of the first thing I always say to the new hires that are going to learn Maximo is how much important is to have a good knowledge of SQL language. It is really important to build application queries, Birt reports, database relationships, complex table domains, conditional expressions and many other Maximo configurations.

The important thing to understand is that SQL is more declarative than procedural like C or Java so it may require a mind shift for common developers. It is hard to explain in a short post like how to develop a good SQL query but well written SQL code can solve many Maximo performances issues.

Script to check if current user is in a Security Group

Sat, 04 Dec 2021 00:00:00 +0000

A typical business case is to prevent editing of some specific fields to a set of organizational roles in Maximo. This is typically achieved by implementing attribute data restriction or conditional UI.

However, if you need more control over what field should be readonly and when, you can use an automation script on the INIT event of the object and implement the business rules in the code.

In the following script you will find the userInGroup function that can be reused whenever needed.

Maximo bulk update from List view

Sun, 31 Oct 2021 00:00:00 +0000

In some cases Maximo allows to perform bulk updates using actions on the List View. For example, you can set the timezone of multiple assets by selecting the Associate Time Zone on the List View of the Assets application and then a dialog will appear to perform a massive update on all the selected records.

In many cases we need to provide the same feature for some other fields. In this post I will demonstrate how to implement a bulk update feature to set the value of an attribute for a set of selected records in any Maximo application. The implementation is based on the technique described in this post and uses:

Adjust field size in application

Sun, 24 Oct 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Maximo sometimes does not display all the characters in a field, because the text box is too small. Of course, you can solve this. First you need to understand how Maximo determines the display size of the text box. Then you can change these setting and control how large the text box should be.

Setting default field size globally

Maximo stores the default field sizes in the file SMPDIR/maximo/applications/maximo/properties/field-size-config.xml

The default configuration for ALN fields is the following.

It's now time to upgrade to MxLoader 8

Sun, 10 Oct 2021 00:00:00 +0000

I’m happy to announce that I have just released version 8.2 of MxLoader. It includes few small bug fixes and few important features. If you haven’t already upgraded to MxLoader it’s time to do it!

Time Zones

You may not be aware that while most time zones differ from Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) by a number of full hours, there are also a few time zones with both 30-minute and 45-minute offsets.

Using API authentication with MxLoader

Sat, 09 Oct 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Here is a quick guide about how to use API authentication with MxLoader.

Generate API Key

Follow these steps to generate an API Key for your user.

Login to Maximo with administrative account.
Go to Administration > Work Center > Integration.
Click on the API Keys and click on the Add API Keys button
Search for user for which API Key needs to be generated and click on the Add button.
This will generate API Key for the user and the key will be visible on the work center. Now this API Key can be used withMxLoader.

More details are available here.

How to improve View Workflow History dialog

Sat, 02 Oct 2021 00:00:00 +0000

One of the frequent complaints from Maximo clients is the scarce user-friendliness of the View Workflow History dialog.

Here is the same dialog after few changes. Clutter information is removed and is now clear the sequence of actions taken by the user.

Before you start you have to open the Application Designer and click on Export System XML action. Then export your LIBRARY.xml file and create a backup copy of it. Search for id=“historywf” to find the definition of the View Workflow History dialog and make the following changes.

MxLoader registration Q&A

Sat, 04 Sep 2021 00:00:00 +0000

MxLoader 8.4 no longer requires registration. You can download the latest version or the updater tool from this page.

DBC XML Format Reference

Tue, 17 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

The DBC XML Format Technical Reference document disappeared from IBM website.

You can download the document from this link.

Thanks to Biplab Das Choudhury and Cezar Tipa.

MxLoader Webinar Q&A

Fri, 02 Jul 2021 00:00:00 +0000

In this post I’m collecting the answer to the questions that we have received during the webinar of 18th of June 2021 about the release of MxLoader 8.1.

Data Validation

Validation process is important before upload. because many clients were asked us physical validation report before process data in Maximo. Do we have any such report using MXLoader?

Unfortunately MxLoader cannot perform validation before processing the data.

Both OS and REST services does not have a “preview mode”. Data validation on the server is performed only while synching objects.

Setting multiple fields as readonly with script

Tue, 27 Apr 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Sometimes you may need to allow some users to update only few fields. This may be hard to achieve using conditional UI and conditional expressions.

In the following snippet I’m setting all fields as readonly except DESCRIPTION and STATUS if the current user is in MANSUP security group. Attach the script to the Initialize event of the object you want to control.

from psdi.mbo import MboConstants
from psdi.server import MXServer

# check if the current user is in MANSUP security group
currentuser = mbo.getUserInfo().getUserName()
groupuserSet= MXServer.getMXServer().getMboSet('GROUPUSER', mbo.getUserInfo())
groupuserSet.setWhere("groupname in ('MANSUP') and userid='" + currentuser + "'")

if not groupuserSet.isEmpty():
    mbo.setFieldFlag(["DESCRIPTION", "STATUS"], False, MboConstants.READONLY, True)

The powerful trick here is to use the method Mbo.setFieldFlag(names, inclusive, flag, state)

Strict validation of attachment types

Mon, 26 Apr 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Few days ago, Vincenzo Luzzi, a fellow Maximo senior consultant working with me in Omninecs, forwarded this secret tip to me. I haven’t tested it but think I could be useful for the community.

You know you can control what types of attachments can be uploaded to Maximo using the system property mxe.doclink.doctypes.allowedFileExtensions.

However Maximo just checks the file extension and is not performing any additional check to ensure other types of files are uploaded to its repository. Starting from Maximo 7.6.0.6 you can implement a more strict file type scanning when you upload an attached document.

Highlight table rows conditionally

Sun, 25 Apr 2021 00:00:00 +0000

You may not know but there is an easy trick to conditionally set the color of Maximo table rows based on a condition.

In this tutorial I will show you how to highlight high priority work orders in Work Order Tracking application.

Identify the field

First of all you need to identify the field on which the rule will be based on. In our example, the rule will be based on WORKORDER.WOPRIORITY field.

Custom REST service with Automation Script

Sun, 18 Apr 2021 00:00:00 +0000

The REST APIs have a tight integration with the automation scripts. Automation scripts can be used to develop custom APIs. The following example call describes how automation scripts interact with REST APIs. You can also use automation scripts for implementing custom queries and custom actions.

JavaScript language is always the preferred choice for integration scripts since it provides native functions to manage JSON objects.

To find the total number of work that is in progress and service requests in a given site, you need to create an API since there is no out-of-the-box API for this task. Create the following Automation Script:

Querying data with MxLoader using REST service

Sun, 18 Apr 2021 00:00:00 +0000

MxLoader 7.1 and above supports the new Maximo JSON APIs that are available from Maximo 7.6.0.2. The REST APIs are based on the OSLC protocol so there are some changes you have to consider. The most important difference between OS and REST service is the format of the where clause that can be set in cell D1 of MxLoader sheets.

While OS server accepts SQL syntax, the REST service follows the OSLC specifications. In this post I will describe the most important concept to write OSLC where clauses.

JavaDocs for Maximo 7.6

Sun, 28 Mar 2021 00:00:00 +0000

For whatever reason IBM recently decided to remove the online version of Maximo JavaDocs from their website. At the moment they are only available as zip files for Maximo 7.6 and Maximo 7.6.1.2.

I think this is not really useful because it is really hard to search what you are looking for so I have just published the JavaDocs on my website so they can easily be searched with Google.

Maximo 7.6 JavaDocs

Send Communication Template from script

Sun, 28 Mar 2021 00:00:00 +0000

This is a quite old topic that has been already addressed in many Maximo communities and blogs around. However, I have found none of them seems to handle it correctly.

There are mainly several techniques of sending an email from an automation script. I will explain the limitations of the current solutions and propose a best practice.

If you just want to se the final solution jump here.

Using Java APIs - worst solution

You know you can use any Java API in your Maximo automation scrips so the first solution is to use the javax.mail package to send email.

Maximo List Archive

Sun, 31 Jan 2021 00:00:00 +0000

In the old days there was no blog on the internet and there was no IBM community to discuss Maximo technical and functional topics. All these LinkedIn communities and webinars were not available to learn and share.

Few heroes were trying to learn from each other on a closed and moderated Yahoo forum. Yahoo decided to shutdown their Groups social platform in 2020 so all the content is not available anymore. Luckily enough, the community owner Christopher Wanko sent me a backup of the community content asking me to make it publicly available.

Uploading and downloading files with MxLoader

Thu, 03 Dec 2020 00:00:00 +0000

One of the new features of MxLoader 7.2 (NextGen) is the capability to upload and download files from Maximo.

Any text field can be exported to a file by simply prepending the attribute name with FileTxt: prefix. In this example, all the long descriptions of assets will be exported to text files under the Assets subfolder.

In a similar way, it is possible to upload large text from a file with a similar syntax. Note that in this case you don’t need the FileTxt: prefix in the header.

Why I hate automation script variables binding

Sun, 27 Sep 2020 00:00:00 +0000

There are two approaches when dealing with Maximo automation scripts input and output variables.

Using launch point variables - This method is described in the product’s knowledge center and allows to get/set values from/to the database specifying how to bind the script variables to specific database fields.
Using getter/setter methods - This approach uses Maximo MBO application layer (businessobjects) methods to get and set values. These methods are described in my Maximo Automation Scripts Quick Reference document.

Launch point variables are also called ‘bound variables’ here is how they look like.

How to resend failed emails

Thu, 24 Sep 2020 00:00:00 +0000

Some Maximo implementations massively rely on email communications to notify users about important events like new tickets or assigned tasks. Sometimes outbound emails are also used to implement integration or notify external parties about relevant events. In such environments, it is important to avoid that a planner or unplanned email server downtime results in a bunch of emails not being sent.

Maximo relies on Communication Templates to send emails. There is an important field in the Communication Templates application called Track Failed Messages. This flag allows to specify if failed email messages should be logged in the COMMLOG table.

Automatically calculate Job Plan duration from Tasks

Mon, 17 Aug 2020 00:00:00 +0000

A small customization I have been recently asked for is to automatically calculate Job Plan duration from Tasks.

This can be easily achieved with an automation script on the JOBTASK object.

Open the Automation Scripts application and create the following Script with Object Launch Point

Launch Point: MXDJPDURATION - Automatically calculates Job Plan Duration from Tasks
Event: Save Add,Insert,Delete - Before Save
Script: MXDJPDURATION - Automatically calculates Job Plan Duration from Tasks
Language: Python

Script

MxLoader NextGen Beta available now!

Tue, 09 Jun 2020 00:00:00 +0000

MxLoader NextGen Beta is now over and starting from MxLoader 7.1 all the NextGen features are now available in the official version.

Refer to MxLoader main web page for download.

MxLoader NextGen advantages are:

Support for Maximo NextGen REST APIs
Improved performance
File download/upload capabilities
Detailed results dialog
Individual response codes for bulk updates

There are some important changes due to the new APIs:

Supports Maximo releases starting with version 7.6.0.2
The connection url is no longer http:// $MXSERVER$ /meaweb/os/ but http:// $MXSERVER$ /
Available actions are now: Query, AddChange, Delete
The where clause syntax for Query action is no longer SQL. Refer to official documentation.
For AddChange and Delete actions, each synced object will report the result in a reserved column $RESULT$
Child objects can now be accessed through database relationship without customizing integration Object Structures
MxLoader is still free but requires a registration key to unlock all the features

The importance of 'sameas' in Database Configuration

Mon, 20 Apr 2020 00:00:00 +0000

An often misused feature of Maximo Database Configuration is the ‘Same as Object’ and ‘Same as Attribute’ fields when defining custom database attributes.

To understand how this works lets consider the ASSET.LOCATION attribute. As you can see from the screenshot below, the LOCATION column of the ASSET table is defined ‘same as’ LOCATIONS.LOCATION’ field.

The direct effect of this is that if you change the size of the LOCATIONS.LOCATION field it will affect all the ‘sameas’ fields defined in other tables.

How to set NULL values with MxLoader

Sun, 19 Apr 2020 00:00:00 +0000

A frequent question from people using MxLoader is how to clear the value of a field.

For example, if asset 11230 has the serial number field set to a certain value and we want to blank it out, the following MxLoader sheet will not do the job.

This is because MxLoader skips all the blank cells and does not pass the blank value to Maximo.

To achieve what we want, we can enter ~~NULL~~ to actually clear the value of the SERIALNUM field.

Attribute validation not triggered immediately

Sat, 18 Apr 2020 00:00:00 +0000

Have you ever experienced a delay when entering data on a field and validation is triggered after several seconds?

The asyncronous data validation has been introduced in Maximo 7.5 to improve responsiveness of the user interface. However there are some situations where this is really annoying. For example, if you have developed your own scripts triggered by Validation or Run Action launch points, you want your script to be executed immediately just after the user entered data.

Route Workflow error in cloned applications

Mon, 13 Apr 2020 00:00:00 +0000

Maximo Everyplace is the quick way-to-go to provide access to mobile devices for IBM Maximo. It is basically a slightly changed look and feel of the standard web interface with a dedicated start center that is automatically displayed when logging from a mobile web browser. Obviously it works only in online mode but is straightforward to configure and supports Maximo workflow.

When using workflows with Maximo Everyplace you may encounter some errors like these:

Reset all meter readings

Wed, 01 Apr 2020 00:00:00 +0000

On a development/test environment today I had to reset all meter readings. Maximo is storing the last readings in a set of fields of the ASSETMETER table and the reading history in the METERREADING table.

Here are the SQL statements I have used.

delete from meterreading;

update assetmeter
set lastreading=0, lastreadingdate=null,
sincelastrepair=0, sincelastoverhaul=0, sincelastinspect=0,
sinceinstall=0, lifetodate=0, average=0,
lastreadinginspctr=null;

Modify Asset's condition code from Work Order

Sat, 14 Mar 2020 00:00:00 +0000

Condition codes are used in Maximo to define various physical states of a particular item. Once the condition code of an asset is set, it becomes readonly and can only be modified using the Move/Modify Asset menu option found in the Select Action menu of the Assets application (link).

In some cases it makes sense to allow the technician to update the asset’s condition after a repair or inspection. In this post I will demonstrate how to allow to edit the condition code of the asset from the Work Order Tracking application.

Loading Item Assembly Structures (IAS) with MxLoader

Mon, 20 Jan 2020 00:00:00 +0000

I have just releases version 6.2 of MxLoader that contains a brand new template for loading Loading Item Assembly Structures (IAS) into Maximo. An item assembly structure is a list of spare parts and subassemblies required to build an Asset or to define the requirements of a location.

Starting from this IBM technote I have created the MXL_ITEMAS object structure including ITEM and ITEMSTRUCT tables. To create the MXL_ITEMAS object structure just click on Create Custom Object Structures in MxLoader ribbon.

Ensure Asset's serial number uniqueness

Thu, 09 Jan 2020 00:00:00 +0000

Sometimes you need to ensure the uniqueness of a certain database column in the Maximo database. A common example of this scenario is to ensure that asset’s serial numbers are not duplicated. This can prevent the creation of duplicate assets.

In this post I describe two techniques to achieve this using a unique database index or an automation script.

Unique Index

The simplest and most reliable way of achieving this is to define a unique database index on the SERIALNUM field of the ASSET table. However, we must make some considerations first. The asset serial is not unique alone for two reasons:

Send Work Order Calendar invitations

Fri, 03 Jan 2020 00:00:00 +0000

Sometimes a full-fledged mobile solution for Maximo is needed to really mobilize your workforce. Some others a simpler solution can help without the need of additional infrastructure or costs.

In this article I will show how to send calendar invitations to workers with work order details and reminders for the activities. The calendar event can have a link to Maximo in order to report progress or close the work order using the standard Everyplace or Work Centers interface.

Improved Automation Scripts application

Thu, 02 Jan 2020 00:00:00 +0000

Maximo automation scripts are a very useful tool to implement custom business logic for your customer. After time you may have many scripts to maintain and it may become hard to understand all the logic you have implemented on a specific object. I easy and useful trick I always use is to modify the Automation Scripts application to be able to display and filter script’s launch points.

You can see in this screenshot how easy it it to understand what scripts are running on each business object.

Maximo Scripting – Library Scripts

Fri, 27 Dec 2019 00:00:00 +0000

This post is an excerpt from the Maximo 76 Scripting Features guide.

Library scripts are good for encapsulating some re-usable logic. In Maximo 7.6, we can write library scripts as just simple scripts. We can write these scripts in any language and then call from another language. Lets make a library script for making HTTP GET calls. We can make that using a py script like below.

from psdi.iface.router import HTTPHandler
from java.util import HashMap
from java.util import String
handler = HTTPHandler()
map = HashMap()
map.put("URL", url)
map.put("HTTPMETHOD", "GET")
responseBytes = handler.invoke(map,None)
response = String(responseBytes, "utf-8")

Here the script is expecting a variable called “url” to be passed into the script from the invoking script. The response is set to the “response” variable, which can be used by the calling script to get the response data as a string.

Service object methods in automation scripts

Thu, 26 Dec 2019 00:00:00 +0000

The service object has been added in Maximo 7.6 script and is very useful in several scenarios. Here is a list of available methods. For more details refer to this page.

Logging

getLogger(loggerName)
log_debug(logMsg)
log_debug(logMsg, java.lang.Throwable t)
log_error(logMsg)
log_error(logMsg, java.lang.Throwable t)
log_fatal(logMsg)
log_fatal(logMsg, java.lang.Throwable t)
log_info(logMsg)
log_info(logMsg, java.lang.Throwable t)
log_warn(logMsg)
log_warn(logMsg, java.lang.Throwable t)
log(logMsg)
logError(logMsg)

Raise errors and warnings

error(grp, key)
error(grp, key, params)
setWarning(warnGrpVal, warnKeyVal, warnparams)

Yes/No/Cancel dialog

yncerror(grp, java.lang.String key)
yncerror(grp, java.lang.String key, params)
yncuserinput()

Integration

httpget(url)
httpget(url, user, pass)
httpgetasbytes(url, user, pass)
httppost(url, data)
httppost(url, user, pass, data)
httppostasbytes(url, user, pass, byte[] data)
invokeChannel(channelName)
invokeEndpoint(endPointName, metaData, byte[] data)
invokeEndpoint(endPointName, metaData, data)
wsinteraction(interactionName)
raiseSkipTransaction()

Invoke scripts and workflows

invokeScript(scriptName)
invokeScript(scriptName, context)
invokeWorkflow(wfName)