Creating cBases with Spectre Build Scripts

The Spectre Build script prepares your data for conversion to a cBase. The Spectre Build editor allows you to inspect your input data and make adjustments to the script to ensure that it produces the most useful cBase file for your needs. The script is a text file with a build file extension that opens by default in the GUI Spectre Build editor. If you prefer, you can open the build script in a text editor tab by right-clicking the file and choosing Open with > Text Editor.

There are two methods to generate a Spectre Build script from a text data file:

Right-click the data file and click Generate Spectre Build Script—This method automates the required input and output elements based on the data file name, and Spectre makes "best guesses" for the column type.
Click File > New > Spectre Build File—This method requires that you provide the input and output elements. You also need to manually define the type field for each column.

Creating a cBase using a Spectre Build script

In the Workbench Explorer, right-click the data file and select Generate Spectre Build Script.

The Save File dialog box opens.
In the Save File dialog box, use the default, recommended /programs directory to store the new build file, or choose another location. Make changes that you want to the default File Name, and click Save.

The Build script opens in a new tab.

NOTE:
- Input file name and path is automatically populated based on the data file
- Output file name and path is automatically populated and takes the form of /cbases/<data_file_name>.cbase
- Column names are listed along with a data preview from the first row
- All columns are set to keep
- The Spectre engine makes a best guess at the type for each column
Make any adjustments if necessary, including:
- Correcting input file properties such as encoding and delimiter (tab, space, comma, semicolon, pipe)
- Correcting the data types (boolean, date, datetime, double, fixed100, integer, period, or string)
- Adding column aliases
- Updating column properties (click in the Properties column to display the dialog)
- Adding comments for documentation (click in the Comments column to see the input dialog)
- Adding any additional calculated columns (click Edit Definition to see the expression editor)
Save the tab.
From the toolbar, choose Run > Run Script, or click the Run button (green circle with white arrow).

The script runs and places a cBase in the indicated output location. If there are any issues, inspect the Output tab at the bottom.

NOTE: If there are unsaved changes in the script, the Script has unsaved changes dialog box opens with choices about how to proceed. See Running Unsaved Scripts for information about these choices and how to set your Workbench preferences to change the default behavior.
If needed, navigate to and open the cBase in ProDiver (right-click > Open with > Diver) to see the results.

You can now iterate by making changes to your build script to fine tune the columns, add calculated columns if necessary, and re-run the script until you achieve the results that you want in ProDiver.

NOTE:

Calculated columns use the same expression syntax as calcs in a cPlan. See About Spectre Expressions and Alphabetized Functions for Spectre.
There are additional attributes you can only apply when editing the script in a text editor tab. See Additional Build Script Column Attributes.
You can set a Workbench preference so that ProDiver opens any cBase that is successfully created with a Spectre Build script. See Setting Workbench Preferences.
A new build script also has ODBC as an option for the input type. When using a database table, Spectre uses the database metadata to help set data types. For example:
When a Spectre build requires either a cBase input or multiple types of input, you must use the Text Editor to create the script.