Customize Your PSA with OpenAir’s Scripting Features
Companies using NetSuite’s OpenAir Professional Services Automation (PSA) platform are already aware that it’s a powerful tool in their toolbox. It isn’t just the out-of-the-box features, multiple integrations, or extensive reporting capabilities that make OpenAir powerful. It’s also the flexibility that is inherently part of the solution.
One way that flexibility presents itself is in OpenAir’s support of scripting. Scripts can be used to extend your PSA instance and customize it to make it act and work exactly the way you want it to, and the way that works best for your business.
With some knowledge of JavaScript, it’s possible to do everything from form validation to building functionality that is triggered automatically. Even with that knowledge, though, OpenAir can be somewhat complex to code for. But it doesn’t need to be. OpenAir provides a number of features baked into the solution that will help you quickly and accurately create custom scripts.
Tools for OpenAir Scripting
Whether you are building form scripts or scheduled scripts, the Scripting Center is the most important thing to know about. The OpenAir Scripting Center was first released roughly five years ago, and it’s been updated in every release since its launch. That’s great news since that’s a signal of NetSuite’s commitment to this powerful feature.
The functionality within the Scripting Center enables users to create scripts faster and more accurately than they would be able to without it. Plus, it provides an environment where a user can create scripts and run them without damaging the existing data. Combined with several other elements, the Scripting Center offers a comprehensive scripting workspace.
Scripting Center Sandbox
A code sandbox is a space where a script can be developed and tested without impacting the existing production system or data. When developing a script within the Scripting Center, you’re doing it within a sandbox environment. This lets you build your script without fear of damaging – or even deleting! – important data.
The Scripting Center identifies the person creating the script and limits the access to that script to only that ID, so there is no danger of someone else accidentally running a script in development. Once your script is complete and fully tested, you can then deploy it to your production environment for OpenAir for other users to access and run.
SOAP Explorer
Within the Scripting Center is the Scripting Studio – a collection of features that make the coding of Form and Scheduled scripts much easier. The SOAP Explorer is the first of those features that we’ll look at.
The SOAP Explorer is an immensely handy tool. Within it, you have a dropdown that shows every script you have access to. Once a script has been chosen, you’re provided with another dropdown that shows all of the fields available for that table.
Spelling and punctuation are important in script development. Calling Table_A is different than calling TableA or even Table-A. The SOAP Explorer can save hours of frustration by making short work of identifying the exact spelling and punctuation for the resource you’ll be calling from your script.
Functions Explorer
It’s important to be familiar with the JavaScript programming language to create scripts for OpenAir. However, OpenAir has its own JavaScript libraries that can be used in addition to the standard language libraries. The Functions Explorer helps script developers find the OpenAir-specific functions needed for their program, how to format calls to these functions and even provides examples of how to use them.
Script Parameters
Parameters passed into a script can lower the maintenance time and upkeep of a script. The Script Parameters feature lets developers define parameters that will be provided, making it easy to make changes in the future. For example, let’s say your application sends an email to someone in your organization as part of its process. If that person moves to a new position, you would need to find any and all of the areas where that email was set in the script and make the change. With Script Parameters, though, you can set that email once, outside of the script, making it easy to update at a later date.
Form Schema
The Form Schema in the Scripting Studio is similar to the SOAP Explorer and just as useful. Unfortunately, there are some inconsistencies between names in the project tables and those in the forms in use in OpenAir. Where the SOAP Explorer helps find the right name in the table, the Form Schema will help find the proper reference in the form.
Conclusion
OpenAir scripting still requires knowing and understanding how to develop functions with the JavaScript programming language. With the Scripting Center, though, you don’t need to be a full-time programmer to be able to pull together a script that gets OpenAir working the way you want it to. If you’re curious about scripting for OpenAir, you can find out more in our webinar, The Power of OpenAir Scripting.
Of course, some of the customizations that you’d like for the platform may go far beyond your scripting experience or may be complex. If that’s the case, Top Step can help. Top Step’s team has extensive knowledge in both the business domains of professional services as well as programming for the platform. We’ve developed hundreds of customizations and integrations for OpenAir users and would love to bring that expertise to your PSA project, too. Contact us today to discuss how we can partner with you to help you get the most out of your OpenAir platform.
