Set up M-Files Essentials

By the end of this section one utility is enabled and doing its job on real objects.

Time: under an hour to install, then as long as the first utility takes to configure. That varies from ten minutes for Auto Name to most of a day for Guiding Document Publishing.

Who you need: someone with administrative access to the vault through M-Files Admin. Nothing outside the vault is involved — no Microsoft 365, no database, no external service.

Before you start

• A vault running M-Files 23.6.0.0 or later, and administrative access to it.
• The M-Files Essentials .mfappx file and its .lic licence file.
• An agreed window for a vault restart.
• A decision about which utility to start with, and a test vault to start it in.

Steps

1. Install the application and its licence.

   Follow Install a vault application, then Install a vault application licence.

   Without a valid licence the utilities do not run. The application still installs and its configuration is still editable, which makes an unlicensed installation look like a working one until somebody notices nothing is happening.

   Check: M-Files Essentials appears under the vault’s Applications node, the vault has been restarted, and the licence shows as valid.

2. Create what the first utility needs.

   Each utility names the object types, classes and properties it acts on, and those have to exist before the setting can be filled in. The utility’s own page lists them.

   The application as a whole requires nothing: a vault where every utility is off needs no structure at all.

   Check: every object type and property the utility’s page lists exists in the vault.

3. Configure and enable one utility.

   Open the configuration under the vault’s Applications node, find the utility under Object Utilities or Workflow Utilities, fill it in and set Enabled to true.

   Set its trigger condition narrowly to begin with — one class rather than every object — so the first run is something you can check by eye.

   Check: the application status in M-Files Admin reports no configuration error.

4. Check the result on a real object.

   Check an object in and look at what the utility did. Placeholder patterns in particular produce a plausible-looking result from a wrong pattern, so read the value rather than the configuration.

   Check: the value on the object is the one the pattern was meant to produce, in full.

5. Widen the trigger.

   Once the result is right, broaden the condition to the objects it should really cover.

   Check: objects that should be covered are, and objects that should not be are untouched.

One utility at a time

Enabling several utilities together makes an unexpected result hard to attribute. Enable one, verify it, then move on — especially where two of them write to properties on the same objects.

Upgrading

The configuration is preserved across upgrades. A new version may add settings to a utility; those arrive with their defaults and the utility keeps behaving as it did. Read the release notes for the version you are moving to before upgrading a vault where several utilities are enabled.

If something goes wrong

See Troubleshooting. Almost every report of a utility doing nothing is one of three things: it was never enabled, the licence is not valid, or the object has not been checked in since.