External program tasks in Qlik Sense are simply another task type. With external program tasks, you can trigger external processes, such as scripts or .exe files. Task chaining is supported and you can combine reload tasks with external program tasks.
The functionality is exposed in the Qlik Sense Management Console beginning with the May 2021 release. See Creating and editing external program tasks.
Previous versions allow you to create external tasks in a command shell process behind the scenes; which in turns means you can run more or less anything you can run on the command prompt. Once you define your command and create a new task, you can both trigger and chain these types of tasks in the QMC.
In this example, we will be using a Powershell Script which means that powershell.exe needs to be in your PATH variable (By default C:\\Windows\\System32\\WindowsPowerShell\\v1.0\\powershell.exe). Again, you can run any command that you can run in the windows command prompt, so these examples are only for demo purposes.
Before we get started, we need to understand that IF you are calling scripts in your command, the script needs to be accessible by the user running the Qlik services. In this example, there’s a folder on the root C: drive called ‘externalTasksExample’, in this folder, there is a script.ps1 file which simply creates a new file in the same folder.
The file looks like:
Start-Transcript C:\externalTasksExample\transcript.log
$date = Get-Date
Write-Host $date
Stop-Transcript
You can run the file from the command prompt by doing the following:
C:\externalTasksExample>C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe -File script.ps1
When the command runs successfully, you should have a new file created in the externalTasksExample folder called “transcript.log”.
Now we will delete this transcript.log and try to run that same PowerShell file using an external program task in Qlik Sense. The first thing we need to do is actually create the task.
The endpoint is:
POST /qrs/externalprogramtask
With the body being:
{
"path": "C:\\Windows\\System32\\WindowsPowerShell\\v1.0\\powershell.exe",
"parameters": "C:\\externalTasksExample\\Script.ps1",
"name": "Task Name",
"taskType": 1,
"enabled": true,
"taskSessionTimeout": 1440,
"maxRetries": 0,
"privileges": null,
"schemaPath": "ExternalProgramTask"
}
Here is a sample script:
$hdrs = @{}
$hdrs.Add("X-Qlik-xrfkey","12345678qwertyui")
$hdrs.Add("X-Qlik-User","UserDirectory=DOMAIN;UserId=Administrator")
$hdrs.Add("content-type","application/json; charset=UTF-8")
$body = '{
"path": "C:\\Windows\\System32\\WindowsPowerShell\\v1.0\\powershell.exe",
"parameters": "C:\\externalTasksExample\\Script.ps1",
"name": "Task Name",
"taskType": 1,
"enabled": true,
"taskSessionTimeout": 1440,
"maxRetries": 0,
"privileges": null,
"schemaPath": "ExternalProgramTask"
}'
$cert = Get-ChildItem -Path "Cert:\CurrentUser\My" | Where {$_.Subject -like '*QlikClient*'}
$url = "https://qlikserver1.domain.local:4242/qrs/externalprogramtask?xrfkey=12345678qwertyui"
Invoke-RestMethod -Uri $url -Method Post -Headers $hdrs -Body $body -Certificate $cert
This generates a response like:
id : 1353eb7c-44c7-422b-9e73-c2667011a1b0
createdDate : 2022-06-13T19:35:40.382Z
modifiedDate : 2022-06-13T19:35:40.382Z
modifiedByUserName : DOMAIN\administrator
customProperties : {}
path : C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe
parameters : C:\externalTasksExample\Script.ps1
qlikUser :
operational : @{id=5ececc2a-dc6c-4769-b424-c325faddf74c; lastExecutionResult=; nextExecution=1753-01-01T00:00:00.000Z; privileges=}
name : Task Name
taskType : 1
enabled : True
taskSessionTimeout : 1440
maxRetries : 0
tags : {}
privileges :
schemaPath : ExternalProgramTask
Once you post this into Qlik, you should be able to go to the QMC and see the following task in the task list.
You should be able to select the task, click 'Start', and the same file should appear in 'C:\externalTasksExample'. You are now running an external task. Remember you don't have to use powershell.exe, you can trigger anything you want as long as it can be run from the command line.
Related Content:
How to configure Postman (desktop app) to connect to Qlik Sense
