CloverETL and Windows Task Scheduler

CloverDX Platform
1

I have a .grf in CloverETL that works just fine when run from within CloverETL. However, when I schedule the task to run in the Windows Task Scheduler it fails on the “readflatfile” - “writedb” step. Again, this works fine when run from within CloverETL as the same user. I’m on a Windows 2019 Server. The only unique thing I see about this and all the other Clover tasks I have scheduled in the Windows Task Scheduler is that the input file for this one is UTF-16LE and all the others are UTF-8. I’ve compared the settings for all the other jobs with this one. They all execute clover.bat using a specific .grf. All work successfully except this one. Only different I see is the author, but all are running using the same account regardless of the author. The history in the Task Scheduler gives very cryptic error:
action “C:\Windows\SYSTEM32\cmd.exe” with return code 4294967295.

2

Hi Phill,

It looks like from the Task Scheduler point of view there is no difference between running the graph successfully or not. The Task Scheduler history always reads “…, action “C:\windows\SYSTEM32\cmd.exe” with return code 4294967295.”. I don’t know what this return code means as this is not part of our product so if you want to know exactly, you will need to contact Microsoft support.

The reason why the graph fails seems to be the difference in encoding. The default encoding in CloverETL products is UTF-8, so if you have the input file in UTF-16LE, you need to adjust your reader (and writer) components to work with UTF-16LE via “Charset” property. If you run the graph with this input file from a command line (clover.bat), you will see the proper error message.

I also wanted to let you know that we already have a solution that is capable of scheduling jobs + a lot more. It is called CloverDX Server and among other capabilities it is also easy to find the root cause of any potential issue.
Since the open-source engine is distributed without any official support, I am afraid that we won’t be able to provide any further advice to help you build your automated flow.

Best regards.