Skip to content

Files & documents

Nodes that read, create and convert files: spreadsheets, Word and PowerPoint documents, PDFs, images and scans. In the palette they sit under Data Storage.

How files move through a workflow

  • Start from files you already have. The Files node brings files from your workspace library into a run. You can upload files in its panel, several at a time.
  • Nodes pass file references. Nodes that make a file (Spreadsheet, Word Document, PowerPoint, PDF Operations, CSV Batch, File Creation, Barcode & QR, SFTP downloads) store it and put a reference to it in their output, usually as file. Nodes that read a file take that reference in fileData.
  • Inline only as a fallback. If a file can't be stored, the node puts the content in its output as base64 instead.

All nodes on this page have one input and one output port unless the entry says otherwise.

Files

What: Brings files from the workspace library into the run as file references.

The Files node's panel in the editor: the header with the node's icon and name, and its Settings tab.The Files node's panel in the editor: the header with the node's icon and name, and its Settings tab.

Configuration: files (required), emit (perFile default: one item per file; or single: one item for all), verify (default off).

File Creation

What: Turns workflow data into a file: PDF, DOCX, XLSX, CSV, TXT or Base64.

The File Creation node's panel in the editor: the header with the node's icon and name, and its Settings tab.The File Creation node's panel in the editor: the header with the node's icon and name, and its Settings tab.

Ports: in input; out output, error.

Configuration: source (required: the data to write), outputType (pdf default), fileName, sheetName, encoding (utf8 default, ascii, latin1).

File Operations

What: File and storage operations: read, write, append, delete, copy, move, list, compress, decompress, convert, upload, download and more.

The File Operations node's panel in the editor: the header with the node's icon and name, and its Settings tab.The File Operations node's panel in the editor: the header with the node's icon and name, and its Settings tab.

Ports: in input; out output, error.

Configuration: operation (required), path (required), content, encoding (utf8 default), destination.

CSV Batch

What: Reads and writes CSV with proper quoting, a page at a time.

The CSV Batch node's panel in the editor: the header with the node's icon and name, and its Settings tab.The CSV Batch node's panel in the editor: the header with the node's icon and name, and its Settings tab.

Configuration: operation (parse default, write, count), fileData, hasHeader (default on), delimiter (default ,), encoding (utf-8 default, or latin1), offset and limit (for paging; limit: 0 reads everything), columns, parseNumbers (default off), trimValues (default on), fileName.

Use when: A CSV is too large to handle in one go. Read 1000 rows at a time with offset and limit inside a Loop.

Spreadsheet

What: Reads and writes Excel .xlsx workbooks.

The Spreadsheet node's panel in the editor: the header with the node's icon and name, and its Settings tab.The Spreadsheet node's panel in the editor: the header with the node's icon and name, and its Settings tab.

Configuration: operation (read default, write, listSheets), fileData, sheet, headerRow (default on), maxRows (0 = all), sheetName (default Sheet1), columns, writeHeader (default on), fileName.

Word Document

What: Builds .docx documents from blocks, or reads them.

The Word Document node's panel in the editor: the header with the node's icon and name, and its Settings tab.The Word Document node's panel in the editor: the header with the node's icon and name, and its Settings tab.

Configuration: operation (build default, read, extractText), blocks, fileData, title, author, fileName.

PowerPoint

What: Builds, reads and fills .pptx decks, and updates their charts.

The PowerPoint node's panel in the editor: the header with the node's icon and name, and its Settings tab.The PowerPoint node's panel in the editor: the header with the node's icon and name, and its Settings tab.

Configuration: operation (build default, read, extractText, fill, updateCharts), slides, fileData, title, author, fileName, widescreen (default on), includeNotes (default on), data, failOnMissing (default off), charts.

Use when: Producing a weekly report deck from a template: fill replaces placeholders with data, and updateCharts refreshes chart values.

PDF Operations

What: Builds, generates, parses, merges, splits, extracts, encrypts and decrypts PDFs.

Configuration:

Field Notes
operation Required: build, generate, parse, merge, split, extract, metadata, encrypt or decrypt
blocks Content blocks, for build
content, contentType Content for generate: text (default), html or markdown
pageSize a4 (default), letter, legal, a3, a5
headerText, footerText, pageNumbers Page furniture
pdfFiles Files to merge
password For encrypt and decrypt
fileName Name of the output file

For scanned PDFs with no text layer, use OCR.

Image Convert

What: Converts and compresses images to WebP, AVIF, PNG or JPEG, and can resize them.

The Image Convert node's panel in the editor: the header with the node's icon and name, and its Settings tab.The Image Convert node's panel in the editor: the header with the node's icon and name, and its Settings tab.

Ports: in input; out output, error.

Configuration: inputPath, outputFormat (webp default), quality (default 80), effort, lossless (default off), resizeWidth, resizeHeight, stripMetadata (default on), outputPath.

OCR

What: Reads text from scans and photographs.

The OCR node's panel in the editor: the header with the node's icon and name, and its Settings tab.The OCR node's panel in the editor: the header with the node's icon and name, and its Settings tab.

Configuration: fileData (required), mode, for PDFs (auto default: use the PDF's own text when it has any and read the image only when it has none; ocr: always read the image; text: never read the image), languages (default eng), minimumConfidence (default 80), perPage (default off), maxPages (default 20), dpi (default 300), pageSegmentation (default 3).

Tips & gotchas

  • Chain by file reference. Pass a file from one node to the next through fileData. Open the upstream node's output to find the field that holds the file reference, and use the Data Mapper to insert it.
  • Large files: page through big CSVs with CSV Batch, and cap PDFs with maxPages in OCR.

Found something out of date? This page lives in the Flero docs content set.