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Welcome to the fifth unit of the “Setting up my first scenario” course within the Make Foundation.
You are now way past the halfway point of the first course, and quickly starting to approach running your scenario for the first time. Before you get there, you have a few more bits to learn.
The aim of this unit is to connect modules together and understand why.
As we have done previously, ensure that you have your Make Foundation Use Case scenario open.
If you have not created this yet, you should access the previous units and build out the scenario.
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Before you proceed, let’s ensure that your scenario is set up correctly for this exercise.
In the previous unit we added and configured the Google Sheets → Add a row module. Your scenario should look like the image, two modules connected to each other. The next step is to disconnect them.
Right click the dotted line connecting the two modules, and select Unlink. This will disconnect the two modules from each other.
You will now have two standalone modules - your Google Sheets will present a warning in a yellow circle. Select the yellow alert; it will give you the details of the warning or error your module has encountered. Your Google Sheets module has an action of Add a row - but there is no source of where that information is coming from. Therefore Make will provide you with the warning prompt.
This concludes this stage – you will all have the same view of your scenario for the next steps. Next you will learn a few methods for how you can connect modules together.
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There are a few different ways to connect modules; there isn’t a correct or incorrect way to do this, it’s down to personal preference. Let’s look at a few of these.
Method 1
Your first method is to add the module linked directly from the previous module.
For example, if we hover over the Weather module and then select Add another module, the next module that we select will be automatically connected.
Method 2
If you have not automatically connected a module, you can drag the connector on a module to the one that you would like to connect it to. You can do this from the starting module, or any additional module.
Method 3
Another option is to drag your module towards the module you would like to connect to; this will automatically connect it.
If you accidentally connect the wrong module, and you are still holding down your mouse, dragging the module away will disconnect it. However, once you let go of your mouse, you will need to right-click → Unlink if you want to disconnect the module.
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To put it simply, you are passing information from one module to another.
From the Weather app, you are sending data about the weather from a city (first module), to a spreadsheet (second module).
Without connecting these modules, the information doesn’t go anywhere from the Weather app, and the spreadsheet has nothing to receive. Think of it as a taxi transporting passengers to their destination.
If you select the Explain flow icon under controls, it will illustrate the journey of your data.
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Spend a few minutes now exploring the different ways that we can connect modules together.
TIP: a handy function within Make is the use of clone / copy and paste function. You can do this by right-clicking your chosen module, and selecting one of the options. You can also hold shift and drag your mouse to select multiple modules at once. This is a useful tool to know about, as it will copy the existing configurations of the module.
Copy the modules and link them together in a straight line, as shown below. Don’t save this - we’re just exploring the function.
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And that is your fifth unit completed. You have played around with the Make UI in regards to adding modules.
By now you should have an understanding of:
- Why you connect modules together
- How to disconnect modules
- The various methods you can use when connecting modules together
Excellent! Our next unit is going to bring us closer to the end goal: Basic Field Mapping.