A Script May Declare Data Areas

Both BPA and server-based scripts may have one or more data areas:

• If the script contains steps that exchange XML documents, you must declare a data area for each type of XML document. For example, if a BPA script has a step that invokes a service script, the BPA script must declare a data area that holds the XML document that is used to pass information to and from the service script.
• You can use a data area as a more definitive way to declare your temporary storage. For example, you can describe your script's temporary storage variables using a stand-alone data area schema and associate it with your script.

Various step types involve referencing the script's data areas as well as support the ability to compare and move data to and from field elements residing in the data areas.

An Edit Data step supports the syntax to dynamically declare data areas as part of the step itself. This technique eliminates the need to statically declare a data area. Refer to Designing Generic Scripts for an example of when this technique may be useful.