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Aras Innovator Platform   Configurable User Interface Administrator Guide   Table of Contents Editor

Importing and Exporting

March 6, 2026 01:42 AM
3 min read

Packaging Aras Innovator configuration data to share changes between developers or different environments, like test and production. This section provides information on how to handle packages that include TOC configuration data.

Exporting TOC Elements

The TOC Editor manages the underlying CUI items that define and render the TOC controls in the Aras Innovator web client. These CUI items need to be packaged to export the TOC configuration to another Aras Innovator instance.

ItemType Buttons

The TOC Editor automatically adds each ItemType button to the package that contains its associated ItemType. For ItemTypes that belong to package definitions, admins can simply export the packages and import them into another environment.

If an ItemType button references an ItemType that does not belong to a package, there are a couple options. One option is to remove the button from the TOC, package the ItemType, and then recreate the button in the TOC Editor. This will automatically package the button.

The second option is to manually package the CUI items that define the ItemType button. The following steps demonstrate how to manually package a custom “Part” ItemType button.

Note
To simplify these steps, it’s recommended to download and install the CUI Add to Package community project from the Aras Labs GitHub page. It’s possible to perform the same tasks without the project’s helpful “Add to Package” action. However, this requires adding the CommandBarSection and CommandBarMenuButton ItemTypes to the TOC and searching for the relevant items to package.

  1. Navigate to Administration > ItemTypes in the TOC.
  2. Search for the Part ItemType and open it.
  3. Click the Client Style relationship tab and open the Presentation Configuration item.
  4. In the Command Bar Section grid, open the Part_TOC_Content item.
  5. In the Command Bar Item grid, open the Menu Button item that corresponds with the custom ItemType button in the TOC. The format of the name will resemble com.aras.innovator.cui_default.toc_Part_<GUID>.
  6. Click the “…” button in the toolbar and select Add to Package Definition.
  7. Choose the package from the list that the Menu Button will be assigned to.
  8. Close the Menu Button item, Command Bar Section item, Presentation Configuration item, and ItemType tabs.

The custom ItemType button is now packaged and can be exported with the export utility.

Warning
The CUI items that define ItemType buttons should be packaged with the ItemType they’re assigned. If they are assigned to a different package, that package definition must have a “depends on” relationship to the package definition containing the ItemType.

Categories

Since Categories are not explicitly assigned an ItemType, they must be packaged manually. The following steps demonstrate how to package a custom Category called “Design Pros”.

Note
To simplify these steps, it’s recommended to download and install the CUI Add to Package community project from the Aras Labs GitHub page. It’s possible to perform the same tasks without the project’s helpful “Add to Package” action. However, this requires adding the CommandBarSection and CommandBarMenuButton ItemTypes to the TOC and searching for the relevant items to package.

  1. Navigate to Administration > Configuration > Client Presentation in the TOC.
  2. Click the Search button to run the Client Presentation search.
  3. Click the Global item property in the single search result.
  4. In the Command Bar Section grid, open the com.aras.innovator.cui_default.toc item.
  5. In the Command Bar Item grid, open the Menu item that corresponds with the custom Category in the TOC. The format of the name will resemble com.aras.innovator.cui_default.toc_<GUID>.
  6. Click the “…” button in the toolbar and select Add to Package Definition.
  7. Choose the package from the list that the Menu will be assigned to.
  8. Close the Menu item, Command Bar Section item, Presentation Configuration item, and ItemType tabs.

The custom Category is now packaged and can be exported with the export utility.

Warning
The CUI items that define Categories should be packaged in the com.aras.innovator.cui_default package or a package definition with a “depends on” relationship to the com.aras.innovator.cui_default package.

Importing TOC Elements

Packages Containing TOC Access or TOC View

Prior to Aras Innovator Release 14, admins defined the TOC using the legacy TOC Access and TOC View relationships on ItemTypes. These relationships are no longer used as of Release 14, however, packages exported from Aras Innovator 12 SP20, or earlier releases may still include this data. These packages can be imported into Release 14+, but they will need a few updates to properly capture the TOC configuration.

Note
Subscribers upgrading to Aras Innovator Release 14+ from an earlier release of Aras Innovator will not need to perform these steps for any packages in the scope of an Aras Upgrades service project. For questions about the Aras Upgrade subscription benefit, please refer to support@aras.com.

The following steps are required to update a package that contains TOC Access or TOC View data.

  1. Import the package into Aras Innovator (Release 14 or greater).
  2. For each TOC Access relationship in the package, create a new ItemType button using the TOC Editor. The “Access” property of each button should match the Identity related to the TOC Access relationship in the package.
Note
The TOC Access and TOC View relationships will not be visible on the ItemType form in the Aras Innovator web client. To find this data, review the AML files in the ItemType subdirectory of the package.

  1. For each TOC View relationship in the package, create a new Form or Page button following the steps in section Display a Form with a TOC Button or sectionDisplay an HTML Page with a TOC Button in this guide.
  2. Export the package using the export utility.

The package can now be imported to Aras Innovator Release 14+ without additional manual steps.

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