How to Create a Workflow Diagram
To
prepare a workflow diagram, double-click on the process activity. In our
example,
double-click
on the NEW PO Approval Process. The Process window will appear. The
Process
window shows the graphical representation of your workflow process. Initially,
the Process window is blank. Drag and drop activities from the Navigator into
the Process window. Between activities, define transitions by drawing arrows
using the right mouse button. If the result code of the source activity is
None, the transitions will not have a label. If the result code of the source
activity is not None, label the transition arrow with the result code that will
initiate the transition.
To diagram the NEW PO Approval process, create the item attributes for a
NEW PO. To do this, copy the item attributes from the PO Approval item type and
paste them to your NEW PO item type. Press C T RL-C on the PO Number from the
PO Approval item type. Then press C T RL-V to paste the PO Number to your PO
item type. Repeat the same copy-and-paste step for the PO Amount, the Requestor
Name Line1, and the Approver User Name (see Figure).
You
must then create the function that selects the approver, which is the next
manager in H.R. Create a PL/SQL stored procedure that will search out the next
manager based on the requestor and tie the stored procedure to a function
activity. In this review question, you can assume that the stored procedure
will always retrieve a valid manager. In this case, the result type of the
function activity can be None and the function activity is NEW Get Next Manager
in H.R.
Create
notifications that allow the manager to approve or reject the PO and that send
a
reminder
if the notification timed out. You do this by creating a message that asks the
manager
to approve or reject the PO. Use NEW_APPROVE as the internal name and New
Approval
as the display name. You can type a message body like the one in Figure .
Your
message must have a Respond message attribute. Use NEW_RESULT as the internal name.
Since the display name becomes the prompt, use Approve as the display name. Enter
Please either approve or reject the PO as the description. Select Lookup as the
type and, since you are soliciting a response, select Respond as the source.
Select Approval
as the lookup type. This will allow the user to respond with either Approve or Reject (see Figure).
Once
you have created the New Approval message, attach the message to a notification
activity
called NEW_APPROVE_PO. Use a display name of NEW Approve PO. Select the
same
result type as your message, which is Approval, and select New Approval as the
message.
Click on the Details tab to change the Timeout field to 3 days. Create a
reminder notification in the same way. Now you are ready to create the workflow
process diagram.
You
should start the workflow process with the Start function activity. You can
find the
Start
function activity from the Standard item type. Drag and drop the Start function
into
the
Process window. You are assuming that this NEW PO Process is initiated by a
CreateProcess
API and StartProcess API with the correct attributes: PO Number, PO
Amount,
Requestor Name Line1, and Approver User Name.
The
Start function activity will be your source activity. The destination activity,
NEW Get
Next
Manager in H.R., will retrieve the appropriate manager. Create a transition by
right clicking the mouse and dragging a line between the Start function
activity and the NEW
Get
Next Manager in H.R. function activity. Since the result code is None, there
will be no need to select a result code. Your next activity will be NEW Approve
PO notification
activity.
Drag and drop the NEW Approve PO notification activity into the Process window.
Since the result code from NEW Get Next Manager in H.R. function activity is None,
you can just connect the NEW Get Next Manager in H.R. function activity to the
NEW Approve PO notification activity.
You
must identify the performer for the NEW Approve PO notification activity. The
performer
is the role receiving the notification. In your case, select the item attribute
Approver
User Name as the performer. To select a performer, double-click on the
notification
activity in the Process window and select the performer. You can only do this
if
you
invoked the Notification Activity Property window inside the Process window;
you
cannot
do this if you invoked the Notification Activity Property window in the
Navigator
(see
Figures).
You can
use the Attribute Values tab to specify a value for any selected attribute in
this
tab. You do not need this
feature for this review question.
The
manager can ignore the notification, approve the PO, or reject the PO. Treat
all three conditions with three different transitions. If the manager approves
or rejects the PO, the workflow process is considered completed. In this case,
it must flow to the End function activity. To show the Or condition, you can
use the Or function activity. Both the End and Or function activities can be
found under the Standard item type. If the manager chooses to ignore the
notification, you must send a reminder to the manager and branch back to resend
the NEW Approve PO notification activity.
To make
sure that the NEW Approve PO notification can be resent, make sure that Loop
Reset is not checked. When you create a transition between
the NEW Approve PO activity and the Or activity, a window appears and asks
which result code should be tied to this transition. Your choices are Approved,
Rejected, <Default>, or <Timeout> (see Figure 11- 20). The
<Default> transition is used if result codes other than any selected
result codes are returned.
Choose
Approved for the transition. Repeat the same step and create a transition for
Rejected
between the NEW Approve PO activity and the Or activity. Create a transition
between
the NEW Approve PO activity to the NEW PO Reminder activity and select
<Timeout>
for the transition. Since you want to route back from the NEW PO Reminder
activity
to the NEW Approve PO activity, you must create a transition from the NEW
Approve
PO activity to the NEW PO Reminder activity.
To see
labels, which are display names in the Process window, you can either execute
Designer’s
View | Show Label | Display Name menu command, or right-click on the Process window
and execute the Show Label | Display Name menu command. See Figure 11-21 for the
complete process you have created.
Other
options in the Process window include copying diagrams, printing diagrams, and
displaying
an Overview window. All of these options are found when you click the right
mouse
button in the Process window. You can verify your workflow process by executing
the File | Verify menu command.
Review Questions
1. When
will you need to select a label for a transition?
2. What
is the purpose of the <Timeout> label?
3. How
will your NEW PO Process be invoked?
4. What is a performer and
how do you specify a performer for a notification activity?
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