WebLogic Process Integrator Overview


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The WebLogic Process Integrator product is a user modeling and workflow environment that combines the tasks of administering data and defining, executing, and monitoring workflows.

The following sections provide an overview of WebLogic Process Integrator:

Architecture Overview

The Workflow Management Coalition defines a workflow management system as one that "...defines, manages, and executes workflows through the execution of software whose order of execution is driven by a computer representation of the workflow logic."

Such a system automates a business process by merging the sequence of activities and invoking the appropriate resources required by the various activities or steps. Individual business processes may have life cycles ranging from minutes to days (or longer), depending on the complexity and duration of the various constituent activities. To achieve this, a workflow management system must provide support in three broad areas:

Workflow definition and execution — capturing the definition of the business process (workflow), managing the execution of workflow processes in an operational environment, and sequencing the various activities to be performed.
Workflow monitoring — monitoring the status of workflow processes and dynamically configuring the run-time controller.
Data administration — managing organizations, users, and roles; rerouting tasks when needed; and maintaining business workflow calendars.

WebLogic Process Integrator is a Java 2 Enterprise Edition (J2EE) session and entity bean-based implementation of a workflow management system. At the center of the WebLogic Process Integrator architecture is the Process Engine, which serves as the run-time controller and is responsible for keeping track of workflow instances and managing the execution of workflows.

WebLogic Process Integrator has the following architecture.

Figure 1-1 WebLogic Process Integrator Architecture

Understanding the Workflow Model

The following sections describe the concepts and terminology associated with the workflow model:

Overview of the Workflow Model

It is important to understand the following key terms:

A workflow is a business process (for example, order processing). Workflow automation is the automation of a business process, in whole or in part, during which information of any type is passed to the right participant at the right time according to a set of intelligent business rules that allow computers to perform most of the work while humans only have to deal with exceptions.
A workflow template is a folder (or a container) in WebLogic Process Integrator Studio. This workflow template represents a workflow and is given a meaningful workflow name, such as Order Processing or Billing. The workflow template aggregates various definitions (or "versions") of its implementation; these are referred to as workflow template definitions. Further, a workflow template is responsible for controlling which organizations can use the "contained" workflow template definitions.
A workflow template definition is a definition (or "version") of the workflow, distinguished by its effective and expiry dates. At run time, WebLogic Process Integrator starts an instance (or session) of a workflow template definition, selecting the most effective (or current and active) definition.

You design a workflow template by using the drawing area of WebLogic Process Integrator Studio to build a business process flowchart. WebLogic Process Integrator Studio is the WebLogic Process Integrator client application that you use to define and monitor workflows. Workflows are designed from the perspective of business analysts, incorporating varied and multiple business activities and transactions involved in business processes.

In WebLogic Process Integrator, one workflow template can be used to generate multiple workflow instances. When a workflow is started, a copy of the workflow template definition is saved and used to generate information in the workflow, such as what user to assign to the first task, what actions are to be executed, when the task is completed, and so on.

Workflow template definition within an organization is usually the responsibility of an analyst, system administrator, or authorized user.

Workflow Definitions

Workflows are defined for and assigned to organizations within WebLogic Process Integrator. An organization can be an entire company, or an organization can represent a division, region, or location within a company. For each organization, users and roles (groups of users sharing common areas of responsibility) are created. An organization can have multiple workflow templates assigned to it.

When a workflow is started, a workflow template definition is instantiated and an instance is created. This instance holds information pertaining to the state of the workflow (running process).

Workflow template definitions are stored as XML documents. XML is a system for defining, validating, and sharing document formats. Like HTML, XML is a markup language derived from SGML (standard generalized markup language). However, unlike HTML, which was created to allow cross-platform formatting of information for display, XML is best suited for organizing data.

Workflow Components

The following sections briefly describe workflow components.

Nodes

Nodes are key components within workflows. Workflow nodes are graphically represented as "shapes" in the workflow drawing area. A workflow node can be a start, task, event, join, decision, or done. Nodes are described briefly in the following list. For more information, refer to Working with Workflow Components.

Start — the beginning of a workflow; initiated by a predefined, timed, manually initiated, or called event.
Task — core process activities of a workflow; tasks evolve through various task events as the workflow progresses (created, executed, activated, done).
Event — a notification node that is triggered by an XML message.
Join — AND (all nodes linked by it must be satisfied before the successor of the join can be activated) or OR (only one of the linked nodes must be satisfied before the successor of the join can be activated).
Decision — contains a condition that must be evaluated before the succeeding node can be initiated. The condition evaluates to either True or False. (If the condition is verified, it is True. If it is not, it is False.) Depending on the outcome of the evaluation, the workflow can follow different paths.
Done — workflow completion.

Variables

Workflows also contain variables, which hold run-time values and data obtained often from external sources. Variables are used to control the flow of business processes. For more information, refer to Using Expressions and Conditions.

Exception Handlers

Workflows contain system- and custom-defined workflow exception handlers, which enable you to generate, trap, and respond to internally and externally generated exception conditions. Exceptions may be abnormal conditions that you define within the workflow, or they may be typical run-time server exceptions that you trap and respond to accordingly. For more information, refer to Handling Workflow Exceptions.

Actions

Workflows also contain actions (units of work), which can be as simple as assigning a task to a user or as complicated as sending or receiving XML messages or invoking Enterprise JavaBean (EJB) methods. Actions are, in a sense, the primitive building blocks of a workflow in that they define the actual behavior of the workflow. Actions are integrated into a workflow by specifying them in start nodes, task nodes, decision nodes, done nodes, and events. For more information, refer to Using Actions.

WebLogic Process Integrator provides a standard set of actions, but this set is extendible through use of Enterprise JavaBean (EJB) and Java Class methods. (For more information, refer to Understanding Business Operations in Administering Data within WebLogic Process Integrator.)

Workflow Model Diagram

The following diagram illustrates the WebLogic Process Integrator workflow model.

Figure 1-2 WebLogic Process Integrator Workflow Model

The workflow model begins at the organization level, where users and roles are created to perform workflow tasks.
Workflow templates are created for and attached to the appropriate organization. An organization can have multiple workflow templates.
For each workflow template, you define workflow template definitions, which are different "versions" of the workflow template.
In defining workflow template definitions, you define workflow nodes, workflow variables, workflow exception handlers, and actions within workflow nodes.
When a workflow template definition is instantiated (placed in to run time), an instance of that workflow is created; multiple instances of the same workflow template definition can be running at the same time.

Administering Data

Users administer components of the WebLogic Process Integrator server and database through the data and server administration facility. More specifically, you can perform the following tasks:

Add, update, and remove organizations, users and roles.
Assign users to and remove them from roles.
Reroute tasks from one user to another for a specified period of time.
Create calendars that are used in workflow template definitions.

User, role, and organization information within WebLogic Process Integrator is maintained in BEA WebLogic Server(TM) security realms.

Monitoring Workflows

WebLogic Process Integrator provides workflow monitoring in the form of two reports: workload and statistics. These can be accessed in the folder tree of the main Studio window. Use the WebLogic Process Integrator monitoring facility to monitor and modify workflows. More specifically, you can perform the following tasks:

Display the status of workflow instances.
Modify the tasks associated with a workflow instance. For example, reassign tasks or force work to be redone.
Graphically display the workload status of the system, showing the number of tasks categorized by status (such as pending, inactive, done, overdue) and user or role.
View historical statistical data associated with workflows in order to determine bottlenecks and inefficiencies in the business processes.
View a user or role worklist in order to dynamically maintain workflows.

Workflow monitoring enables you to gather system workload information and make informed decisions based on available data, thus managing your resources more efficiently.

Starting WebLogic Process Integrator Studio

To start WebLogic Process Integrator Studio:

Select Start > Programs > WebLogic Process Integrator Studio to display the WebLogic Process Integrator Logon dialog box.
Figure 1-3 Logon to WebLogic Process Integrator Dialog Box
Enter your user ID, password, and the name of the WebLogic Process Integrator server to which you will connect, and click OK.
Click OK to display the main window of WebLogic Process Integrator.
Figure 1-4 WebLogic Process Integrator Main Window

Navigating WebLogic Process Integrator

This section describes the components and tasks of the WebLogic Process Integrator Studio user interface. WebLogic Process Integrator Studio is a client application that allows for the definition and monitoring of workflows.

Menu Options

The File menu has the following options:

Logon — logs on to the WebLogic Process Integrator server
Logoff — logs off from WebLogic Process Integrator server
Exit — logs off from WebLogic Process Integrator server and exit WebLogic Process Integrator Studio.

The View menu has the following options:

Refresh — updates the information if changes are made to the database by other client applications
Use color on flowcharts — allows the user to view the flowcharts in color or in black and white
Sync selection with tree — synchronizes the workflow components in the folder tree hierarchy with the workflow components in the drawing area. For example, clicking the Start node in a workflow diagram opens the corresponding Start node folder in the folder tree hierarchy.
Look and feel — choices are Metal, CDE/Motif, and Windows.

The Configuration menu has the following options:

Organization — defines organizations, representing different business entities, geographical locations or any other distinction relevant to the particular business of the company
Business Operations — defines business operations. For more information, see Understanding Business Operations in Administering Data within WebLogic Process Integrator.
Events — defines event key expressions.

Folder Tree Display

The WebLogic Process Integrator Studio interface contains a folder tree display, which follows standard explorer-type conventions.

Figure 1-5 WebLogic Process Integrator Folder Tree Display

Note: Displayed information pertains only to the current organization. Select the organization from the Organization drop-down list at the top of the screen.

Double-click one of the following items to expand it and view details about the item:

Templates
Calendars
Users
Roles
Routing
Workload Report
Statistics Reports

For example, double-click the Templates folder to display a list of workflow templates. Double-click a workflow template to display a list of all workflow template definitions. Expanding a particular workflow template definition displays folders containing the tasks, decisions, events, joins, starts, dones, and variables for that workflow template definition.

You can right-click most items in the folder tree to display a menu containing options relevant to the highlighted item. Choosing any menu option displays a corresponding dialog box on the right-hand side of the screen. However, right-click menus in the folder tree are context specific. Depending on the context in which you are accessing the right-click menu, certain options may not be accessible. For example, if your security realm does not permit you to add users and roles to WebLogic Process Integrator, the Create Role and Add Users menu options will not be accessible to you.

For example, right-click on an existing workflow template to display a menu with the following options:

New Template Definition
Import Template Definition
Delete
Properties
Instances
Delete Instances
Figure 1-6 Workflow Template Menu Options

WebLogic Process Integrator allows you to have multiple workflow diagrams open simultaneously. It is possible to view more than one workflow and toggle back and forth between them.

Figure 1-7 Multiple Workflow Diagrams

Workflow Drawing Area

Use the shapes (representing the various nodes or components of a workflow) on the workflow toolbar to draw a workflow. The shapes somewhat simplify the complexity involved in designing workflows. Workflow shapes and connectors can be selected and dropped onto the workflow drawing area, allowing you to modify workflows as needed.

To open the workflow drawing area, shown in the following figure, create a new workflow template definition or open an existing workflow template definition. Refer to Defining and Maintaining Workflows, for detailed instructions on performing these tasks.

To place a shape in the drawing area, click the shape on the toolbar, place your cursor on the drawing area, and click again to drop the shape onto the drawing area. To move a shape within the diagram, click and drag the shape with your mouse.

Figure 1-8 Workflow Drawing Area

The following table describes the various node shapes that WebLogic Process Integrator provides for workflow template definition.

Table 1-1 Workflow Template Definition Nodes

Symbol	Shape Name	Purpose
	Start	Indicates the start of the workflow.
	Task	Defines a task in the workflow.
	Decision	Represents a condition in the workflow that evaluates to True or False. (If the condition is verified, it is True. If it is not, it is False.)
	And	Allows joining of one or more task, decision, or event with an AND condition.
	Or	Allows joining of one or more task, decision, or event with an OR condition.
	Done	Indicates the end of the workflow.
	Event	Represents an event that can be triggered either internally or externally by an XML message. Subactions can be performed and/or workflow variables can be set as the result of the trigger of the event.
	Connector	Used to connect workflow nodes. The arrow directs you to the subsequent task in the flow. Note: In the case of a Decision, when the arrow is drawn from a Decision shape, the Create Connection dialog box prompts you to specify whether the connection is True or False.

Each decision contains a condition. This condition, if verified, evaluates to True; if it is not verified, it evaluates to False. In a workflow, a decision is followed by one or more nodes, which are dependent on either a True or False condition. Depending on whether the condition results evaluate to True or False, one or more subsequent nodes are instantiated.

Having more than one possible outcome from a decision is not mandatory, since actions can be set to False or True within a decision; also, a workflow can be aborted upon a True or False, in which case there will be no True or False connector resulting from the decision.

Exiting WebLogic Process Integrator Studio

To exit WebLogic Process Integrator Studio:

If you want to save changes to a workflow, right-click the workflow template definition and choose Save from the menu that is displayed.
Select File > Exit, or select the System Close box. A dialog box asks you to confirm your decision; click Yes to exit.

Note: If you try to exit WebLogic Process Integrator Studio without having saved your changes, a dialog box prompts you to do so.