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| iPlanet Process Manager, Version 6.5 Process Express User's Guide |
Using Process ExpressProcess Express is a web-based mechanism for routing forms from one person to another to complete a business process. A process is a series of work items, or tasks. These tasks are defined in a process map using Process Builder software. Users who have a role to play in completing a process use Process Express to organize, view, accept, search for, and delegate their individual work items. Some Process Express users can also initiate new processes.
In iPlanet Process Manager, each process is completed through the use of a Process Manager application built to specifically handle the process.
Process Express has three main sections:
- The Work Item List This list contains all the work items assigned to a Process Express user. It shows information about each work item and is the place from which the user can view, accept, and delegate work items.
- The New Process Wizard This is a set of pages that takes users through the steps in initiating new processes.
- The Search Form This form allows users to search for information on work items and processes.
This document provides instruction for users of Process Express to complete their work items and processes.
The document includes the following sections:
- Understanding Work Items and Processes
- Accessing Process Express
- The Work Item List
- The New Process Wizard
- The Search Form
- Important Terminology
Understanding Work Items and Processes
A work item is a specific task in a series of tasks and a process is a series of work items. In the sample Time Off Request application there are four work items:
- the employee initiating the request
- getting their manager's approval
- the employee providing additional information for clarification
- getting HR's approval.
The process is this whole set of work items from beginning to end.
The following steps explain what happens in a typical process:
- A Process Express user initiates a process.
- A work item appears in the Work Item List of the first person to play a role in the process. If the work item can be completed by any member of a group, it appears in each member's list.
- If the work item is assigned to a group, one member of that group accepts the work item. When a group member accepts a work item, he or she claims the responsibility for completing that item and the item disappears from the Work Item Lists of all other members of the group.
- The person or group member completes the required action for that work item.
- The work item appears in the Work Item List of the next person or group to play a role in the process.
- Steps 3, 4, and 5 are repeated until the last person or group in the process has completed the required action.
- The process is complete.
Accessing Process Express
Process Express is the web-based application that Process Manager end-users access to view, accept, search for, delegate, and create processes and work items.
Each Process Express user has a customized Process Express client and a User Name and Password for accessing that client. Users access Process Express through a web browser.
The URL that end-users access for Process Express depends on the implementation of iPM clusters an Administrator sets up. There are two possible cluster implementations:
- Single Cluster
- Multiple Cluster
Table 1 shows the information a Process Express user needs to access the Process Express client based on the above cluster implementations. Your Process Manager Administrator should set you up with an account (User Name, Password, and Cluster Name, if needed) and tell you which URL to use.
To access Process Express
- Enter the correct Process Express client URL in the location bar of your browser.
For a single cluster:
http://server_name/Express.npm/
For multiple clusters:
http://server_name/ProcessExpress.npm/
A login screen appears.
- Enter your Process Express User Name and Password.
If you access the multiple cluster Process Express client, enter the name of the cluster you want to access.
- Select Login.
Your Process Express client appears. Figure 2 shows a sample Process Express client.
Handling Work Items Assigned to You
Once a work item is assigned to you or to a group that you are a member of, it appears in your Work Item List. If it is assigned to only you, the item remains in your list until you complete the required action for that item or until you delegate the item to another user. If the item is assigned to a group that you are a member of, and another member of that group accepts or delegates the item, the item is removed from your Work Item List and is assigned to the person who accepted it or to the person it was delegated to.
You handle your work items from your Work Item List using the drop down list on the top right. Figure 1 shows the drop down list.
Figure 1 The Action Drop-down List
The items in the drop-down list are:
View Item You can view a work item before you work on it. This feature is particularly useful if a work item is assigned to a group to which you are a member. You can view the item to determine if you want accept it. If a work item is assigned to a group, you cannot edit that work item's form until you accept the work item.
Accept Item When you accept a work item, you claim responsibility for completing it. Once you accept a work item, you can edit it. Work items that are only assigned to one person do not need to be accepted by that person. They are automatically accepted by that person and the form for the work item is always editable.
View Details and History You can view the history and details of a work item to better understand the process that the work item is part of. The history and details include information about who initiated the process, when it was initiated, and what other work items have been completed as a part of the process.
Delegate Item You can only delegate a work item if the application was designed to permit you to do so. You delegate a work item when you want to assign it to someone else. When you delegate a work item, it disappears from your work list and appears on the delegated person's work list. If you have authority to delegate a work item, a Delegate button appears in the action bar on the work item's form.
The Work Item List
The Work Item List contains information about all work items assigned to you. To access your Work Item List, select the Work Item List tab in Process Express. From this list, you can perform the following actions:
- Viewing a Work Item
- Accepting a Work Item
- Viewing Details and History of a Work Item
- Saving a Work Item
- Delegating a Work Item (only if you have permission to do so)
- Specifying How Many Work Items Appear in the Work List
Figure 2 shows the Process Express client and Work Item List for a user named Administrator.
Process Manager supports parallel processing and subprocesses.
Parallel processing allows the process to have multiple simultaneous work items. For example, in the Office Setup application, ordering a phone and getting a computer for the new employee can occur simultaneously. Thus, the work list in Figure 2 has two separate work items for process ID 33: Install network connection and order computer.
A subprocess is a work item that invokes a completely separate process instance that might have several work items of its own. The work item in the parent process does not get completed until all the tasks in the subprocess have finished and the subprocess process instance has exited through one of its own exit points.
Figure 2 The Work Item List
The Work Item List contains the following information for each work item listed:
Process The name assigned to the specific work request or business process instance that the work item is a part of. For example, according to this work list, offices are being set up for these users: bogey, John Smith, and Howard Jones.
ID The number that identifies the process instance.
Application The application used to handle the process that this work item is a part of.
Required Action The action required to complete this work item.
Priority The level of importance assigned to this work item.
Due Date The date by which the required action must be taken. Once the due date for a work item has passed, that item becomes expired. However, unless an administrator suspends it, the user can still accept and finish the required action for the expired work item.
There are also several icons used in the Work Item List:
Viewing a Work Item
You may want to view the form for a work item if the work item is assigned to a group that you are a member of. You can view the item to determine whether you will accept it. For information about accepting a work item, see "Accepting a Work Item".
To view a work item
- Select the Work Item List tab in the Process Express client.
- Select the radio button next to the work item you want to view.
- Select View Item from the drop-down list on the top right of the form.
The form for that work item appears.
Or
- Select the Work Item List tab in the Process Express client.
- Select the name of the work item that you want to view.
The form for that work item appears.
The form you view varies depending on whether or not you have accepted the work item. If the work item is assigned to a group that you are a member of, but you have not accepted the item, you cannot edit the form. The action bar appears at the top of the form and contains at least an Accept button. For information about accepting a work item, see "Accepting a Work Item".
The form displayed for a work item you have accepted is editable. The action bar appears at the bottom of the form and does not contain an Accept button. Figure 3 shows the form for an accepted work item.
Figure 3 An Accepted Work Item.
Accepting a Work Item
Accepting a work item causes the work item to be active. In other words, you are able to edit the form for that work item. Before you accept a work item, it is available, but not active.
If a work item is only assigned to you, the item is automatically considered accepted and the form is editable. You must manually accept work items only if they are assigned to a group. When a work item is assigned to a group, one member of the group must accept the work item.
When a work item is assigned to a group of users, and one of those users accepts the item, the work item disappears from the work item lists of all other members of the group. The work item is then only assigned to the member who accepted it.
To accept a work item
- Select the Work Item List tab in the Process Express client.
- Select the radio button next to the work item you want to accept.
- Select Accept Item from the drop-down list on the top right of the form.
The editable form for that work item appears. The action bar is at the bottom of the form and does not contain an Accept button. Figure 3 shows the form for an accepted work item. For information about working on this work item, see "Working on Your Accepted Work Item."
Or
- Select the Work Item List tab in the Process Express client.
- Select the radio button next to the work item you want to accept.
- Select View Item from the drop-down list on the top right of the form.
The form for that work item appears. The form cannot be edited. The action bar is at the top of the form and it contains an Accept button.
- Select the Accept button.
The editable form for that work item appears. The action bar appears at the bottom of the form and does not contain an Accept button. For information about working on this work item, see "Working on Your Accepted Work Item."
Working on Your Accepted Work Item
The form for an accepted work item is editable. You need to edit this form and select an action from the action bar at the bottom of the form to complete the work item and remove it from your Work Item List.
A work item's form may also have a comments text box. The comments you enter into this text box are recorded to a history log. They do not appear in the form for the next work item in the process.
Important You must select an action from the action bar before exiting an edited work item form. If you do not select one of these actions, the changes you made to the form are not saved.
Note By default, work items assigned to only one Process Express user are accepted by that user. The form for that work item is automatically editable.
Viewing Details and History of a Work Item
The history of a work item can be helpful in understanding how a work item fits into a process. It can help you to understand your role and the roles of others in completing the process. It also shows you who created the process and when it was created.
Figure 4 The Details and History page
Details and history information includes:
- the name of the process that the work item belongs to
- the application
- the date the process was initiated
- the date the process was last modified
- the due date of the work item
- the status of the work item
- the history of the work item that shows the current step, the description of the work item, and the user to whom the work item is assigned
To view the details and history of a work item
- Select the Work Item List tab in the Process Express client.
- Select the radio button next to the work item for which you want to view the details and history.
- Select View Details and History from the drop-down list on the top right of the form.
A history dialog box for the selected work item appears.
Or
- Select the Work Item List tab in the Process Express client.
- Select the radio button next to the work item for which you want to view the details and history.
- Select either View Item or Accept Item from the drop-down list on the top right of the form.
The form for the selected work item appears.
- Select the View Details and History link at the top of the form.
A history dialog box for that work item appears.
Saving a Work Item
The process designer can design an application to give you permission to save a work item. If you have permission to save the current work item, a Save button appears in the action bar on that work item's form. When you save a work item, you do not have to complete your task at that moment, but you can return at a later time to complete it.
Delegating a Work Item
The process designer can design an application to give you permission to delegate a work item. If you have permission to delegate the current work item, a Delegate button appears in the action bar on that work item's form. When you delegate a work item, you assign it to another Process Express user. The work item then disappears from your work list and appears on the delegated person's list.
To delegate a work item
- Select the Work Item List tab in the Process Express client.
- Select the radio button next to the work item you want to accept.
- Select Delegate Item from the drop-down list on the top right of the form.
- Select the Apply button.
The Delegate This Work Item form appears
- Enter the user ID or name of the user to whom you are delegating a work item in the Delegate work item to field.
- Select the Find button.
A list of found users appears.
- Select a name from the list of found users.
- Select the Delegate button.
Specifying How Many Work Items Appear in the Work List
Process Express allows you to specify how many work items appear on a page in your work list and then you can page back and forth through the pages of your work list.
To use this feature, access the work list in Process Express by using a fully-qualified domain name, for example, http://abc.mydomain.com/Express.npm in a single default cluster implementation, or http://abc.mydomain.com/ProcessExpress.npm in a multiple cluster implementation.
Note If you do not use the full domain name, for example you use http://abc/Express.npm or http://abc/ProcessExpress.npm, the paging feature may not work.
Figure 5 shows an example of the top of the work list.
Figure 5 The top of the work list
To specify how many work items are displayed on a page, enter the desired number in the Display field at the bottom of the work list and press Return or Enter. The change does not take effect until you press Return or Enter.
Use the navigation buttons at the bottom of the page to page through the work list.
Figure 6 illustrates the Display field and the navigation buttons at the bottom of the page:
Figure 6 The Display field and the navigation buttons
The New Process Wizard
You may have been granted permissions to use the New Process Wizard. The New Process Wizard allows you to initiate new processes. It takes you through a series of forms that help you initiate a new process.
Figure 7 The New Process Wizard page
Initiating a New Process
A process is a series of tasks, or work items, that are completed by Process Express users for an application. The first task is to initiate a new instance of a work request or business process. When you initiate a process, you choose an application and create a new process instance of it.
To initiate a new process
- Select the New Process tab in the Process Express client.
A list of the applications to which you have access appears.
- Select the name of the application that handles the type of process you want to create.
A list of the forms available for that applications appears.
- Select the name of the form you want to use to create the new process.
A form appears.
- Complete the form.
- Select the action you want to take from the action bar at the bottom of the form.
The Search Form
You may have been granted permission to use the Search form. The search form allows you to search for specific work items or processes. From this form, you can search for:
Figure 8 shows the Search form.
Figure 8 The Search Form.
As shown in the above figure, the items on the Search form are:
Show Your Last x Processes Use this radio button and field to search for the last x number of processes you created.
Show All Your Open Processes Use this radio button to search for all of the processes you have created that are not yet completed. The processes can be in states of available or suspended.
Show the Processes You Initiated Between x and y Use this radio button and the corresponding fields to search for all of the processes you created during a certain time period. x and y are dates you enter using the mm/dd/yyyy format.
For example, to search for all of the processes you created between January 1st, 1999 and February 1st, 1999, you would enter 01/01/1999 in the first field and 02/01/1999 in the second field.
Select an Application Use this drop-down list to search for the open processes for a specific process application.
Process ID Use this field to enter the identification number of the specific work item for which you want to search.
Note There are three Search buttons on the Search form; one for each type of search you can perform. Be sure to use the appropriate search button for the type of search you want to perform.
Search for Processes and Work Items
You may want to view the status of a process you created or view the open (not yet completed) processes for a certain application. You may want to look at the status of a particular work item. To find these processes or work items, you need to use the Search form. You can only use this form if the application designer has granted you access to it.
Note You can only search for open processes. If a process is closed or terminated, it does not appear in your search results.
Using the search form, you can search for:
- processes you initiated
- an application's open processes
- a specific process by ID
To search for processes you initiated
- Select the Search tab in the Process Express client.
The Search form appears.
- Select a radio button to specify which processes you want to search for in the top section of the form.
You can search for:
The last x processes you initiated - where x is a number you specify
The processes you initiated between x and y - where x is a beginning date and y is an end date in the mm/dd/yyyy format.
- Select the Search button in the top section of the form.
The Search Results page appears showing only those processes you searched for.
Figure 9 The Search Result page
To search for an application's processes
- Select the Search tab in the Process Express client.
The Search form appears.
- Choose the name of the application for which you want to find all processes from the drop-down list in the middle section of the Search form.
- Select the Search button.
The Application Search form appears.
Figure 10 The Application Search page
- If the form has editable fields, enter the appropriate value into the fields. You may enter text into the fields to find an exact match, or you can use the % character as a wildcard for substring matches.
- Select the Search button.
An Application Search Results list appears that contains only those processes that you searched for.
To open a specific process by ID
- Select the Search tab in the Process Express client.
The Search form appears.
- Enter the process identification number in the Process ID field at the bottom of the form.
- Select the Search button.
The form for that process appears.
Figure 11 The Viewing a Work Item page
Important Terminology
Application A Process Manager application defines the tasks, routings, and assignments in a business process. Designers use Process Builder to create Process Manager applications.
Builder The builder is the person who uses Process Builder to design the software, or applications, to handle processes.
Group A group is a group of people with the ability to perform a certain role or activity. For instance, all members of the Art Department group have the ability to create the graphics for their company's documentation.
Parallel processing application An application that branches between two or more branches so that two or more work items can execute in parallel.
Process A process is a series of tasks, or work items, that can be completed by Process Express users through a process application.
Process Builder Process Builder is the part of Process Manager used to design and build the Process Manager applications.
Subprocess A fully functional process that is called from within another process. The process that calls the subprocess is the parent process and the subprocess is its child process.
