Before Getting Started

Before you start using Change Activity Planner, ensure you have the necessary privileges and familiarize yourself with the CAP terminology.

Change Activity Planner Roles and Privileges

For security purposes, Change Activity Planner provides the following roles:

EM_CAP_ADMINISTRATOR
EM_CAP_USER

The EM_CAP_ADMINISTRATOR role grants the CREATE_JOB, CREATE_CAP_PLAN, and BASIC_CAP_ACCESS privileges. To create, create-like, edit, and delete plans, you must have been granted the EM_CAP_ADMINISTRATOR role. The EM_CAP_USER role grants the BASIC_CAP_ACCESS privilege only. Without the basic access privilege enabled, you will be unable to access Change Activity Plan and My Tasks features.

Change Activity Planner security model adheres to owner-based management. Object level privileges are currently not supported.

Change Activity Planner Terminology

The major concepts in Change Activity Planner are plans, task definitions, task groups, and tasks. This section explains these concepts in detail.

Plan

Plans introduce new changes into an organization, and specifies the start and end date for the required changes. It identifies the set of changes that are required, as well as the targets where the changes are needed.

To create plans you must have been granted the EM_CAP_ADMINISTRATOR role. (See 'Privileges and Roles' in the Oracle Enterprise Manager Cloud Control Administrator's Guide for additional information.) Once a plan is created, it is possible to monitor the progress of the plan. A plan is considered complete once all tasks that make up that plan are closed.

The following terms are used when working with plans.

Plan Term	Description
Activation in Progress	Plan is in the process of being activated. Tasks are being created. Plan cannot be edited.
Activated	Plan definition is complete and the plan has been activated. Activation means that tasks have been created and you can start managing the plan's progress.
Overdue Plan	An Active Plan which still has open tasks but has passed the Plan's scheduled end date.
Due Within One Week	Active Plan which is due within seven days.

The various statuses of a plan are:

Plan Status	Description
Active	Plan for which tasks have been created, and which is already in progress. A plan is also considered active if the plan has been activated, and CAP is in the process of creating tasks. While CAP is creating tasks, the plan's progress will be displayed as 'activation in progress'.
Completed	Plan is complete. All tasks are completed or canceled.
Deactivated	Plan was activated but then canceled. All tasks associated with the plan are canceled. The plan can still be viewed in the Change Activity Plans page, and operations such as Create Like, Manage, and Delete are available. You can view the Manage Plan page for Deactivated Plans.
Definition in Progress	Plan has been partially defined and saved for later use. Edit the plan to continue or complete its definition, and to activate it.
Failed in Activation	Error occurred when the plan was being activated. The Comments and Audit Trail or the log files will have more details on the error.
Pending Activation	Plan has been scheduled to be activated at a future date.

Task Definition

The description of one step of the work to be accomplished to meet the plan's goal.

The action described in the task definition can be associated with a target type, or the target type can optionally be set to None which means that no target will be associated with the task. This is usually the case when the task defines a manual action, for example 'Get management approval to proceed'. In this case, the task owner will obtain management approval, acknowledge the approval by marking the task as completed, and then proceed with the follow on tasks.

If the task definition has a target type specified, then it can be associated with one or more targets. When a plan is activated, a task will be created for each task definition / target combination. If no target type is specified, then a single task will be created.

A task is given a start and scheduled end date and is assigned to an owner.

Task Type: Specify the type of task to generate for users.
- Custom (or Manual)
  
  Allows you to specify the Action to associate with this task definition. Custom task types also support two modes of verification:
  - Manual
    
    Task owners will have to update the task status.
  - Use evaluation results from the compliance standard rule to update the status. (Only available for task definitions with a target type specified.)
    
    A compliance standard rule can be associated with the task definition. When the tasks are generated, and as work is done on the target, this rule is evaluated and the results are used to determine if the task is still open, or if the task can be automatically closed.
- Patch Plan
  
  This choice integrates with the My Oracle Support Patches & Updates support. A patch template is associated with the task definition, and when you assign your tasks, you can use the template to create and deploy a patch plan.
  
  Both Patch Template and Compliance Rule require a target type selection on which to base the evaluation.
- Job
  
  Enables the plan creator to create tasks based on jobs. In turn the task owner submits a job for the task or associates the task with an existing job execution. Use either the My Tasks page or the Manage Plan Tasks tab for submitting jobs and associating tasks.
  
  A library job must be associated with the task. Only those library jobs whose target type matches the task's target type will be available for selection.
  
  There are a number of ways to specify when a task is completed.
  - Task is marked as complete when the job completes successfully. This is the default. Once a day CAP updates the job-based tasks based on the status of their associated job executions.
    
    To immediately update the status of a job-based task, select the task in the My Tasks page or the Manage Plan Tasks tab.
  - Task is manually marked as complete by the task owner.
  - Task is marked as complete based on the evaluation of a compliance rule.
  Note: When selecting a job for use with a CAP task definition, ensure that task owners have the appropriate access to the job and any appropriate job runs or executions. You can change the access to a job from the Job Library page. When creating a job, or editing the job later, select the Access tab. Add access for the appropriate users. Failure to grant the proper access will prevent task owners from viewing the job associated with their task.
- Deployment Procedure
  
  Enables the plan creator to associate a configured deployment procedure with a task definition. A popup displays the available configured deployment procedures.
  
  Note that only configured deployment procedures will be available for selection. To create a configured deployment procedure, select a procedure from the Procedure Library page. Click the Launch button, fill in the desired attributes, and then save the configuration.
  
  The task owner can associate a CAP task with a procedure run which has been launched from the Procedure Library.
  
  There are a number of ways to specify when a task is completed.
  - Task is marked as complete when the deployment procedure completes successfully. This is the default.
  - Task is manually marked as complete by the task owner.
  - Task is marked as complete based on the evaluation of a compliance rule.
  Note: When selecting a deployment procedure for use with a CAP task definition, ensure that task owners have the appropriate access to the procedure definition and any procedure runs for the selected procedure. You can edit the access for procedure definitions from the Procedure Library page. You can edit the access for procedure runs from the Procedure Activity page. After launching a procedure, Edit Permissions for the procedure execution associated with the CAP task, and grant access to the appropriate administrators. Failure to grant the proper access will prevent task owners from viewing the procedure associated with their task.
Task Status: The task definitions and task groups all have an associated status, indicated by an icon. The status is determined by the status of the tasks that make up the task definition or task group.

Example: If a task definition has four associated Tasks: Task 1 is Unacknowledged, Task 2 is Complete, Task 3 is In Progress and Task 4 is Canceled, then the task definition status will be In Progress.
Dependent Task (or Dependency): Task that cannot be started until another task is complete.

When creating a task definition or task group, you can define a single dependency on another task definition or task group. When the plan is activated, tasks are generated. Task dependencies are determined based on the dependencies defined during plan creation. If a task is dependent on another task, it will be flagged as waiting until that task is complete. If a task is dependent on a task group, it will be flagged as waiting until all the tasks in the task group are complete.

Task Group

A folder containing one or more task definitions and can be used to represent a phase in the plan. When defining a plan, targets can be assigned to task groups. All task definitions within the task group will inherit the target assignments. You can set the task group to be dependent on another task definition or group, providing you a quick way to establish dependencies among sets of task definitions.

The task group is in progress if at least one task is in progress. The task group is completed when all tasks in the group are closed.

Task

When a plan is activated, tasks are created based on task definitions. If the task definition has targets, a task will be created for each licensed target.

The following terms are used when working with tasks:

Task Term	Description
Unassigned	Task that does not have an owner.
Open	Task with a status of Unacknowledged, Acknowledged, or In Progress.
Closed	Task with a status of Completed, Canceled, or Deactivated.
Waiting	Indicates the task is dependent on another task, and the task it depends on has not been closed. If a task is waiting, it is indicated in the Waiting column of the Tasks table. To see details, click on the task. The Tracking section will show information on the task's dependency.
Require Attention	The system checks tasks for certain conditions, and if they are found, the task is flagged as needing attention. The system checks for the following conditions: Is Overdue - Indicates the task is still open and its scheduled end date has passed. Is Due Within One Week - Indicates the task is due within seven days. End Date Beyond Plan End Date - Indicates the task's scheduled end date is after the plan's scheduled end date. Is Unassigned - Indicates the task does not have an owner. Was Completed Out of Order - Indicates the task was set to Completed, while it was still waiting.

The task status shows where the task is in its lifecycle. The task statuses include:

Task Status	Description
Unacknowledged	When a plan is activated, all tasks start as acknowledged.
Acknowledged	Indicates a user has seen the task but has not yet started work on it.
In Progress	Indicates work has started on the task.
Completed	Indicates work on the task is complete. Tasks with automatic verification will enter this status when the system verifies the expected changes were made. For manual tasks, users will have to set the task status to Complete once they finish their work. Once a task is completed, the details become read only. Note: Completing a task cannot be undone.
Canceled	Indicates the work specified in the task is no longer needed, and will not be done. When a task is canceled, the details become read only. Note: Canceling a task cannot be undone.
Deactivated	If a plan is deactivated, all associated tasks are marked deactivated.