Refining a To Do Entry's Details at Creation Time

When a To Do Entry is created, the key information provided to the system are the To Do Type and the drill key, which is the identifier of the object related to the To Do entry. With this information, system logic along with algorithms called at creation time can add details to the To Do entry or update important attributes so that the To Do can be worked on by the right team in the right priority.

The topics in this section will highlight the features provided to further refine a To Do Entry at creation time.

Linking Additional Information to a To Do Entry

Additional information may be linked to a To Do entry using characteristics. This may include master data so that the To Do entry is associated with one or more specific main objects in the system. It may also include other information that is helpful to any user that may be working on the To Do entry.

For manual To Do entries, the valid characteristic types that may be linked to the To Do entry must be defined on the To Do Type for that To Do entry. When create a manual To Do entry, the user populates the related characteristics as part of creating the To Do.

For automatic To Do entries, the program that generates the To Do may link related data to the To Do using characteristics.

In addition, the system To Do Pre-creation plug-ins can be used to link additional characteristics. These algorithms would use the drill key, which is the related object for the To Do entry. Based on the drill key, it can look up other information and create appropriate characteristics. Your specific product may be providing one or more algorithms to determine key master data records associated with the related object. For example, Oracle Utilities Customer Care and Billing provides an algorithm that attempts to link a related person, account, premise, service agreement and service point for that drill key. Other edge applications provide a similar algorithm for their relevant entities.

Any information that your user may need to have to help work a To Do entry should be linked to the To Do via a characteristic. For example, if the Rate Class of an account is important or the amount of the previous bill will help determine the priority of the To Do entry, this information may need to be linked as a characteristic.

Note: With the volume of To Do entries in the system, it is recommended to carefully consider what information you are linking to the To Do as a characteristic. Users can drill down on details when investigating a To Do entry. Only very important and critical information that would help users in reviewing To Do entries in the To Do Management portal and make decisions about prioritization and assignments should be linked as characteristics.

Note, before you can set up these algorithms, you must define the characteristic types that you'll use to hold each of these entities. Also note that it is not necessary to define these characteristics as valid characteristic types on the To Do type.

If your To Do entries reference characteristics that are related to your global context data, you may want to configure an alert algorithm to display an alert if a related entry is Open or Being Worked On. Refer to Installation Options for more information.

Note: Count of related To Do entries. There are some user interfaces that display a count of related To Do entries. This logic looks at foreign key characteristics linked to the To Do entry where the underlying object is a master or transaction object. It counts the distinct list of other non-closed To Do entries that reference the same characteristic(s).

Adjusting the To Do Role

When creating a To Do entry, for a To Do type, there may be attributes of the To Do entry that require that a special set of users work on it. This is sometimes referred to as 'rerouting the To Do entry' to a different role. This section highlights ways to override the role based on conditions specific to a To Do entry.

The information in this section only applies to automatic To Do Entries created by an algorithm or background process. It does not apply to manually created To Do Entries.

Refer to To Do Entries Reference A Role for the hierarchy used to determine the role .

Reroute Based on To Do's Message

As described in Suppress the Creation of the To Do Entry, To Do entries created for a given To Do type may have different messages based on the specific condition for a record. You may decide that based on the message, the To Do should be routed to a specific Role that is more knowledgeable about a specific error condition. The same message override configuration that may be used for suppression of a To Do entry, may alternatively be used to assign a specific Role. For example, if certain bill segment errors are always resolved by the rate specialist team, you can indicate the role for that team on the To Do type, message override.

Reroute Based on a Condition

The To Do Pre-creation plug-ins may be used to assign a specific role based on some condition related to the To Do entry's specific data.

The product provides configuration on access group to define To Do assignment overrides. The override list defines a To Do type and To Do role. This is useful if your product associates access groups with specific master data for row level security purposes and you would also like to direct To Do entries related to this data to a specific role.

Oracle Utilities Customer Care and Billing also defines similar To Do assignment override configuration on CIS division and Account Management Group.

A pre-creation algorithm is responsible for checking if data linked to the To Do entry is related to a configuration object that supports an assignment override and then looks for an override for the To Do type. You can decide if this algorithm should be plugged in at the To Do Type level or the Installation level. The decision is based on how many To Do types you define overrides for. If it's a small number, then it makes more sense to plug the algorithm in for each To Do type that you define an override for. This ensure that the configuration is only checked for To Do entries that will have an override. However, if the number of To Do types that are eligible for overrides is larger or if the list changing or growing often, it may be better to plug the algorithm in at the Installation level to ensure that every To Do is checked for a possible override.

Note: Note that your product may already provide a base delivered pre-creation algorithm that is checking for this override. If so, that can be used by your implementation. If not, your implementation can provide an appropriate algorithm.

To Do Pre-creation Plug-ins

The system provides two To Do Pre-creation plug-in spots that allow for functionality to add or update information on the To Do Entry that is about to be created. The two plug-in spots are To Do type and installation options. In general, the installation option To Do pre-creation algorithms would be used for logic that applies to many To Do types and the To Do type pre-creation algorithms would be used for logic that is specific to that To Do type.

If at least one To Do pre-creation algorithm is plugged in on the To Do type, only those algorithms are executed when creating the To Do entry and the installation option algorithms are ignored. The system provides a base delivered To Do type pre-creation algorithm that executes the Installation option To Do pre-creation algorithms. This allows you to control whether the installation algorithms should also be executed for a To Do type that has specific algorithms and if so, when.

The following points highlight functionality supported by both To Do pre-creation plug-in spots.

Indicate that the To Do entry should be suppressed (not created). The expectation is that this type of algorithm is configured on the To Do type rather than at the installation options level, as this allows for more granular conditions to be checked for a given To Do entry. Refer to Suppress the Creation of the To Do Entry for more information.
Linking context specific data to the To Do entry using characteristics. Refer to Linking Related Information to a To Do Entry for more information.
Overriding the Role of a To Do entry based on specific configuration related to the To Do's characteristic data. Refer to Adjusting the To Do Role for more information.

Assigning a Priority

As described in The Priority of a To Do Entry, a To Do type may reference a Calculate Priority algorithm. If so, this algorithm is called as part of the steps to create a To Do entry. The algorithm may use the drill key or any of the related information linked to the To Do as described above to determine priority information.