Is there an on-page connector element/diagram when creating the workflow?

Q&A
1

Good Day,

I have a workflow with 5 tasks (A, B, C, D, E). When the user starts the process the form for task A is initially displayed. I have buttons in the form to indicate the next task to be performed – next task can either be B C D E. Each task would contain buttons to navigate through the 5 tasks. Each task would also have a Submit and Cancel button. My current workflow is so cluttered already. Is there an on-page connector or other similar elements we can use to simplify/de-clutter the diagram.

Thank you.

Best Regards,
Alfred Ayson

2

Hi,

I’m adding this to be the answer as to the actual question of the post:

Is there an on-page connector element/diagram when creating the workflow?

In short no, which means your diagrams will be as big as they need to be.

I would add this to the Ideas forum so Bonitasoft can consider it for a future release.

That being said…and from my point of view as helper in this regard:

I would suggest the first mistake is not having a full clear picture of the full process, you said Yes these are separate tasks. at the end of each task we plan to have connectors run (emails and scripts) at finish.

Adding this detail later will make the whole process much more complex to manage/develop. It would be better to try to detail this as much as possible before beginning and then crunch it down to a minimum set of requirements. For example we had something similar, but with 500 x 2 processes, potentially 1,000 diagrams.

But when we looked at it, and through careful design, changed it into 2 diagrams and 5 subroutines! Much better, faster and easier to manage. That was us and may not be possible in this case.

That was one issue we had with process design.

Our second was much more subtle…

Questions we asked ourselves (and the users)…

Do you really have to email after each task (A, B, C, D, E)?
Do the scripts change the data/operation of the process at all?

If these two questions can’t be answered very well then I would question their need at all.

emails->what is the justification for emailing after each task execution or can one email be sent at the end of the process?

scripts->what do the scripts do, if they’re not dong anything useful do they need to be there?

You should ask the same because what we found changed everything. In the end the process was a SINGLE STEP Process (I’m simplifying) with 7 FORMS. The users saw each form as a step in the process…wrong. 7 forms make up a single process. This may not be true in your case but bare it in mind…

We then looked at what was required, 7 steps, each with a next, previous, save, quit and continue buttons. It would be easy to accommodate your Next Task logic (A=(B, C, D, E), B=(A, C, D, E), C=(A, B, D, E), D=(A, B, C, E), E=(A, B, C, D)) in this way.

This design is based on One UI Form using hidden fields, see here

We we have only One submit at the end and One email at the end.

We do however have 6 scripts after each task that manipulates the data between steps as well. This is code in the Next/Previous buttons we developed for our requirement.

Tremendously powerful once you get round the idea, and can be made extremely complex with AJAX/REST calls to the host if required.

Good question though, and probably with an answer you may not have thought of.

I think, in this case you have a simple process with lots of forms, like we did, rather than a complex process with lots of different outcomes…

Hope this helps and gives you some ideas,

regards
Seán

PS: While I understand this may not be the answer you’re hoping for, it does indicate a possible route to the solution, please mark as resolved.

3

And now for Answer two

This is based on CMMN (Case Management Model and Notation) which is really the type of processing you are doing:

Separate each and every task into a separate diagram/pool, then add buttons that START and assign the follow-up PROCESS with a MAP. Don’t use Signal - not in this design.

This will enable you to do what you want. We use this with our 2 diagram model into 1,000 virtual diagrams. This works well when assigning to others, but not so well when only one person is doing it.

For example - Single UI Form - One process case - One interaction - and repeat in still only one case
This example - multiple Processes - multiple Cases - multiple Takes - and repeat with multiple cases

So if your user did this
Single UI Form A-B-C-D-E-A-D-B-C-A-E-Submit → One case, One email
Start Process A-B-C-D-E-A-D-B-C-A-E-Submit-> 11 Cases, 11 UI Takes->11 Submits->12 emails

It becomes clear the former is better than the latter.

Process design very important…

regards
Seán

PS: While I understand this may not be the answer you’re hoping for, it does indicate a possible route to the solution, please mark as resolved.

4

I tried to use throw and catch interrupt events but encountered issue when navigating/moving from task-to-task after several steps. My process becomes completed/ends.

Steps:

  1. Start the workflow (Task A appears)
  2. Click Task D button
  3. Task D appears
  4. Click Task A button
  5. Task A appears
  6. Click Task C button
  7. Task C appears
  8. Click Task B button
  9. Task B appears
  10. Click Task A button

Result: Process ends

5

It seems that the signal event can only be used once even though that the workflow throws signal every time the buttons are passed.

6

@Alfred. Are these separate tasks or is the same person doing them one after the other?

Once this is understood I can give you a direction.

regards

7

@sean

Yes these are separate tasks. at the end of each task we plan to have connectors run (emails and scripts) at finish. Apologies for not being clear on that.

Yes also that that this will be performed by the same person.

thanks and best regards