Name: Recapping Workflow Management for Workflow Automated Actions in SAP Commerce Cloud
Uploaded: 2024-7-15
Duration: 442 s
Description: In this video, you will learn about the Workflow concept in SAP Commerce Cloud. You will get an overview about the key features of Workflows extension, and how to manage them within the Backoffice application.

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<div><div><div><div><div><div><div>In this video, you will learn about the Workflow concept in SAP Commerce Cloud. You will get an overview about the key features of Workflows extension, and how to manage them within the Backoffice application.</div></div></div></div></div></div></div>

Recapping Workflow Management for Workflow Automated Actions in SAP Commerce Cloud

Hello Everyone, in this video we are going to talk about workflows.  The SAP Commerce workflow extension enables modelling and processing of workflows which are usually made up of Backoffice-related user interactions for collaborating on a task.  The key features of the workflow functionality enable you to  design human- and system-based workflows  assign actions to specific Principals, that is: Users or User Groups  attach task-relevant items to a workflow  attach comments to an in-process workflow start and track a workflow via Collaboration Center  Let us review the basics of creating and working with a workflow in the system.  After logging-in to Backoffice, you can expand the collaboration center on the right-hand side.  It has 2 tabs: one is WORKFLOWS, and the other is TASKS.  Currently there are no workflows running nor are there any tasks assigned.  Let us go through the essential kinds of components that make-up a workflow design.  First, is an Action component.  It represents one of the tasks or steps in a sequence to be performed by a collaborator.  For example, the AddDetail task, followed by the CheckChanges task.  If the collaborator deems the changes from the previous action to be correct, then the workflow finishes with the “I am Happy” task.  The Happy task is not actually a task to be performed by anyone, but rather, it represents an end state.  The second kind of component is the assigned Principals.  Each Action will be assigned to the Principal who is meant to perform the Action.  (Think of this as a collaboration role).  The third kind of component is Decision.  When a Principal finishes an action, then a Decision must be returned.  This is necessary to trigger the workflow to transition to one of the next Actions in the sequence.  Let’s explore this further.  In Backoffice, I’ll search for Workflow Templates  A workflow template is a workflow’s definition.  It can be defined entirely at runtime via Backoffice.  It consists of a composition of the kinds of components we mentioned moments ago.  Let me create a new WorkflowTemplate.  I’ll give the id and name as TestWorkFlowTemplate and click Create and Design.  This will open the workflow designer.  I’ll add the very first action: adddetails , and set the id as adddetails. Set the user as detailManager,  The action type is ‘start’.  The name as ‘add details to products’.  The next action is checkchanges.  Let me assign it to a qualityManager and choose the action type of ‘Normal’.  I’ll set the name to ‘check changes of products’.  Lastly, I’ll create an End node for the happy state, and assign it to Backofficeworkflowadmingroup.  Being an end node, it doesn’t really matter who it’s assigned to.  Keep the action type as End, and name as happy.  Let me add decision that is doneadding and connect it, via edges, between ‘AddDetails’ and ‘CheckChanges’.  Then create another decision that is ‘Reject details’ and connect edges between ‘check changes’ and ‘add detail’.  The third decision is ‘approve details’ and connect edges between ‘check changes’ and ‘happy’.  Now we have completed building a workflow template as per our requirements.  When you click on save, the workflow template is persisted.  Later, when I click on it, in case I want to edit it, it is recommended to use the pencil icon to open the workflow designer.  Because the workflow designer is much more user friendly and intuitive than the normal editing mode, via clicking the three dots beside the workflow actions and editing from there.  Don’t forget an important step: go to the Administration tab and set the property, Visible for principals to productManager and click on Save.  Only then will the productManager be able to manage workflows based on this workflow template.  The Backoffice workflow template designer, as we saw, is a visual editor for creating or editing workflow templates.  We can add, edit, or delete workflow components.  It supports drag and drop.  Also, it optimizes visualizing of active workflow instances.  For example, if we change the position of the actions or decisions in the graph, then the new positions will be remembered.  The next time anyone opens the workflow template in the editor, it will be seen with the last saved component positions.  Thus, keep the graph neat and clean, so that it is easier to view the workflow structure and understand its underlying logic.  Now let us log in Backoffice as the productManager, and select the authority group as Backoffice Workflow Administrator Group.  I’ll switch to the product cockpit, then click on the products node to find a product I want to assign to a workflow.  To create a new workflow, I’ll open the collaboration center, drag the product and drop it onto the plus button. I’ll use the previously created TestWorkflowTemplate and click next.  While observing the product is attached as a workflow item, I’ll click on next, type a simple description, and finally click on Start to create and start the workflow.  Here, if the workflow was not started immediately, it would have been found in the Prepared tab.  But because I clicked the Start button just now, the new workflow is in the Running tab.  Let’s see how the new workflow is used by Backoffice users.  I’ll log in as the detailManager, and observe that, on the right-hand side, on the collaboration center icon, there is a numeric value “1”, that means, there is one task.  I’ll click on it and see that the task is to add details to specific products.  Let’s assume that I have added some details and put a related comment to notify the subsequent workflow user about the progress of my task.  And then in the right-hand side in the decisions tab, I can select the predefined “done adding details” decision to confirm that I finished the task.  I’ll log in again as productManager.  In the collaboration center, I can observe the running workflow: one person has finished adding details, and now it is in the "in-tray” of the quality manager to check the changes.  I’ll log in as the qualityManager.  In the collaboration center I can see one task to check the details.  Once I finished checking the details and type in a relevant comment, I’ll select an appropriate decision: either approve the details or reject the details.  This is how a typical workflow collaboration works within Backoffice. Thanks for watching.