I'm try using Workflow Foundation (WF 4.5), in particular I'm interested in state machines. The purpose would be make it easier to navigate a complex state machine.
I started with this tutorial, then I tried to create a macro-state and I found that, once entered in the inner state machine (placed in the "Entry" of the macro-state) any transition, both internal or from bookmarks, from the macro-state to to other states were not executed. the machine is stuck in the inner state-machine.
Here my attempt of hierarchical states:
Does anyone know if WF support the hierarchically nested states (as from UML standard) and how to allow transition directly from macro-states? (without using FinalState as workaround)
Thanks everyone
Workflow does support nested states.
and as for the reason of workflow stuck in inner state-machine your inner state-machine is like an infinite loop so it won't come out.
Related
I need to create an application to auto generate C code. ie. User can design the logic from the G-UI using basic blocks from C. This is similar to Matlab Code Generation. I need to do this using .net framework. When I search for the samples, I've seen about rehosting workflow foundation. I don't have any idea about WF4. Can you please anybody tell me is it possible to do the designer(Design is like flowchart) using WF4? And also I have seen some samples using MFC? I'm not sure which one can be applicable for my situation..
I think you are confusing the Flowchart and Rehosted Workflow designer in WF as some kind of UI to draw the flowcharts.
Workflows are meant for executing business process and the different blocks like If-Else
While etc help to implement a business logic.
Workflow Designer just provides a visual way of representing those if else / whiles etc so that developers and possible super users of the application can modify the business logic in a more visual manner instead of writing them using code.
Is it possible to place an item in workflow from the event system? The problem I am facing is that we would like to direct components to two different workflows based on what folder they are in (instead of what schema they use), which the Tridion UI doesn't seem to support. I was hoping to write an event that is triggered on check-in of a component, so I can then determine which folder that component is in and direct it into the appropriate workflow from the event.
I'm fine with creation of the event, I'm just totally lost on where to start as far as adding the item to workflow goes. I have looked at the TOM.NET API documentation but really haven't found anything that helps. Any assistance or examples would be appreciated.
As #Jeremy suggests, what you are actually trying to do is not possible.
However you can achieve the same outcome by making the second step of your workflow an automated decision which creates 2 separate workflow branches within one workflow process definition. Your automated decision can read the Org Item of the component and direct it accordingly.
This is not possible - a Component is only added to a WF process when it is saved and its Schema has an associated process definition.
We are in the process of designing a web site were users can fill an application form and submit it. Once an application is created, it goes through different departments for review.After each review, the department persons log on to the website and update the status of the application. Once review is completed, the application is said to be 'approved'. Also, communication(email) is sent to the applicants updating them about the status of their application.
I am thinking of using Windows Workflow for this application, but am new to it.
Can anyone tell me if it would make sense to use WF for such an app..or would it be an overkill..I was thinking of using a State machine workflow, as each application created goes through different states. One of my major concerns is, this process also involves manual work such as reviewing the application(this could take days) and then updating the status(say by clicking a button on the website). Can workflow handle this kind of thing?
I have gone through many websites, but they talk about very basic examples where states change automatically.But in my case there is a lot of human interaction.
Any help is appreciated
Thanks!!!
Here is a sample on MSDN that describes a very similar workflow that you've described - although they use a Windows Forms client rather than a web client - but those details shouldn't matter given the use of the Workflow Runtime.
I would say that your situation would be well suited to Workflow - long-running workflows are supported by having the runtime automatically persist workflow details at certain points while it runs, so steps that take days or weeks to fulfill are perfectly fine.
"my case there is a lot of human interaction".
That's the easiest kind of thing to build. It's just transactions.
Each stage in the process is a simple web application.
Fetch all items that are waiting at this state. Display them in a list. User picks one.
Display that piece of work. User makes changes. Saves it. Some change will move it to the next state. It's still just an update.
That's it. Nothing fancy.
You just need to very, very clearly define each state.
You must have a simple query that finds work in this state.
You must have a simple update that moves work on to the next state.
The states must be very, very clear and simple definitions. One column with a state name, for example.
The state transition rules, however, may be complicated. If the work is highly manual, it may be as simple as a drop-down list of available states.
If the state transitions are complex, then, perhaps you need something more sophisticated to embody the transition rules. But since it's manual, you don't need much.
Do I need a separate workflow instance for each application created?
I don't know what this can possibly mean. Each "application" that's moving through the pipeline of manual processing steps has a "state" -- the step of the pipeline where it's waiting, right now.
Each application also has a complete history of each state change. I don't know which of this is a "workflow" that could have an instance. They're just states of being of an object.
It is a web application. So it will have some other logic such as view an appln., navigation etc. do I need to accommodate this in the workflow as well?
Yes and No. Yes, each processing stage which show the application so the user at that stage can do whatever value-add thing they do. They add information or they approve information.
Each stage in the workflow is a place where some human being makes a decision and takes an action. So each stage displays all the information the person needs to make the decision. There's no additional view required.
Navigation isn't terribly interesting. People go to pages to see their queues of unprocessed work. I guess you'll have to build a page with some URL's, but there isn't much to that.
Would it be ok to have just a part of the application based on workflow.
Sure. Why not? I'm not sure I understand the question.
Your web apps just queries a queue of stuff out of the database and present that queue of stuff to a person. The person can request details and make changes to a specific item in the queue. One change the person can make will be to move the stuff out of their queue and into someone else's queue.
This isn't very complex. It shouldn't be. What's hard is defining the allowed state changes.
I've been working on a Flex component and I'd like to write some automated tests for it. The trouble is, the UI testing tools I've looked at (FlexMonkey and Selenium Flex API) don't simulate "enough":
Most of the bugs which have come up so far relate to the way Flex deals with dragging and dropping, which these libraries can't simulate accurately enough. For example, I need to test a case where there is a "drop" event which occurs in the bottom half of a component – neither FlexMonkey nor Selenium Flex API can do that (they may simulate a mouse event, but they won't include coordinates).
So, is there any "good" way to automate that sort of testing?
Edit: After much research, it looks like the only piece of software that can do this is iMacros, which is Windows-only and the interface is... Lacking. So I'm going to be writing my own. Basically, it will put an HTTP interface on java.awt.Robot so code (in any language) can simulate mouse/keyboard events. If you're interested, PM me and I'll keep you updated.
Edit 2: I have published the first version of the framework I wrote, Blunderbuss, over at BitBucket: http://bitbucket.org/wolever/blunderbuss/ . You'll need Jython to run it (http://www.jython.org/), but after that the flex-client example should work.
Videos of Blunderbuss live over at Vimeo:
Automating Flex testing with Blunderbuss
Blunderbuss test suite running
At the moment this remains a proof-of-concept, as I haven't had the cycles to clean it up and make it more useable… But maybe enough people bothering me would give me that time :)
I've used Eggplant to test Flash and AIR apps without having to add any hooks into the code. It's a great tool but it's quite expensive. It simulates a real user by VNC-ing into a system and uses image recognition - among other things - to interact with the app.
I am definitely interested in your custom Java class, and (though I am not the best at Java (yet...)), I would be willing to help out if you're thinking of making this collaborative.
As to Flash MouseEvents. Unfortunately, there really isn't an accurate way to simulate the drag/drop experience in Flash. MouseEvents, when generated by the mouse, are handled in a very different way than regular events and while you could simulate actions by passing events into the handling functions, or by making the dispatcher fire a new DragEvent( DragEvent.DRAG_DROP..., it will not be the same as having the user interact with it. And for some functionality (like gaining access to the clipboard), nothing inside Flash will accomplish your goals.
To be honest, you're probably headed in the right direction -- using something which is not written in Flash to drive faked mouse events is probably your best bet.
I've never had to use it in Flex but i recently stumbled across some info on automation packages in the MS Surface SDK... after looking into it those classes automated user behavior which can be used for testing i.e. move a fake mouse to this point, perform this action. As you're using Flex mx.automation packages and classes. My guess (and hope) is that you'd be able to achieve what you want using these classes.
You could also try auto-hotkey - it is similarly a macro-editing program but it has proven to be very efficient and you can write scripts and set it up very easily.
I am working on a design spec for a new application that will be heavily workflow driven.
Before I re-invent the wheel, is there a decent lightweight workflow engine that plugs into ASP.NET already around?
Basically, I'm looking for something that handles moving through a defined set of workflow pages while handling state management automatically.
If this isn't around already, I'll definitely try to abstract the engine from my app and put it on codeplex, as it would be really handy.
Any suggestions?
Note: .NET 2.0, so no WWF, though I think WWF is overkill for my needs.
EDIT: Seems like there is a legitimate need for this, and there isn't a product out there...So I might build this.
Here is what I'm picturing:
Custom Page class called WebFlowPage
All WebFlowPage's are registered in a Workflow mapper.
Each WebFlowPage has some form of state object.
A HttpHandler handles picking the appropriate WebFlowPage based upon the workflow, and populating it from the state object.
Is the workflow dynamic, or static?
If the workflows are simple, you could roll your own workflow engine.
In certain situations, it can be fairly simple, and just a couple of data tables to handle the rules, processing and state.
Alot of workflow engines are built for large scale processing (credit card applications, for example). For small scale, you should at least consider your own, which would eliminate the overhead and dependency of/on an engine.
Not sure exactly what you wish to do here, but Ra-Ajax can easily keep state at least if you want your solution ajaxified...
For reference purposes you might want to check out the Ajax Calendar sample or even the (banalistically implemented) Ajax Wizard sample. It surely beats the hell out of doing it with JavaScript...
And every time you "do something" you're in "server-land" which means you can store temporaries all the time as you wish...
The project is LGPL
(PS!
Yes I do work with it)
Building a custom workflow engine is not trivial, although it may seem simple at first. We've tried that. It depends a lot on the complexity of the logic you need it to cover.
Given the current state of the Windows Workflow Foundation and the lack of another framework that abstracts the workflow concepts, I would choose WF if you need complex logic, asynchronous handling or branches in your workflows.
Tracking your state through the workflow can be accomplished by carrying some kind of xml payload or storing the state in a database,
If your workflow is actually a sequential set of forms that need to be filled in by the user, tracking the steps and guiding the user to the next step can be accomplished with some simple custom solution.
You could take a look at the InRule engine too.
Also, there is nxBRE.
These too are mostly used for business rules.
InRule is proprietary, whereas nxBRE supports RuleML (the defacto standard).
You might need to make your own implementation for the pages, and use the rule engine as the "structure".
At this moment, I know that Sharepoint 2007 supports page workflows (using WF), but this would imply using .NET Framework 3 and deployng sharepoint.
My suggestion would be to use whatever you find more light and easier to use.
I think the term "workflow" is very open to interpretation. I have been working lately with a type of workflow that is very different from what you seem to be describing. Mine is a state machine based workflow where the state of a particular record determines what actions a user can take to move the record to the next step in the business process. So "workflow" in this instance means how the record flows from one state to another until it is finally completed.
Your usage of workflow seems to have more to do with moving a user from one page to another in a linear multi-step process, which is a completely different use case (correct me if I'm wrong). So before coming up with a general purpose "workflow" engine that anyone could use, I would recommend defining a little bit better exactly what types of situations this system would handle.
I've been using this for a few months http://objectflow.codeplex.com. Not asp specific but it may fit your needs
While browsing the web for some workflow & BPM resources, I found the following project: NetBPM. Unfortunately, the project seems to be stopped.
I don't think there is a workflow engine that will automatically handle state for you, but if you are moving through a set of pages like a process such as checkout on an ecommerce site, perhaps the ASP.NET wizard control could help you?
There are few workflow options. "Aspose" and "Skelta" are the offers I´m evaluating.
Fábio
you can use WorkFlow Engine, just read the document and run the Demo.
all of the features you need for a dynamic workflow engine they added in there.