Activate task

Hi,

I am using WFconstructor to create a flow and invoke the same dynamically. I have to declare a task in the same but the issue is there is a task C... which can be activated only and only when both tasks A and B.. completed.

It means that something like this should come as output.
<activation>
<and>
<pred v = "A"/>
<pred v = "B"/>
</and>
</activation>

Could anyone help me out... as how to declare the task C and define its predecessors A and B with a logical expression as AND.

declare_task ("C", name => "to be activated task", description => "to be activated", type => "externaltask", owner => $my_id, areavpath => $my_path, command => $ext_path", successors => "ends_task", activation => "??", predecessors => "A, B");

- AKs.... The Shadow

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Adam Stoller

Try:declare_task("C",
name => "to be activated task",
description => "to be activated",
type => "externaltask",
owner => $my_id,
areavpath => $my_path,
command => $ext_path",
successors => "ends_task",
conjunction => TRUE);(read the perldoc for more info)

--fish
Senior Consultant, Quotient Inc.
http://www.quotient-inc.com

kaalraa

Thanks Fish,

You have refered ablout the PerlDOC, but i dont have the same. Could you please mail the same to me at achink@mahindrabt.com

Would be grategful to you. Also what if i need the output as such:

<activation>
<and>
<pred v = "X"/>
</and>
<or>
<pred v = "A"/>
<pred v = "B"/>
</or>
</activation>

- AKs.... The Shadow

Adam Stoller

Are you sure you don't have the perldoc for WFconstructor? [do you know what perldoc is? and how it's used?]
What version of TeamSite are you using?

Also, the construct of your hypothetical activation clause is wrong. You have:
<activation><and>...</and><or>...</or></activation>
it would need to be:
<activation><or><and>...</and>...</or></activation>

Off-hand, I'm not sure how you would specify that via WFconstructor, but I haven't needed to do so, so I haven't bothered to figure it out.

--fish
Senior Consultant, Quotient Inc.
http://www.quotient-inc.com

report.bmp

kaalraa

Hello,

For your info, i know what a Perl doc is.. and also thinks that i use the same quite often. As i am a new to work with WFconstructor and using for the first time its usual that i face some problems and issues for the same.

I have some small queries about the same. If you would like to answer then it would be great else don't increase your number of reviews on devnet which is of no use to new joined members.

Thanks to you... as for many times you have helped me a lot.

Queries to those who wants to share their knowledge:
1. As per my above query, how can i get that output.
2. And, i have to link some tasks as conditional tasks. If the approver approves the work done by editors then the task A would be linked to B and so on... else Task A would be linked to C. My query is how to set a variable or value which intimates me whether the approver has rejected or approved the content edited as once the job spec file is invoked... there is no method which can access the same and tell the file to go to task B or C.

- AKs.... The Shadow

Adam Stoller

Are you sure you don't have the perldoc for WFconstructor? [do you know what perldoc is? and how it's used?]
For your info, i know what a Perl doc is.. and also thinks that i use the same quite often. As i am a new to work with WFconstructor and using for the first time its usual that i face some problems and issues for the same.

Okay - I just needed to be sure that you understood what perldoc was so that you're statement that you didn't have the perldoc (or the same one that I referred to in an earlier post) could be qualified. However, you still failed to answer this question:

What version of TeamSite are you using?

Which means that if I were to send you the perldoc for WFconstructor from 6.5 and you're using 5.5.2 - it probably wouldn't be that much help.

I have some small queries about the same. If you would like to answer then it would be great else don't increase your number of reviews on devnet which is of no use to new joined members.

Thanks to you... as for many times you have helped me a lot.

You seem to be blowing hot and cold here - first you insult me by intimating that I am only posting to "increase [my] number of reviews on devnet" - then you're saying "Thanks" to me for helping you out a lot in the past.

Personally, I get nothing - whether you succeed or fail in the project you are undertaking - but you asked a question, I answered it, you asked another one and I responded indicating that I did not have a handy authorative response for you - and then you insult me. Not much of an incentive for me to put any more of my free time towards helping you - is it?

Queries to those who wants to share their knowledge:
1. As per my above query, how can i get that output.

Which output - the incorrect output you posted or the corrected output I posted?

2. And, i have to link some tasks as conditional tasks. If the approver approves the work done by editors then the task A would be linked to B and so on... else Task A would be linked to C. My query is how to set a variable or value which intimates me whether the approver has rejected or approved the content edited as once the job spec file is invoked... there is no method which can access the same and tell the file to go to task B or C.

If you look at the perldoc for your version of WFconstructor - do you see anything about 'type' under the definition of declare_task($id, %properties) ? If not - then it's quite possible that your version of WFconstructor might not support the functionality you're looking for.

--fish
Senior Consultant, Quotient Inc.
http://www.quotient-inc.com

kaalraa

Once again a humble thanks... but my intention was not to insult you or hurt your feelings. But i case you feel so... i can just say a Sorry with a Smile.

Apologies... once again. As far as your queries are concerned we are using 6.5 version and i also tried earlier to use logical type task... but that does not fulfill my requirement as the conditional tasks is external task and how could the job spec file know whether the variable set with in the external .ipl file is a success or a failure.

I hope you understand.... Thanks

- AKs.... The Shadow

Adam Stoller

Could you post the code you tried to use with 'logical' *and* the task declaration with which you wanted to have the logical activation clause associated?

Perhaps you misunderstood the directions in the documentatoin (I'm still not clear about your saying you didn't have the perldoc for TeamSite::WFconstructor - what happens when you type 'perldoc TeamSite::WFconstructor' from a Command prompt?)

--fish
Senior Consultant, Quotient Inc.
http://www.quotient-inc.com

Migrateduser

the logical type task and activations don't care about variables within an external .ipl file...not sure if that's bad english or misunderstanding the function of conditional activations...in any event, here's how you accomplish what it seems you want...

declare a Logical task for the And portion (e.g. LogicalAndTask)
declare a Logical task for the Or portion (e.g. LogicalOrTask)

you also have declared tasks X, A and B, and also task Z that you're setting the special activation on...

to get the right activation that Fish mentioned (such that the task is activated either by X _or_ both A and

, namely:
<activation>
<or>
<pred v="X"/>
<and>
<pred v="A"/>
<pred v="B"/>
</and>
</or>
</activation>

to set that activation on task Z, do the following task linkings (order doesn't really matter):
X -> logicalOrTask
A -> logicalAndTask
B -> logicalAndTask
logicalAndTask -> LogicalOrTask
logicalOrTask -> Task Z

and if you have the WFConstructor.pm module, you should have the perldoc for it since it's built into it...admittedly, I'm on TS 6.1 windows, but it shouldn't change between versions/OS:
"<IWHOME>/iw-perl.bin/perldoc "<IWHOME>\iw-perl\<PATH TO MODULE>\WFConstructor.pm" where on my 6.1, <PATH TO MODULE> = vendor\lib\TeamSite

and of course, you could always just open the WFConstructor.pm in your favourite text editor and read the perldoc entries along with the subroutines ;-) while documentation can be wrong, the code doesn't lie...

cheers,
-Rori

Adam Stoller

and if you have the WFConstructor.pm module, you should have the perldoc for it since it's built into it...admittedly, I'm on TS 6.1 windows, but it shouldn't change between versions/OS:
"<IWHOME>/iw-perl/bin/perldoc "<IWHOME>\iw-perl\<PATH TO MODULE>\WFconstructor.pm" where on my 6.1, <PATH TO MODULE> = vendor\lib\TeamSite

Actually it should be easier: iwhome/iw-perl/bin/perldoc TeamSite::WFconstructor

--fish
Senior Consultant, Quotient Inc.
http://www.quotient-inc.com

kaalraa

Thanks to both of you...really appreciated. Also the reason for asking the perlDOC is we are not accessible to admin directories of teamsite installation.

Also one another problem i am facing is that i want two successors of a particular task. Describing briefly: Task A is a external task, which returns 0 or 1 beased upon the approval and denial of the person. Now how can i get the output of two successors using WFconstructor methods so that if 0 is returned then my first successor task would be activated else if 1 is returned then... second successor would be activated.

When i tried to link the tasks as below...then my get_job_spec function is not working.

link_tasks("Deploy_Skeleton", "Notify_Sucess" , "success notification");
link_tasks("Deploy_Skeleton", "Notify_Failure" , "failure notification");

- AKs.... The Shadow

Adam Stoller

If you link them in that order - it should do what you want.
If it doesn't - you'd need to provide a lot more informaton for us - like showing us both the WFT code and the instantiated job description file.
If you don't have read-access to the iw-perl/*/lib directories on your TeamSite server - get it! or get another job.

--fish
Senior Consultant, Quotient Inc.
http://www.quotient-inc.com

Migrateduser

the order is definitely key for callback 0 to success, 1 to failure...

the main "gotcha" with link_tasks is that you tell it the right parameters...the first and second ones are the names of the declared tasks you're linking...not to be confused with the name attribute of the task...meaning:

declare_task('Name_Here',
name => 'External_Task',
.....and so on....
)

declare_task('Second_Task',
name => 'Deploy',
....and so on....
)

the urge is to use 'External_Task' and 'Deploy' for the linking, which is what you do when you don't use the WFConstructor, but, well, you're using the WFConstructor ;-)

so the actual task linking is:
link_tasks('Name_Here', 'Second_Task', 'transitioning task');

and to second what Fish said, it's definitely a lot easier to provide help if the code that's not working is provided...

cheers,
-Rori

kaalraa

Thanks Rori and Fish,

For your information... i have reached at about 90% of my workflow... the last part is remaining which is attaching the files and workflow variables to the task.

If possible can you just provide me a small brief as what exactly is the difference between using a set_task_variable and add_wfvarstartop. Also what would be a better way to attach the files to each of the task concerned.

- AKs.... The Shadow

Adam Stoller

If you want to attach pre-selected files (or hard-coded or programmatically determined files) to the workflow - you do so with the 'files' and 'file_comments' attributes in the declare_workflow() call [*note* workflow, not task] - they expect a reference to an array:

files => \@list,

set_task_variable, as the name implies, sets a task-level variable - something which is only accessible by that task (or code with access to that task).
add_wfvarstartop is for creating workflow (wf) [or job-level] variables - something which is accessible by any script with access to the job's data object. And as a 'startop' it means the variable would be created/set/deleted [just] *before* the task starts. There is also a 'finishop' variant which performs its actions [just] *after* the task finishes.

In general, files are attached to the job, not the task - however in "classic" wft coding - you can only attach files to a task which has start='t' set.

externaltasks and cgitasks can add/remove files from the workflow (via their task object) within their scripts by utilizing methods in TeamSite::WFtask

--fish
Senior Consultant, Quotient Inc.
http://www.quotient-inc.com

mogoo

After trying this all day, I finally figured out the syntax if you want to have multiple successors (A will go to B OR C) for an externaltask, here's the syntax...

declare_task("RouteJob",
 name => "Route Job",
 start => TRUE,
 description => "Job is being routed...",
 type => "externaltask",
 owner => $iw_areaowner,
 areavpath => $areavpath,
 successorset => {
  "EmailGatekeeper" => "Emails approver group",
  "EmailWeb" => "Emails Web group", },
 command => "$iwperl $lbin/route_job.ipl $route",
 );

...then, in the external script's callback, pass the index# value of the task you want to transition to...

my $n = 0;
if ($route eq "EmailWeb"){
 $n = 1;
 }
my $callback = "$iwhome/bin/iwcallback $taskid $n";

While reading the perldoc is good advice, fish, once again, interwoven has dropped the ball on documentation. After pouring thru the perldoc multiple times with no answer in sight, I figured out the above by lengthy trial and error.

Maybe I should've known this, maybe I missed it documented somewhere, but the answers aren't always in the manuals. Really lame not to document simple syntax and show examples, when there's obviously a standard way to do things.

(This is in no way stink eye to your RTFM comments, fish, but stink eye to IWOV for not W(riting)TFM on WFConstructor in the first place. Frustrating!)

kaalraa

Thanks.. to all who have helped me... at last i acheived the workflow with all variables and tasks running.. gracefully.

- AKs.... The Shadow

awizardly

You do realize that you can instantiate task objects using the task WFtask object and do the callbacks.

use TeamSite::WFtask;

my $jobid = $ARGV[0];
my $taskid= $ARGV[1];
my $area = $ARGV[2];

my $task = new TeamSite::WFtask($taskid);

my $success=0;
.... if something goes wrong set $success to something other than 0....

if ( success eq 0 ){
$task->CallBack(0, "Approved");
} else {
$task->CallBack(1,"Rejected");
}

This methodology is used all over interwoven provided external tasks. In fact if you aren't using the WFTask and WFWorkflow objects in your external tasks, I am curious about how you are interacting with the WF from your external tasks. Is it through CLT's?

There is MANY useful functions that are documented quite well in the Perl Docs.

Also if you want to add files to a payload you can do things like

$task->AddFile($filepath, "dynamically added");

To get files from a task you can do
my @files = $task->GetFiles();

This is all documented.

Lee
Organic Inc
http://www.organic.com

kaalraa

Hi Lee,

Thanks for you response...

As of now, i am using the same but earlier i am trying to use iwcallback on CGI tasks, which are giving me the problems.

- AKs.... The Shadow

awizardly

For CGI Tasks there used to be the iwcallback function inside the CGI_lite perl module, but as of version 6 they recommend against using that syntax and instead using javascript in your cgi tasks.

Take a look at the sample cgi task where it generates a form just for doing the transition and then posts into the /iw-cc/transitiontask Casual Contributor URL.

This is copied directly from the sample cgi

print "<form name=\"transitiontask\" method=\"POST\" action=\"/iw-cc/transitiontask\">\n";

foreach my $key (keys %parameters) {
print "<input type=\"hidden\" name=\"$key\" value=\"$parameters{$key}\">\n";
}

print<<EOS;

</form>

<script language="JavaScript">

document.forms['transitiontask'].submit();

</script>
EOS

}

This syntax has me wanting to rewrite some CGI tasks to use CGI.pm instead of CGI_lite. Alot more built in validation abilities that are alot cleaner than CGI_lite. Transitioning to the next task is as simple as posting to a the Casual Contributor URL when you are done with everything.

Lee
Organic Inc
http://www.organic.com

Adam Stoller

For CGI Tasks there used to be the iwcallback function inside the CGI_lite perl module, but as of version 6 they recommend against using that syntax and instead using javascript in your cgi tasks.

There's still an iwcallback function inside the TeamSite::CGI_lite module.
Who/where is it recommended against using that syntax?

(the other way may be fine - I'm just curious to know from where this information comes)

--fish
Senior Consultant, Quotient Inc.
http://www.quotient-inc.com

awizardly

It isn't a hard statement persay, just an observation from the sample cgi.
There is a commented out callback function call.

The actually implemented code uses a the javascript to post to the transitiontask CC URL.

This is taken from the sample CGI

# Traditional method of transitioning CGI tasks:
# Activate the task callback and display an acknowledgement.
#my ($success, $immediate) = $task->CallBack($transition, $comment);
#write_acknowledgement($success, $immediate);

# TeamSite 6.0 method of transitioning CGI tasks:
# Transition the task by redirecting the browser to a CCI URL.
### ATTENTION: This example writes html for the user to select
### a transition. For your task, you may prefer to
### use the Transition Task UI screen to choose a
### transition.

do_task_transition($transitions[$transition], $taskId, $comment, $donePage);

I interpreted this as the preferred 6.x method for doing transitions especially to allow for immediate=t type functionality.
Maybe I overstated this as a recommendation against, but I certainly see it as a recommendation for using the CC URL

Lee
Organic Inc
http://www.organic.com

Adam Stoller

[From Rori]:

I figured I'd post this potential clarification since it took me a while to grok this together with the documentation to make it work for me.

First, declare your standard tasks:declare_task("part_one_of_two", type => "usertask" , ...);
declare_task("part_two_of_two", type => "usertask" , ...);
declare_task("alternative" , type => "usertask" , ...);
declare_task("next_task" , type => "externaltask", ...);The objective being that next_task should become activated if ((part_one_of_two and part_two_of_two activate it) or alternative activates it).
By default, linked tasks will be combined within a logical or clause.
If you set conjunction => TRUE for next_task then they will all be combined with an and clause.
In order to get the relationship described in the objective, you need to declare a special task just for that purpose:declare_task("logical_and" , type => "logical" , conjunction => TRUE, ...);Once that's done the linking changes from:link_task("part_one_of_two", "next_task" , ...);
link_task("part_two_of_two", "next_task" , ...);
link_task("alternative" , "next_task" , ...);to:link_task("part_one_of_two", "logical_and", ...);
link_task("part_two_of_two", "logical_and", ...);
link_task("alternative" , "next_task" , ...);
link_task("logical_and" , "next_task" , ...);and that is how you get the complex logical association between tasks.

Hope this helps ....

--fish
Senior Consultant, Quotient Inc.
http://www.quotient-inc.com