This document includes the following topics:
IBM WebSphere MQ Workflow V3.6 - Portal Client allows you to access your WebSphere MQ Workflow system from within WebSphere Portal Server. The functionality is similar to the IBM WebSphere MQ Workflow Web client. Using these functions, you can execute your business processes modelled in the workflow system. Like with the WebSphere MQ Workflow Web Client, you can customize the look and feel of the Portal Client, and can extend it's functionality.
If you have already customized JSPs for the Workflow Web Client, you can also use them in the Portal Client. How to reuse your existing JSPs is described in Converting your existing Web Client JSPs for use with the Portal Client.
The following figure illustrates the structure of the WebSphere MQ Workflow Portal Client.
Two types of Workflow portlets run in the WebSphere Portal Server:
The List Portlet instances are used to display all Workflow information related to lists. They allow users to work with activities that are assigned to them, and to create and start Workflow processes. Users can also create, modify, and delete lists. You can select from five predefined list views:
The ActionPortlet instances are used to process the actions that are triggered by mouse clicks in the ListPortlet. When an action is triggered in a list portlet, a free action portlet capable of handling the action is located using the Workflow Portal Client's interportlet communication mechanism, and a message is sent to that portlet to trigger the appropriate interaction with the Workflow system. If no suitable action portlet is available, the user gets a warning that she must first complete a previous action to free-up a portlet. When successful, the responses from the Workflow system are displayed in the action portlet, when the portal page is aggregated in response to the user request. When a user finishes an action in an action portlet, the portlet becomes 'free', and is available for further actions. You can use the 'edit' mode of the action portlets to specify which types of command each portlet instance can and cannot handle. If you wish, you can assign certain actions to a particular portlet.
To make full use of the portal's capabilities, you can and should include several action portlet instances on a portal page. These portlets use the Web Client BuiltinHandler to interact with the Workflow system using the Java API and MQ messages.
The architecture of the Workflow Portal Client allows CommandHandlers and viewers that were originally written for the Workflow Web Client to be reused in a portal context. You can use a new viewer interface, JSPPortletViewer, to generate portal specific views of the data in the Workflow system.
IBM WebSphere MQ Workflow V3.6 - Portal Client requires the following prerequisites:
For version 3.6 of the MQ Workflow Portal Client, there are no known restrictions at the moment when writing these instructions. Check the ReadMe for last minute information
How to use IBM WebSphere MQ Workflow V3.6 - Portal Client is described here.
If you have already created Activity Implementation and Process Start JSPs for the WebSphere MQ Workflow Web Client, you must perform the following steps before you can use them in the Portal Client:
Name of DefaultPortletAction | Implied actions |
---|---|
cancel | This action type is used for commands that only require the default view to be displayed again, and do not need to inform other instances about any changes. For a List Portlet, the default view is the most recently displayed list. For an Action Portlet, the default view is generated by ActionPortletNotUsed.jsp. |
free | This action marks an Action Portlet as free, resets the Action Portlet view to the default view generated by ActionPortletNotUsed.jsp, and refreshes all List Portlet instances on the page. |
list | If an action of this type is triggered in a List Portlet, the command is executed and only the list view is updated. |
select | This action type causes an MQWFPortletMessage to be sent to a free Action Portlet. When it receives the message, the target Action Portlet sets its status to 'used', it executes the command contained in the message, generates a new view showing the results of the command, and refreshes all List Portlet instances on the page. |
cancelRequest | This action type is used by commands that require the views of used Action Portlets to be updated, for example, terminate/delete ProcessInstance or cancelCheckout triggered from a worklist. A message is sent to the Action Portlets to display either the canceled work item or other information related to a terminated process instance, and all List Portlet instances on the page are refreshed. |
Each method in the IBM WebSphere MQ Workflow V3.6 - Portal Client API is described here.