Business Activity Monitor example - setup

This topic outlines the process to create a small demonstration using BAM functionality to monitor user-defined data fields in a sample workflow. The workflow consists of three steps that check credit for an incoming customer order, then either ship the order or notify the customer of credit problems. The data in each workflow includes the Amount of the order, the region where the order will be shipped (Location), and a credit value.

This document contains instructions for creating and configuring the data source, and includes links to instructions for using FileNet Application Workbench to set up monitoring of the following conditions:

The general steps to set up the three of the examples are as follows, with details below:

  1. Create and configure the data source:
  2. For each example, use FileNet Application Workbench to define the appropriate query for the BAM event, and to define the dependant views and cubes.
  3. Use FileNet Operational Dashboard to create the appropriate dashboard objects to display the data.

Create and configure the data source

Create the work queues and expose the data fields

  1. In Process Configuration Console, double-click the router.
  2. Select the Server, then create the two work queues, Notify and PackShip.
  3. Select the default event log and display the properties. Specify three data fields: Amount (Integer), Location (String 10), and CustomerID (Integer). These fields will be used in the example workflow and ultimately monitored using the Business Activity Monitor software.

Create the workflow definition

Using Process Designer, create a very simple process - SalesMonitorDemo. The fictional purpose of this process is to receive an order for some product, check the customer's credit, and then either proceed to pack and ship, or notify the customer of rejected credit. To have values to monitor, each order includes a location (N, E, S, or W), and an amount of the order. We also have different queues to monitor—Notify and PackShip, in addition to an Inbox (CheckCredit).

  1. In Process Designer, Workflow Properties, create four data fields. (To avoid entering values at Launch, we initialized the fields with random values as indicated.)
    • Amount (integer)   
      value: random(10000)
    • Location (string)     
      value: translate(convert(random(4),string), "0123", "NEWS")
    • Credit (integer)    
      value: random(10)
  2. CheckCredit step is processed by the F_Originator (Inbox).
    • Ok route - condition Credit >=3
    • Reject route - condition Credit <3
  3. PackShip step is processed by the PackShip queue.
  4. Notify step is processed by Notify queue.
  5. Save the workflow definition
Simple sales workflow

 

Expose the data fields to the Process Analyzer

Use Process Task Manager to expose the data fields to the appropriate cubes in Process Analyzer. See Add, change, and delete data fields in the online Help for Process Task Manager for detailed instructions.

  1. Run Process Task Manager on the Process Analyzer server.
  2. Stop the Process Analyzer.
  3. Right-click on the Process Analyzer Data Fields folder and select New.
  4. Add the data field Amount as a measure, and expose it in the following cubes:

    - Work Item in Progress

    - Workflow In Progress

  5. Add the data fields Location and CustomerID as dimensions, and expose them in the following cubes:

    - Work Item in Progress

    - Workflow In Progress

  6. Restart Process Analyzer.

Launch the workflow to provide the data stream

Start Process Designer, and Launch the SalesMonitorDemo workflow a few times (at least eight or ten) to create a data stream of workflows and work items.

The data fields will be initialized with random values in each instance of the workflow. In Workplace Tasks, you should complete some of the work items in your Inbox—the CheckCredit step—so that there will be work items in the Notify and PackShip queues.

TIP Do not complete the items in the Notify queue or the PackShip queue—in FileNet Business Activity Monitor, we will monitor workflows and work items in progress, not completed workflows.

This completes the setup steps for the data source that will work for all three examples. Continue now with instruction for configuring FileNet Application Workbench for the following examples: