eProcess Developer's Guide Overview

This guide provides information for developers who are extending or customizing the Panagon eProcess out-of-the-box (OOTB) applications or who are creating custom workflow processing applications (sometimes called "work performers") for Panagon eProcess Services. Extending out-of-the-box applications may include creating Java™-, ASP-, or COM-based applications for Panagon eProcess Services, modifying the interface to eProcess services, creating new customized Java or HTML (ASP) Step or Launch Step Processors, or modifying and customizing the Java or HTML Step Processor and Launch Step Processor samples provided with the Panagon eProcess Toolkit.

Previous experience with Panagon Web Services, Panagon Web WorkFlo, or Panagon WorkFlo Services is not required. However, you must be familiar with the specific development concepts, technologies, and languages on which eProcess Services is based. If you are planning to develop Java applets or applications, you should also have experience using the Sun Microsystems Java Software Development Kit (SDK).

Topics covered in this overview include:

Overview of This Guide

Development information is provided in the following sections of this guide:

How to Use This Guide

Provides information on the documentation conventions used in the guide, printing the guide or individual topics, locating additional FileNET resources, and how to contact us to send comments or suggestions about the guide. A copy of the Panagon End User License Agreement is also included in this section.

What's New in 5.0

Provides information on What's New in 5.0, which describes the changes to the eProcess API (and other developer-related changes) from the previous Panagon eProcess 4.2.2 release to the current 5.0 release.

Understanding eProcess

Provides an overview of the Panagon eProcess Services architecture, the eProcess Services directory structure and the components you use while developing customized eProcess applications. The section also includes information on the referenced Web Services and Web WorkFlo files used for ASP development. Also described are the tools and languages needed for different development tasks.

Installing Panagon eProcess Toolkit

Describes the Panagon eProcess Toolkit, how to locate and install the eProcess Toolkit, the Toolkit contents, and how to access the eProcess Toolkit Web Services Help.

Developing with eProcess APIs and Samples

Provides information on:

Developing with eProcess APIs — describes the eProcess API Classes and API class relationships and calling sequences, developing for Java, developing for COM, and developing for ASP.

API samples — describes the API samples that are provided with the Panagon eProcess installation and that may be used as a starting point for developing your custom application (includes useful helper classes and information on how to compile and run the samples).

Customizing Java and HTML Applications

Provides information on:

Customizing Java and HTML Processors Overview — provides an overview of customizing Java and HTML (ASP) Step and Launch Step Processors.

Customizing Java Step and Launch Step Processors — includes an overview of the Java Step and Launch Step Processor Toolkit), describes issues on whether to deploy a custom Java Step Processor as an application or an applet, and describes how to use the Java Step Processor samples provided with the Toolkit, and working with the Java UI Toolkit interfaces and beans (to customize the user interface).

Customizing HTML (ASP) Step and Launch Step Processors — includes a description of the HTML Processor Toolkit files, modifying the sample HTML Step Processor, HTML Step Processor File relationships, and similarly with the HTML Launch Step Processor and the HTML Launch Step Processor file relationships.

Deploying Step and Launch Step Processors — Provides procedures on deploying custom Java Step or Launch Processors, signing a JAR file (required for Java Processors), and adding custom Java and HTML Step or Launch Processors to the workflow.

Modifying Email
Notification Messages

Provides information on modifying the email notification message files supported by Panagon eProcess Services, including how to enable SSL for email notification. The section contains reference information for each of the email notification message file types, including information on the localized language versions. How to set up a test mail server to test notifications is also described.

Additional Tips and Procedures

Provides a procedure on how to set up and use ADO to query the eProcess database, which can improve performance on queries on queues, rosters, or logs, where there are large amounts of data to retrieve.

Related eProcess API Documentation

This guide is only one part of the development documentation set you will need to develop applications or applets for Panagon eProcess Services. Additional related eProcess API documentation includes the eProcess API Classes JavaDoc and the Java UI Toolkit JavaDoc API reference documents, which are HTML-formatted documents containing API class reference information taken directly from the Java code (using the Sun Microsystems JavaDoc utility).

The eProcess API Classes JavaDoc and Java UI Toolkit JavaDoc API reference documents are included in the Panagon eProcess Toolkit.

Browser Compatibility

Some navigation components used in guide, like the expandable Table of Contents pane and the Search engine, work best in Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.0 (and later) and Netscape 6.0 (and later). If you experience problems viewing the table of contents or search results, verify that Javascript support is enabled in the browser you are using. If problems persist and you are unable to access the expandable contents pane, switch to an HTML version of the contents.