An attachment is a link to information a participant uses to complete a step in a workflow. For example, in a workflow for processing insurance claims, the submitted claim form and associated medical reports could be attachments.
In the workflow definition, the author defines attachments and indicates the steps at which each attachment is used. In the insurance claims processing example, the medical reports are used in the medical review step but not in the policy verification step.
For a workflow system, the specific item an attachment links to is called a target. The most common target is a document stored in a Content Platform Engine object store, or in a Content Services (CS) or Image Services (IS) library; however, document arrays, stored searches, folders, URLs, or files located on a shared disk can also be targets.
In defining the workflow definition, the workflow author can assign a specific target to an attachment, or, for more flexibility, allow the target to be assigned when the workflow is launched or in progress. The following scenarios illustrate each case:
For example, in a workflow for approving travel requests, the policy manual on travel reimbursement could be included as reference material. Since the same policy applies to all employees, the workflow author creates an attachment named TravelPolicyManual and assigns the actual policy document to that attachment in the workflow definition.
For example, in defining a workflow that circulates press releases for approval, the workflow author defines an attachment named PressRel. The author does not assign a specific target to the PressRel attachment; instead, the author puts instructions in the launch step prompting the person who launches the workflow to assign the target.
For each step in a workflow, the workflow author specifies the following:
Note the difference between access to an attachment and access to a target. The participant's access privileges for the target determine the operations he or she can perform on the target (such as opening or modifying). Access privileges on the target are not part of the workflow definition; if the target is a document in an object store or library, for example, the user's access to that document is specified in object store or library.