Don't forget WIS

Thu Apr 10 05:22:31 EDT 2003

Michael,

I believe people usually forget about WIS once they hear about it in the
early workflow implementation stages. Only after some time inevitably the
question comes up: "How good/bad are we?". That's when WIS comes handy as
the first rough-cut reporting tool. And that's where I think it usually
stops -- exception reporting etc. are usually not used AFAIK. Which is
probably because you need to be really commited to active process monitoring
/ improvement in all areas in your company. I believe the approach has been
widely accepted in QM circles (production-related), but is still far from
deployment in administrative areas -- the core of most WF implementations.

Habits win,
Tomasz

-----Original Message-----
From: Michael Pokraka [mailto:workflow at quirky.me.uk]
Sent: Wednesday,9. April 2003 17:16
To: SAP-WUG at MITVMA.MIT.EDU
Subject: Re: Don't forget WIS

Funny you should mention that, just this morning was on the topic of whether
to use WIS or not... Currently client isn't running WIS, but this may just
be the type of thing that can make it worthwhile.
Out of interest, are there many people that use WIS's 'monitoring' type
functionalitly - Exceptions / Early warning system and the likes? What sorrt
of experience, any use?

Cheers
Mike

On Wed, Apr 09, 2003 at 03:57:48PM +0200, Soady, Phil wrote:
> Don't forget the WIS for reporting.
> There is a user exit to fish out your variables from the container
> at the time the WIS data is written.
>
> That way special report on your data not just the technical data in a
workflow
> is possible in the WIS.
>
> Worth the effort once people want to report of business processes and
workflows
> and to do so effectively you need to calculate values, or at least use
your container
> variables from WorkItems.
>
> Start with RMCADATA,
> then run MCAH, MCAI MCAJ to get a feel of what's possible.
>
> The Help (CD or SAPHELP site) has details on the user exit.
> A sneaky way to have good reporting on Workitems with YOUR custom data.
>
> Standard WIS analysis is as boring as bat shit.
> But the tool for displaying and the possibilities with real
> data is something else.
>
> That's why I like the user exit.
> You will also need to look at creating your own evaluation
structure.(sorry).
>
>
> Cheers
>
> Phil
>
>
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Michael Pokraka [mailto:workflow at quirky.me.uk]
> Sent: Monday, April 07, 2003 8:16 PM
> To: SAP-WUG at MITVMA.MIT.EDU
> Subject: Re: Variable deadlines...
>
>
> Hi Richard,
> I was planning on both - using the WF reports and probably coding some
custom ones for the users to run for themselves. I suppose it would not be
too difficult to add up the durations of all tasks under one flow to get the
total time.
>
> I'm trying to stay with SAP's reports as far as possible though as they
offer far more flexibility than I could knock up in the day or so I'd be
allocating to writing my own report. There is that aspect of the lazy user
who takes ages appearing busier than the efficient user who does more items
in a shorter time - according to any SAP-reports...
>
> Also, it's about 20-30 tasks that need this type of setup, so for now I'm
still thinking about this one...
>
> Thanks for your input..
> Cheers
> Mike
>
> On Thu, Apr 03, 2003 at 10:38:03AM -0600, Richard Marut wrote:
> > Mike,
> >
> > That's correct - each would take at most one day. If your stats
> > capturing is using the Workflow log, then you will show excessive
> > activity each day rather than on the actual day that the deadline
> > should occur according to your requirements.
> >
> > Were you planning to use the log or create your own report for
> > reporting your stats? I have a hand written list of steps that I would
> > need to code to produce my own statistics report. I could send it to
> > you if you're interested. I would need a day or two to locate it.
> >
> > Richard...
> >
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: SAP Workflow [mailto:Owner-SAP-WUG at MITVMA.MIT.EDU] On Behalf Of
> > Michael Pokraka
> > Sent: Thursday, April 03, 2003 7:37 AM
> > To: SAP-WUG at MITVMA.MIT.EDU
> > Subject: Re: Variable deadlines...
> >
> > Hi Richard,
> > I like the theory, but one thing bothers... A minor requirement is
> > that stats are quite important , which would be skewed if I understand
> > this correctly - each task would be take at most one day, correct?
> >
> > Thanks for the useful input,
> > Cheers
> > Mike
> >
> >
> > On Wed, Apr 02, 2003 at 12:41:50PM -0600, Richard Marut wrote:
> > > Michael,
> > >
> > > I'm ready to do the same thing where I have deadlines of 3, 5 and 8
> > days
> > > for the same task. My solution and design is:
> > >
> > > 1. Create a table that defines the deadlines. This is to allow
> > additions
> > > if needed in the future.
> > > 2. Set the deadline at the task to 1 day.
> > > 3. Create a new method that reads the deadline table and determines
> > > if the actual deadline is reached. 4. Put the new deadline
> > > determination method/task after the task with the deadline.
> > >
> > > I'm going to manage this by using a container element that I
> > > increment each time the deadline is reached. If I find a match
> > > between the deadline element and one of the deadline table entries,
> > > then I do my escalation of notifying the appropriate person(s)
> > > otherwise I loop
> > back
> > > to the task with the deadline.
> > >
> > > Richard...
> > >
> > >
> > > -----Original Message-----
> > > From: SAP Workflow [mailto:Owner-SAP-WUG at MITVMA.MIT.EDU] On Behalf
> > > Of Michael Pokraka
> > > Sent: Wednesday, April 02, 2003 11:11 AM
> > > To: SAP-WUG at MITVMA.MIT.EDU
> > > Subject: Variable deadlines...
> > >
> > > Greetings all,
> > > I have a design issue with not-so-nice solutions and wonder if
> > > anyone may have better alternatives:
> > >
> > > Scenario: Many tasks, all call same method.
> > > Depending on an object attribute, different deadlines are to apply
> > > to each step (We have a 'deadline matrix' of flow type and task).
> > >
> > > Thus a 'Normal' obj will have 3 days, 2 days and 5 days for the
> > > first
> > 3
> > > tasks.
> > > A 'Partial' obj will have shorter deadlines (2,1 and 3 days) and so
> > on,
> > > a 'Rush' shorter again (not quite accurate - in reality we have 15
> > > different types).
> > >
> > > Since the methods are all the same, I would need to pass a
> > > parameter, thus requiring a seperate step before each task, calling
> > > a 'GetDeadlineForTask' method of sorts. At 30-odd steps, this
> > > becomes
> > both
> > > annoying and ugly. Does anyone have an idea on how to accomplish
> > > this with an attribute? I could of course create 30 deadline virtual
> > > attributes but even that is not really all that nice either....
> > >
> > > Any ideas welcome...
> > > Cheers
> > > Mike