Wouldn't it be nice.... possible agents of Deadlines

[Trant, David]

I think this is the same issue I posted a couple of weeks ago (text and the=
 one response I got copied below).  Can anyone from SAP comment?  Is this s=
omething that should be posted to OSS or raised at a future influence sessi=
on?
 
Thanks,
David
 
Original response/message (and by the way John, thanks for the suggestion, =
but it won't work for us since the deadline is going to the original recipi=
ent list, which is built on a combination of the org object and possible ag=
ents ... if I created an org unit, then I'd just use that for both; this is=
 analogous to our planned long-term solution which is to migrate to respons=
ibility rules ... I'm thinking there is no quick fix and we'll just have to=
 wait for our long-term solution to be developed):
 
David,
 
In Deadline monitoring, you can assign "the recipient of message when lates=
t end missed" based on an Org unit.  If you do the assignment by org unit, =
this might be a quick solution to your problem.
Hope this works for you,
 
 
John Scheinoha
Briggs & Stratton Corporation
(414) 256 - 5136
scheinoha.john at basco.com
 
>>> David.Trant at andrew.com 11/26/03 09:32AM >>>
Can anyone confirm whether my interpretation of deadline processing using o=
rganizational objects is correct?  We are on 4.6C and here is the scenario:
Before responsibility rules were either available or understood (before my =
time in workflow, anyway), we created workflow A that uses a role with an o=
rganizational object that has plant and division as keys.  Org unit A was c=
reated for this workflow and has everyone associated with the process defin=
ed within that structure.  Then, another relatively inexperienced person cr=
eated workflow B based on the same design principles.  Workflow B uses the =
same org object, and a different org unit, call it B, containing the people=
 associated with process B.  After org unit B was populated, we started not=
icing sporadic deadline messages from process A showing up in the inboxes o=
f people associated with process B.  Note that workflow B is not yet active=
; just having org unit B populated in production is sufficient for the role=
 resolution from A to start finding the new people defined for B.
My analysis indicates that when a step in workflow A determines agents, it =
applies the role to find all people (A or B) associated with a given plant =
and division, and then restricts the list according to possible agents, whi=
ch has been assigned to be org unit A.  Likewise, a similar step from workf=
low B would also resolve to the same list of people from the role, but then=
 restrict the results to just those listed in org unit B.  This seems to wo=
rk fine.
The problem occurs the deadline is reached for this step.  The latest end t=
ab has the same role defined for the recipients of the deadline message (th=
e process is to simply remind someone that there is work to do rather than =
escalate to someone else).  At this point, the message is going to everyone=
 associated with that plant and division from both org units A and B.  My g=
uess is that SAP's mindset is that while the original activity is intended =
to go to a select group of people as defined in agent assignment, that in g=
eneral it might be desirable to send escalation messages outside that origi=
nal group.  The system therefore seems to ignore the possible agent restric=
tion and simply send the deadline message to everyone identified by the rol=
e resolution.  The online help for deadline maintenance doesn't go into thi=
s level of detail.
Can anyone verify whether my interpretation is correct or not?
Does anyone have a quick fix suggestion?  Our anticipated solution is to co=
nvert to responsibility rules, which we've decided to do anyway long term f=
or these workflows, but this is likely to take a while.
Thanks for your help,
David
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 -----Original Message-----
From:   SAP Workflow [mailto:Owner-SAP-WUG at MITVMA.MIT.EDU]  On Behalf Of Mar=
k Pyc
Sent:   Wednesday, December 03, 2003 5:51 AM
To:     SAP-WUG at MITVMA.MIT.EDU
Subject:        Wouldn't it be nice.... possible agents of Deadlines
 
G'day all,
 
Not really a question for I fear I know the answer, but wouldn't it be
nice if you could specify the possible agents of a Deadline notification.
I have a situation where I'm using a job (Buyer) as the Possible Agents of
a task, and a rule which determines an Org Unit based on a Purchasing
Group. The combination of the two gives me the Buyer for a given
Purchasing Group. Next comes the deadline which I want to send to a
different job (Source & Supply) in the same Org Unit.
 
Unfortunately I have to go and create a programmed Rule which will utilize
the PGrp rule and delimits it based on Job. If I could specify the
possible agents of the deadline message I could use the same clean
solution as for the basic Workitem.
 
Oh well...
 
Have fun,
Mark
 
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