AW: Portals and Workflow

[Mark Pyc]

G'day Alan,
 
Can you please confirm this for me. I've had the Portals team upgrade to=20
the latest release (only available for about a week) but it is still not=20
working as I'd expect.=20
 
There is the main section titled 'Work Item Details' with subheading 'Task =
 
Description'. This task description section ignores all line break=20
formatting in the text. It has been possible with the Portal team=20
performing a little hack of a flag to get it to recognise <BR> breaks in=20
the text, but this is painful at two levels. One the team is not happy=20
about changing the standard i-view settings (don't know enough to use the=20
appropriate jargon) and Two because it means having to include <BR> tags=20
in the task descriptions (either on a '(' line or between '<(><BR><(>'=20
tags).
 
Just beneath this section is a link 'Work Item Details (SAP GUI for=20
HTML)'. This takes you to the technical work item display, which is much=20
better than the 'User View without Active X'. Within here the description l=
ooks fine and the navigation issues I=20
complained of in the initial mail (1 or 2 lines only displayed at once)=20
are resolved - Nice! You can here also select the menu option 'Workitem >=20
Object > Display', and this link works fine also, it's just not very=20
intuitive.
 
Below this again is another major section titled 'Object List'. This is=20
where I expect to be able the hyperlink to display the default method of=20
the object. The objects involved are listed, however in the latest version =
 
it shows only the object name and not key. Although I can't verify this, I =
 
think the version before listed the object key (which makes sense).=20
However when you select the link a new dialog is opened which states:
 
~~~~
Information=20
No link generated=20
Check the log file for details=20
~~~~
 
The portal team have identified the log entries they believe this to be=20
referring to:
~~~~
Info            Object "Invoice Line Item: "(ZRSEG) is looked up for newer =
 
system SAP=5FR3=5FFinancials
Warning Object display transactions "SWF=5FOBJ=5FEXEC=5FCL" or "SWK3" does =
not=20
exist in system SAP=5FR3=5FFinancials.              Display for object=20
"Invoice Line Item: " of Workitem 000000393760 not supported.  Check for=20
webflow plugin
~~~~
 
This Z object does have a default method and the display from the Workitem =
 
in SAPGUI for HTML works fine. Is there any other configuration or=20
installation that needs to take place for this object link to work????
 
Many thanks for tips,
Mark
 
PS Searching the Weblog section of SDN with term 'Workflow' only returns=20
one of your two blogs - both of which contain the term Workflow. Is this a =
 
worry??
 
 
 
 
 
"Rickayzen, Alan" <alan.rickayzen at sap.com>
Sent by: SAP Workflow <Owner-SAP-WUG at MITVMA.MIT.EDU>
14/10/2003 21:44
Please respond to SAP Workflow Users' Group
 
=20
        To:     SAP-WUG at MITVMA.MIT.EDU
        cc:=20
        Subject:        AW: Portals and Workflow
 
 
Bijay,
Please take a minute to read my blog on http://sdn.sap.com (anyone can regi=
ster). The object links in the universal worklist are=20
just about to reach your doorstep (thanks to the feedback from our last=20
ASUG meeting in May),
Alan
 
-----Urspr=FCngliche Nachricht-----
Von: Bijay Shrestha [mailto:Bijay.Shrestha at genmills.com]=20
Gesendet: Montag, 13. Oktober 2003 21:05
An: SAP-WUG at MITVMA.MIT.EDU
Betreff: Re: Portals and Workflow
 
 
Thank you for clarification.
 
Bijay Shrestha
Ph: (763) 764-2201
Pager: (612) 661-2772
Email: Bijay.Shrestha at genmills.com
"WebFlow gets the right information to the right people at the right=20
time!"
 
 
-----Original Message-----
From: Dart, Jocelyn [mailto:jocelyn.dart at sap.com]
Sent: Sunday, October 12, 2003 8:12 PM
To: SAP-WUG at MITVMA.MIT.EDU
Subject: Re: Portals and Workflow
 
 
Hi Bijay,
The display of objects is not available in ITS either, similarly secondary =
 
methods are not available in the web inboxes.  This is due to issues=20
around controlling multiple web sessions.
As the UWL has some sort of hyperlink for objects, suggest you query OSS=20
as to how to use these hyperlinks or build your own.
Jocelyn
 
 
 
-----Original Message-----
From: Bijay Shrestha [mailto:Bijay.Shrestha at genmills.com]
Sent: Saturday,11 October 2003 4:24 AM
To: SAP-WUG at MITVMA.MIT.EDU
Subject: Re: Portals and Workflow
 
 
Hi,
 
I'm currently exploring and testing to implement workflow long term=20
solution via Portal or short term solution using ITS. I'm saying short=20
term because we are already running ITS for other purpose.
 
>From reading your posts, I learned that the display of object can not be=20
done in Portal. Is that correct?
 
We are using Object Image Display 30001128 to display our archived=20
document in iXos. So if it can not be used it's kinda useless for us.
 
Mark, what do you mean by "t's also obviously meant to be possible as the=20
object are listed with hyperlinks."? Can we have hyperlink instead?
 
Bijay Shrestha
Ph: (763) 764-2201
Pager: (612) 661-2772
Email: Bijay.Shrestha at genmills.com
 
 
-----Original Message-----
From: Mark Pyc [mailto:Mark.Pyc at boots.co.uk]
Sent: Friday, October 10, 2003 6:41 AM
To: SAP-WUG at MITVMA.MIT.EDU
Subject: Re: Portals and Workflow
 
 
Excellent tips Joc!
 
However, in the new sexy format all text formatting is out the window. Is
it possible to control line breaks in the long text desciption?? Also the
fear of the object links not working is true. It is possible to go the GUI
for HTML view, but it's not pretty. It's also obviously meant to be
possible as the object are listed with hyperlinks.
 
 
 
 
 
 
"Dart, Jocelyn" <jocelyn.dart at sap.com>
Sent by: SAP Workflow <Owner-SAP-WUG at MITVMA.MIT.EDU>
10/10/2003 08:36
Please respond to SAP Workflow Users' Group
 
 
        To:     SAP-WUG at MITVMA.MIT.EDU
        cc:
        Subject:        Re: Portals and Workflow
 
 
Hi Mark,
Long time no see.
Yes I have customers using the Universal Worklist iview in the portal and
I'm working at one right now.
 
Substitutes - easiest approach to create your own iview/transaction to
support it - either just update HRUS=5FD2 transaction directly or use the
RH=5FSUBSTIT* function modules.  You can then distribute the subsitution to
the relevant systems.
 
Work item display/User decisions - Make sure you have VERSION 2 of the UWL
(released May) and that you set the paramters ITS Mode and User Decision
(something like that) to FALSE rather than true in the UWL configuration.
This gives you the new sexy look and feel for the work item display and
for user decisions which is a huge improvement. For reasons of - keep it
the same as the last version - they default to TRUE which give you the old
less attractive display.
 
Regards,
        Jocelyn Dart
Consultant (SRM, EBP, Workflow)
and co-author of the book
"Practical Workflow for SAP"
SAP Australia
email: jocelyn.dart at sap.com
phone: +61 412 390 267
fax:   +61 2 9935 4880
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
-----Original Message-----
From: Mark Pyc [mailto:Mark.Pyc at boots.co.uk]
Sent: Friday,10 October 2003 4:31 AM
To: SAP-WUG at MITVMA.MIT.EDU
Subject: Portals and Workflow
 
 
G'day Workflowers (no floral reference intended),
 
A few general and a few specific...
 
Is anyone running a Portal productively and using it as the only interface
to Workflow?
 
It is not possible to maintain substitutes via the I-view universal
worklist as I understand it. I also believe this extension was due in the
next release of the i-view but this has been put on hold. What has anyone
put in place to cope with this? Access to SBWP via GUI for HTML does allow
it, however to me it seems that if users are to be trained on this then
the I-view is redundant. Positional substitutes through HR are possible if
a full Org struct is maintained. Alternatively develop a web transaction
to allow updates to HRUS=5FD2 (directly or via
RH=5FUPDATE=5FSUBST=5FLIST=5FSERVER)??.
 
The display of Workitem (selecting the spectacles) through the Portal is
the same as if you select 'User View without Active X' in personal
settings through the GUI. Is this always the case?? The major problem is
that the WI description is limited in size depending on your screen
resolution (between 9 and 12 lines) and if navigate at all (scroll the
text, view the Available Objects tab and return, etc) the size is reduced
to 1 or 2 lines!?!? This seems completely unusable.
 
OSS note 487649 indicates that Advance with Dialog is not possible via the
web. However I've found that Web Transaction steps do Advance with Dialog.
Are there any other treats that make Workflow on the web better?
 
User decisions appear as if 'No HTML in execution of decision tasks' has
been selected. I understand that i-view Universal Worklist task mapping
allows i-view display of decisions, but I believe this precludes the
ability to display any attachment objects (BUS2081 for example). What
solution have you found most effective.
 
Has anyone built custom i-views to cope with any of these issues? Has
anyone developed Business Server Pages? Can anyone give an indication of
development costs / required skill sets needed for success???
 
I apologise for raking over old issues if these have been covered but I've
had little luck with search sap-wug over the last few days, and OSS hasn't
returned any gems either.
 
If you're company has decided that Portals was an unusable solution than I
am equally interested in hearing about it.
 
Have fun,
Mark Pyc
Smoothflow Consulting