Synchronous Dialog Chains and the UWL

[Alexis Collins]

Mark,

I just wanted to respond to your comment below by giving a different
perspective on this.  I'm in agreement with Greg that it is not
reasonable in the world of HR to expect that admins and managers who
aren't very technical should look at the log.  We have the same issue
here not only with the expense workflow, but with the compensation
approval workflow and the PCR workflows as well.  

For example, HR wants to see who approved a certain employee's
compensation adjustment.  The ID on the record is WF-BATCH.  All they
know is the employee number, so the log is of no help to them because
they have no way to query it.  Hence, we customize the workflows to
update the employee records and create custom reports.  

Perhaps I'm not aware of all the reporting tools available??  

Thanks,
Alexis

-----Original Message-----
From: sap-wug-bounces at mit.edu [mailto:sap-wug-bounces at mit.edu] On Behalf
Of Mark Pyc
Sent: Friday, August 12, 2005 3:13 AM
To: SAP Workflow Users' Group
Subject: Re: Synchronous Dialog Chains and the UWL

G'day Greg,

A bit of an unhelpful soapbox comment but why MUST the agent's id be
listed as the approving agent. One of my little missions in the world
of workflow is to change that attitude that the changed by field can't
be WF-BATCH. It's really only a training issue to get people to look
at the log. I know about the comments that it's more clunky to get to,
but how often do people really look at that info?

My 2p.

Have fun,
Mark

On 8/11/05, Gregory Utley <Gregory.Utley at citrix.com> wrote:
> Hi Mike,
> 
> Step two (of the two-step process) must retain the same approving
> agent's userid (not WF-BATCH) as step one, so running in background is
> not an option.  Step two (executes method APPROVE in BUS2089) is a
> standard SAP method that applies the approving agent's userid to the
> activity log in PR05 (T&E).  This passing of the executing agent from
> one step to another, then executing the next step without stopping, is
a
> key feature of synchronous dialog chains that was lost with the move
to
> the UWL.  That said, I appreciate all input because I could be
> overlooking another, simpler solution than the one I chose.
> 
> Greg
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: sap-wug-bounces at mit.edu [mailto:sap-wug-bounces at mit.edu] On
Behalf
> Of Mike Pokraka
> Sent: Thursday, August 11, 2005 5:37 PM
> To: SAP Workflow Users' Group
> Subject: Re: Synchronous Dialog Chains and the UWL
> 
> Hi Gregory,
> I've a feeling I'm asking the obvious, but can you not make the update
> step a background task?
> Cheers
> Mike
> 
> Gregory Utley wrote:
> > All,
> >
> >
> >
> > A question to all:  We are soon implementing the SAP Portal.  For
the
> > most part, we've had no problems with workflow applications in the
> > portal environment, and the consolidation of agent approval
> > notifications in the UWL is an improvement over using system
dependent
> 
> > SBWP inboxes.
> >
> >
> >
> > The one major downside for workflow in the portal (specifically the
> UWL)
> > is the loss of "synchronous dialog chain" processing (OSS Notes
794439
> 
> > and 487649).  The standard SAP travel expense workflow depends upon
a
> > two-step approval process (approve, then update the employee master)
> via
> > workflow.  With the loss of synchronous dialog processing, the
> "update"
> > step goes into READY status in the UWL instead of just executing
> > automatically as it did before.  The bottom line: the approver must
> > approve twice.
> >
> >
> >
> > I wrote a program that will run periodically in background to
identify
> 
> > these READY update tasks and trigger them.  This solves the problem
> (the
> > approver only approves once), but it's not an optimum solution since
> it
> > leaves the update task in the approver's UWL inbox until the
> background
> > program runs.
> >
> >
> >
> > If anyone else has run into this problem and solved it in a more
> > efficient way, I'd love to hear from you.
> >
> >
> >
> > **Greg Utley**
> >
> > **C****i****TR****!****X Systems, Inc.**
> >
> > **SAP Development Team**
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
>
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