Race condition in a workflow

[michael.mcley@daimler.com]

Mike,

Oooh, that sounds like a good idea!  Would you mind elaborating a little 
more on the "conditions job" (its name, a program name, something...)?  I 
guess this is something I should look for in SM37, just not sure what to 
look for...

I am using task conditions in this workflow, but these are "complete work 
item" conditions that will cause a step to be bypassed (completed) if that 
step is not relevant for this instance of the WF (for example, we don't 
need higher levels of approval if the dollar value of the invoice isn't 
that big...).

Thanks for your help.
 
Michael McLey 
MBUSI - IT Parts & Administration 
Mercedes-Benz US International, Inc. 
1 Mercedes Drive 
Vance, AL 35490 
PHONE:  (205) 462 - 5239 
EMAIL:   michael.mcley at daimler.com   



wug at workflowconnections.com 
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11/11/2010 05:18 AM
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Re: Race condition in a workflow






Joe's suggestion is good, but if your archivelink WF is too generic then a
less kludgey version of your option 3 is to use a step condition to ensure
adhoc objects exist.
If you haven't used them before: Conditions tab on the first step that
uses adhoc objects; and make sure the conditions job is running.

Cheers,
Mike


On Wed, November 10, 2010 2:25 pm, michael.mcley at daimler.com wrote:
> Wuggers,
>
> I have set up a new workflow for the approval of parked invoices.  Only
> invoices for specific types of purchase orders (service) get parked for
> approval.  It seems I have a race condition that was not detected during
> user testing.  The race is between the start of the approval workflow 
and
> the scanned document association with the SAP invoice.  Some more
> details...
>
> 1. When an invoice for a service PO arrives, 2 processes are kicked off
> simultaneously:
> a) the invoice approval workflow
> b) the association of the scanned document (archivelink) with the SAP
> invoice object.
> 2. Sometimes the scanned document association completes first, in which
> case an entry in the AdHoc objects container item is made, and a 
hyperlink
> to the scanned document appears in the subesquent work items in the
> invoice approval workflow.
> 3. Other times the approval workflow starts before the association
> completes and no scanned documents are found -> no hyperlink in the work
> items.
> 4. The approvers require the link to the scanned document so they can
> review the vendor invoice before approval.
>
> I was wondering if anyone else has seen a similar problem and what was
> done to correct.  Some things I thought about:
> 1. Triggering the workflow off the BUS2089.ASSIGNED event (this event is
> generated when an association is made between the archivelink document 
and
> the SAP object) - this probably is not a good idea as all invoices
> generate this event, but not all invoices go thru the approval workflow.
> 2. Including a wait step for the BUS2089.ASSIGNED event - probably not a
> good idea as the workflow could hang in those cases where this event is
> already generated when the approval workflow starts
> 3. Create a loop to test the adhoc objects container element for entries
> and loop until there is one - this would probably work, but it seems a
> little, well..., kludgey.
>
> Can anyone give me some advice on correcting this issue?  Your help is
> appreciated.
>
>
>
> Michael McLey
> MBUSI - IT Parts & Administration
> Mercedes-Benz US International, Inc.
> 1 Mercedes Drive
> Vance, AL 35490
> PHONE:  (205) 462 - 5239
> EMAIL:   michael.mcley at daimler.com
>
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