The Skelta Workflow.NET Process Designer is the main user interface of Skelta Workflow.NET. The workflow process is designed and deployed from this window. It opens when the Process Designer control is executed from a Web Form in the Web Application.

The Process Designer is an ASP.NET server control that can be embedded in any Web based product, ASP Engine or Web Page. It is browser based requiring no plug-in or IDE. It provides complete drag & drop and link functionalities to design your processes. The Process Designer has two areas:

• Staging Area – Where you can design and save multiple versions of a workflow process design; and
• Deployment Area – Where you can select and execute your desired version. By default Skelta Workflow.NET Engine always executes the latest version.

The Process Designer user interface has four parts –

• the Tool bar
• the Toolbox
• the Design Area, and
• the Properties Pane.

These are described in separate sections. The Process Designer screen is shown here with the Properties pane for Start action.

Process Designer Screen

Tool bar

Tool bar

The Tool bar is located at the top of the Process Designer window. It has the following controls that perform key functions.

Zoom

This dropdown allows you to Zoom In or Zoom Out. You can set the display size of the workflow process design here.

Open

This tool opens an existing version of a process design to view or edit.

Rename

This tool allows you to change the name of the current process design.

Save As

This tool allows you to save the current process design file with another name.

Delete

This tool deletes an existing version of a process design.

Open Deployed

This tool opens an existing deployed version of a process design.

Deploy

This tool deploys the selected version of a process design from the Staging Area, where it will be saved by default, to the Deployment Area, from where it can be executed.

See also Tool bar Popup Windows for more details on the popup windows opened by each tool.

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Toolbox

Toolbox

You can use the Toolbox to access the different actions that can be used to design the workflow in the Process Designer. There are sixteen menu options in four menus in addition to one action that is not part of any menu. These correspond to the standard actions available with Skelta Workflow.NET. A fifth menu – Custom Actions, is added to the Toolbox whenever a custom action is defined for a workflow process. Each menu groups a set of related actions dealing with the following common activities:

Resource Actions

When clicked, this displays a menu with six resource-related actions: Approval, Checklist, Information, Notification, ResourceSet and Task.

Engine Actions

This displays a menu of workflow-engine related actions: COM-Object, Email, ResourceVariable, Rule, Script, Shell, TimerTriggerAction and Workflow.

Data Base Actions

This displays a menu with one database-related action: StatusChange.

Miscellaneous

This menu also displays one action: Synchronize. This synchronizes the execution of different actions.

Link

This tool links the selected action with another action in the workflow. It opens a popup in which you can link the actions.

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Design Area

Design Area

You can create and edit workflows in the Design Area. Initially it displays only the icon for the Start action. You can drag and drop the different actions from the toolbox to the Design Area. This will display the icons corresponding to the selected actions on the Design Area. Alternatively, you can also display the action icons on the Design Area by clicking on the corresponding actions in the Toolbox. After displaying the action icon you can use the Link tool to link it to the workflow.

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Properties Pane

Properties Pane

The Properties Pane at the right of the screen shows the property fields corresponding to the selected action. This image shows the Property Pane for the ‘Approval’ action.

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