TIME Events

As a developer and object designer you define TIME Events to trigger tasks based on the time conditions you define on this page. If they are met, the actions that you define on the Event Process page are carried out. These actions are usually the execution of further objects. TIME Events are in Sleeping status as long as the frequency and time conditions are not met and change to Active when they are.

You can use the following functions of the Automation Engine scripting language to retrieve relevant data for the Event object:

To Define TIME Event Conditions

  1. Define the Event Process Activation:

    1. In Frequency select the option that determines how often the event object should be activated:

      • Once

        It is activated only once.

      • Repeatedly

        It is activated periodically, depending on the setting you define below.

    2. In Activate indicate when the Event object should be activated. The options available here depend on the frequency you have selected:

      Once:

      • Immediately - it is activated as soon as it is started.
      • After - enter the number of minutes after starting that you want the event to wait before activating it.
      • At - define a specific time. If you choose this option you can indicate when the event should be activated in case it is started after this time:
        • Immediately
        • Wait for the next valid date - it becomes active with the next valid date considering the calendar and time conditions you specify below

      Repeatedly

      Specify when the event should be activated. The options are:

      • In intervals of ... minutes to define a periodicity.

      • At to define a specific time.

      In either case, in First Activation you must then define when the Event object becomes active for the first time, the options being:

      • Immediately
      • After the first interval, that is after the expiration of the first time interval.

    3. Depending on your selection in Activate, you specify one of the following:

      First Activation

      • Immediately
      • After the first interval

      If start time is later

      • Activate immediately
      • Wait for the next valid date

  2. Define the Time and Date Conditions.

    These conditions are always checked and an event will only be triggered if at least one of the them is met or if no condition has been defined here. The current date and time are used as reference. The Time Zone assigned to the event is considered as well. This means that activating an event and specifying a logical time does not make sense.

    Important! Time specifications are checked for full minutes, i.e. the ending time 23:59 hours lasts until 23:59:59. Hence, the event can also be triggered in the last 59 seconds.

    See Tables On Pages.

  3. Switch to the Event Process Page to define the actions that the Event will trigger.

Activating/Executing and Monitoring the TIME Event

Execute the Event object to activate it.

The execution of an Event object triggers the execution of other objects, which in turn trigger the execution of further tasks. The tasks resulting from these executions are displayed in the Process Monitoring perspective on the various lists of Executions related to the Event object. They are children of the Event task and are flagged with a special tag type called !EVNT. The tag lets you check which executions were triggered by a specific Event. For more information, see Monitoring Events and Execution Data.

Execute Event objects in the following ways:

  • Include Event objects in Schedules (JSCH) to execute them automatically at predefined times and/or intervals.

  • Insert Event objects in Workflows (see Workflows (JOBP)).

  • Manually execute, restart or stop Event objects. For more information, see Executing Events.

To check the number of times the system checked the Event, go to the Check count section in the Details of the object. For more information, see Viewing Object and Task Details.

Note: If a Time Event is activated outside the Time and Date Conditions, it will be activated immediately after the first time interval has passed.

Monitor the Event

Immediately after executing the object, you can start monitoring the Event. Right-click the object and select Monitoring, Show in Process Monitoring and open the pre-filtered list of tasks to display the task. Follow the progress of the task and access reports and statistical information in the Process Monitoring perspective.

You can stop active Events in the following ways:

  • cancel the Event
    Status: Abend/manually canceled
  • Quit the Event
    Status: Ended_OK
  • Suspend the Event
    Event remains active, but temporarily disabled

For more information, see Working with Tasks, particularly Stopping and Interrupting.

See also: