Release Notes

Improved Prompt Handling

In its prompts handling, the Process Automation UI Plug-In now supports input assistants and validates constraints on regular expression.

Prompts that have only a label are displayed correctly.

Various bug fixes.

Process Monitoring perspective

Jobs in waiting or sleeping status are now also displayed.

"Run per patch" is now available only where it makes sense to use this function.

Process Monitoring and Process Assembly perspectives: Tooltip texts for workflow tasks. 

Tooltip texts are now available for the task boxes in the Workflow Editor (Process Assembly) and the Workflow Monitor (Process Monitoring). They provide information about related tasks. Hover the mouse pointer over a task box, wait a moment and the tooltip text will appear.

The tooltip texts now show the alias and/or the title and object name. They also include the information whether the rollback function is active and whether pre- or postconditions have been stored.

Process Assembly perspective: The object selection menu in the Workflow Editor has been changed.

The Explorer and Search areas in the object selection menu of workflows have been combined in the Explorer area. The search field is no longer available in a separate area but instead, it is now shown directly above the folder list in the Explorer. When you start searching, a result list now appears instead of the Explorer. The Explorer appears again as soon as you remove the search term.

Relevant for users of the product Application Release Automation:
The Deployment area in the object selection menu has been renamed to Components, and the Logic area (which lists the predefined Actions References) to Functions.

When the client of the user who has logged on is a deployment client, the Explorer area points to the folder <root>/UC4.GENERAL and the Functions area points to the path <root>/RUNBOOKS.

Process Monitoring perspective: New commands are available in the activities list and in the Workflow Monitor

• Ignore preconditions (only Workflow Monitor)
• Ignore Sync object conditions
• Ignore Queue limit
• Set inactive (only Workflow Monitor)
• Run workflow task (only Workflow Monitor)
• Suspend / Suspend (recursively)
• Go immediately / Run (recursively)

The following commands have been renamed:

• "Edit" to "Show definition" (only Workflow Monitor)
• "Open report" to "View full Report"

All perspectives: Improved start and restart behavior

The start and restart behavior of Service Catalog objects has been improved and now provides feedback to the user about the status and clearly structures user input via prompts.

Process Assembly perspective: Editing and reading mode

Workflows can now explicitly be opened in reading mode. This means that no write access is required and that there is no need to lock the object for other users.

The new Edit button can be used for this purpose, it is displayed right next to the Definition menu item (ECC Main Pane - menu bar).

Process Assembly perspective: IF and FOREACH Workflow objects can be directly created and inserted.

You can use a context menu in the Workflow Editor to directly create and insert IF, FOREACH and standard workflows without expanding the object selection menu or the Navigator Pane.

Process Assembly perspective: Automated generation of object names

A suitable object name is now automatically generated when you create a new object within a workflow and insert ARA Component Workflows. No suffix needs to be appended anymore. If required, the name can be adjusted manually.

Process Assembly perspective: Indicators for Pre- and Postconditions

The Workflow Editor boxes now provide the information whether one or several conditions have been defined for the task (properties: Pre-/Postconditions). It is no longer necessary to open the definition for this purpose. The left edge of the task box appears in dark gray when at least one condition is stored in the Preconditions, and when a condition is stored in the Postconditions, the right edge appears in dark gray.

Process Assembly perspective: Additional operations in the Navigator's Explorer area

The following additional operations are now available in the Explorer area: Move, duplicate and rename.

Process Assembly perspective: Icons and improved presentation of actions (previously also referred to as runbooks).

Actions which are available in the Functions area of the object selection menu are now displayed with an individual content-related icon. Also, the readability of long object names and titles has been improved. Actions are useful for defining Deployment Workflows (Application Release Automation).

Process Monitoring perspective: The new function Workflow Monitor is now available.

You can use the activity list of the Process Monitoring perspective in order to call the monitor of workflows. It lists the workflow tasks and shows general information and details about their runs.

Process Assembly perspective: The new function Conditions is now available.

The new areas Preconditions and Postconditions are now available in the Workflow Editor in the properties of workflow tasks. Here you can define conditions and actions that will either be processed before (Preconditions) or after (Postconditions) the task has run. These conditions and actions are structured as blocks and can also be nested. Depending on the definitions, they can manipulate or delay the task's execution.

Service Catalog perspective: A new functional area is available in the Navigator Pane. It is called Catalog.

The Catalog includes the combined Favorites folders and objects of all user groups to which your user belongs.

Service Catalog perspective: Favorites area in the Navigator Pane.

Folders that are part of the user's Favorites are now also displayed. You can select these folders and list their contents (such as objects and subfolders).

Process Assembly perspective: Dialogs New Workflow / New Folder

You can now select the Folder in which the new workflow or Folder should be created in a column browser.

Service Catalog and Process Assembly perspectives: Adding and removing Favorites

You can now use the context-menu commands Add to Favorites and Remove Favorite in the Navigator Pane in order to add or remove your personal Favorites.

The command Add to Favorites is available in the Navigator areas Catalog (Service Catalog), Search and Explorer (Process Assembly). Remove Favorite is available in the Favorites area (Service Catalog, Process Assembly).

New perspective Process Assembly
Here you can define workflows and add, link, move and remove workflow tasks as well as modify important properties.

Process Automation perspective
Here you can start tasks from a Favorites list, monitor processing and pull up the related statistics and reports.

Process Monitoring perspective
Here you can view all the activities of an AE client as well as monitor and modify active tasks.