Deadline Monitoring in SAP Workflow (Working with Latest end)

By Suresh Kumar Parvathaneni A major advantage of workflow is the ability to monitor the workflow steps according to a predefined schedule. Following are different deadlines that can be monitored against each workflow step:

Requested Start Latest Start Requested End Latest End

In this example, we will define a deadline to the User Decision example created earlier (click here). Following is the screenshot of the application developed using the User Decision example:

We would extend this example to the deadline monitoring. In the User Decision step, click on the latest end tab.

By default, No deadline monitoring is active (as seen in the above screenshot). Choose the Work Item Creation from the list box.

After selecting Work Item Creation, chose an offset of 5 minutes. This means that the work item must be executed within 5 minutes of the creation, if not this would trigger.

Enter recipient details to whom the message to be escalated, if the work item is not executed with in 5 minutes after work item creation.

Save and activate the workflow definition. Testing the workflow application: Execute your workflow. Check for the work item in the SAP Inbox. This time do NOT execute the work item. Wait for the deadline to be triggered. After that, a deadline message is delivered to the recipient mentioned in the Latest End tab. See the screenshot below.

Dont worry if the deadline message doesnt appear immediately after 5 minutes. This depends on various factors including how the deadline monitoring program is scheduled and also on the availability of the background processors. Use SWWA to check how the deadline monitoring program is scheduled in program.

For example, assume that our work item has been created at 09:10 hrs and the deadline message is expected to trigger at 09:15 hrs. From the above screenshot, it is understood that the background program is scheduled to execute for every 3 minutes. Assume that the last run of the program is at 09:14hrs and the next run is expected at 09:17hrs. So even our deadline expires at 09:15, the deadline message would appear only at 09:17hrs after execution of the background program. Some more points In our above example, we have used the deadline on the Work Item creation time. i.e., 5 minutes after creation time, the deadline message would be sent. Now we would check the other option Expression. Here we can mention the date and time, when the deadline message should appear irrespective of the work item creation date/time.

As seen in the above screenshot, we can provide the target date and time by which the task should be finished. Container elements could be used in this case. Please refer to our example on creation of container elements (click here).