5/5/2020

SAP Business Work ow

Generated on: 2020-05-05

SAP NetWeaver 7.0 | SPS37

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Original content: https://help.sap.com/viewer/109b51f56c531014b4e7c143c4b731a9/7.0.37/en-US

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SAP Business Work ow

Purpose
You use SAP Business Work ow (WebFlow Engine) to de ne business processes that are not yet mapped in the SAP System.
These may be simple release or approval procedures, or more complex business processes such as creating a material master and
the associated coordination of the departments involved. Business Work ow is particularly suitable for situations in which work
processes have to be run through repeatedly, or situations in which the business process requires the involvement of a large
number of agents in a speci c sequence.

You can also use Business Work ow to respond to errors and exceptions in other, existing business processes. You can start a
work ow when prede ned events occur, for example an event can be triggered if particular errors are found during an automatic
check.

SAP provides several work ows that map prede ned business processes. These work ows do not require much implementation
effort. For an overview of these SAP work ows for mySAP Technology see work ow scenarios and the documentation for the
application component.

Integration
Business Work ow uses the existing transactions and functions of the SAP System and does not change the functions. You can
combine the existing functions of the SAP System to form new business processes with Business Work ow. The work ow system
takes over control of the business processes. If you are already using Organizational Management , you can use the organizational
structure created there to have the relevant agents carry out the individual activities. It is possible to have an activity carried out
by a position. This ensures that the respective occupiers of the position can carry out the individual activities during execution of
the work ow. This means that personnel changes in your organization are taken into account immediately in the execution of a
work ow.

Business Work ow is also integrated with cross-component Business Process Management (BPM) in Exchange Infrastructure
(XI). A work ow can send messages to a business process and, conversely, messages from a business process can be processed
in a work ow.

Features
Business Work ow provides a number of tools for de ning and analyzing work ows as well as for monitoring operation.

The Work ow Builder is for displaying and making changes to work ows. You can make small extensions directly to the original
work ows supplied by SAP, such as carrying out your own agent assignments or changing deadline monitoring. These can be
saved as work ow con gurations .

WebFlow Functions can be used to execute work ows between different companies. All the data required can be sent as XML
documents . Business Work ow can also respond to suitable inbound XML documents.

There are several Work ow Wizards to support you in the de nition of work ows, with which you can create speci c parts of a
work ow. You can start the existing Work ow Wizards from the Work ow Builder .

To make the functions of the SAP System available to the work ow, use the business object type. You can de ne and analyze
business object types in the Business Object Builder . The work ow accesses the individual business objects at runtime using the
reusable tasks. The Business Work ow Explorer gives you an overview of all existing tasks.

The end user receives information about the activities that they carry out in their Business Workplace or in the Work ow Inbox
MiniApp or in the iView Universal Worklist of the enterprise portal. An iView is available within portals. This provides them with a
central overview of all the activities that they are authorized to carry out. They can commence the activities from here.
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Several tools are available to the work ow system administrator, with which they can control and analyze the current work ows.
The work ow system administrator is noti ed of problems automatically by the system.

Using this Documentation

The SAP Business Work ow documentation has the following parts:

Role documentation

You use this part of the documentation if you:

Have one of the work ow roles de ned in the role-based procedure model

Have little or no experience using SAP Business Work ow

Want to get an overview of the main functions of SAP Business Work ow

Reference Documentation

You use this part of the documentation if you:

Require a comprehensive overview of all functions of SAP Business Work ow

Are interested in detailed information

Want to look up a particular subject

Work ow scenarios

You use this part of the documentation if you:

Require an overview of the SAP work ows supplied in SAP NetWeaver

Require examples for SAP Business Work ow

 Note
Further SAP work ows are described in the relevant component documentation.

Technical Principles of SAP Business

Work ow
The de nition and execution of a work ow can be divided into four main areas. A user executes work ows in their Business
Workplace where the work items that they are allowed to execute are displayed. A work ow must be de ned to be executed. To
this end, a work ow de nition is created in the Work ow Builder . This de nition contains steps that are executed at runtime. The
steps either control the work ow directly or contain a reference to a task. The task refers to a method of an object type in the
Business Object Repository (BOR) and can be executed at runtime either automatically (background task) or by a user (dialog
task).

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Business Workplace and work items

Work items are displayed to the user for execution in their Business Workplace. For example, work items represent a step at
runtime that is to be executed. There are various types of work item. Only certain types are displayed in the Business Workplace.

Work ow and work ow de nition

You have to de ne a work ow before execution. This work ow de nition is made up of steps that control the work ow or refer to
the tasks to be executed. You can make additional speci cations about agents and deadline monitoring for a step. These
speci cations are evaluated at runtime by the work item manager . The work ow is started either manually by the user or by the
system. For the system to start a work ow, the work ow de nition must contain at least one triggering event (for example the
event material created ). When the event occurs, the relevant work ow is started automatically.

When you activate a work ow de nition, you automatically generate a runtime version. When the work ow is started (manually or
automatically), the relevant runtime version is used for the execution. If the work ow de nition is changed later and a new runtime
version is generated, these changes do not affect work ows that are already being executed.

Tasks

Tasks describe elementary business activities. Tasks always refer to a method of an object type. Possible agents are de ned for
tasks. Tasks can refer to automatically executable methods (background tasks) or they can require a user to execute them (dialog
tasks).

Object types and objects

An object type describes the data with which you want to work in a work ow (for example the object type Material ). An object is
an individual data record of an object type. Attributes are de ned for an object type, which make up its data record (such as
material name, material number). Every object type has methods in which activities are de ned that can be executed with the data
(for example, create material ). You can call the transactions and functions of the SAP System in a method, as can your own or
other applications. Events are another important component of an object type. The events describe the status changes that an
object can undergo (for example, material deleted or material changed ). A work ow can be started by an event of this kind being
triggered.

The Business Object Repository provides an overview of all the object types in the SAP System. You can use or extend the existing
object types as well as create new object types.

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General Procedure Model

Purpose
With SAP Business Work ow you can map business processes in the SAP System and process them (several times if required)
under the control of the work ow system. A work ow management system can process and monitor structured processes that:

Encompass a sequence of activities

Reoccur in the same or similar forms

Involve several people of groups of people

Require a lot of coordination

In addition to this general procedure model for working with SAP Business Work ow, there are also role-speci c procedure
models. For descriptions of these procedure models, refer to Work ow Roles .

Prerequisites
Before working with SAP Business Work ow , you should have a clear idea of the areas in question and the extent to which you
want to change and adapt business processes, and pass them over to electronic process control.

Process Flow
Use the following procedure model as orientation when working with SAP Business Work ow .

Organizational plan

The enterprise-speci corganizational plan describes the organizational assignment of the employees. The aim of this is to
determine the responsibility of employees for the execution of individual business activities in the form of activity pro les .

You maintain the organizational plan on a client-speci c basis. You can use an organizational plan that was created (or is still being
created) for HR purposes in SAP Business Work ow as well without making any changes, as long as the work ow functionality
and the HR application are used in the same client.

Generally, however, in each client you (only) map those sub-areas and organizational structures of your enterprise, in which you
also coordinate business processes using SAP Business Work ow .

For further information, refer to Enterprise-Speci c Organizational Plan .

Objects and object type de nition

You identify all objects involved in your business process. You sort out which business function you want to map in your scenario
and which attributes you want to access for control purposes.

You check whether the relevant object types with their methods, attributes and events are de ned in the Business Object
Repository . The grouping of object types in the application component hierarchy and the option of searching generically for parts
of a name help when looking for existing object types.

If you nd an object type whose de nition meets your requirements, you can use it without making any modi cations.

If you nd an object type whose de nition does not quite meet your requirements, you extend its de nition.

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If you do not nd a suitable object type, you de ne your own object type.

For further information, refer to Extending and Adapting Object Types .

Tasks

You identify the tasks involved in your business process. You establish which object method is to be executed with the task and
who is responsible for executing it. You then de ne the tasks by specifying object type and method, and determine the possible
agents of the tasks.

 Note

In the test and development stage, you should make all the tasks used general tasks .

You check whether tasks are already de ned.

The tasks available are not usually sufficient, meaning that you have to de ne additional tasks to meet your requirements.

For further information, refer to Single-Step Task .

Rules for agent determination

You identify possible agent rules in your business process. You use these rules when agents are to be found using speci c,
business, functionally-oriented criteria.

 Note

Specifying rules is always optional .

You can initially do without rules in the test and development stage.

You check whether you can use existing rules. If you cannot use existing rules, you de ne your own.

For further information, refer to Rule .

Events

You identify the events required to initiate and control the work ow and check whether these events are de ned for the relevant
object types.

If you require an event that is not incorporated in the standard version, you must add the event to the relevant object type
de nition and ensure that the event is created.

For further information, refer to Event .

Work ow

To describe a business process usually comprising several steps, you create a work ow.

You can use SAP work ows as templates for your own developments to help you make a start. You use the Work ow Builder for
the de nition. You can also create new work ows there directly.

From a technical point of view there is a multistep task for every work ow. For further information, refer to Multistep Task .

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Demo example and tutorials

You can learn the basic principles of work ow de nition and execution in the demo example for processing a noti cation of
absence.

For further information, refer to Demo Example: Processing a Noti cation of Absence .

There are tutorials that introduce you step-by-step to selected functions. See SAP Business Work ow - Tutorials .

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