Publishers of technology books, eBooks, and videos for creative people

Home > Articles > Web Design & Development > Adobe ColdFusion

📄 Contents

  1. Workflow Challenges
  2. Translating the Business Flow into an Application
  3. Conclusion
This chapter is from the book

Translating the Business Flow into an Application

You now have an understanding of your business process in the back office. It meets most of the requirements as to why we would choose this as a perfect Management layer solution. Your next challenge is to translate the business flow into an application to support and improve upon this process. Before we begin to analyze it and break it down into a more automated solution, let's make some assumptions about the project approach.

Workflow Application Assumptions

The following are assumptions to determine how the DuvalShock requirements will be delivered in a workflow application:

  • The workflow application will be built using a web interface. We need to keep in mind the limitations of the web as we design our application.

  • DuvalShock uses Microsoft's Active Directory as the standard for intranet, extranet, Internet, and desktop authentication. Users and groups already exist in this repository. We will be expected to build our solution toward this security model.

  • Understanding the development limitations of web technologies, the interface needs to be simple with little or no business training necessary to manage content.

Of these assumptions, the most important to understand is the challenges the web technologies present us. These challenges clash considerably with our desire to make the application easy to use, dynamic, and client rich, which is similar to traditional Client-Server applications that are written for a Microsoft Windows operating system. The web is stateless in nature, so a request-response model is dealt with in creative and not-so creative ways. Developers continually try to meet this challenge by extending web languages to their limits and sacrificing browser compatibility and performance of an application to get the most out of a better user experience.

If you have worked on a web application before, you most likely have been asked in the requirements to make your application perform a task that is not quite possible. The developer will come out with options for how to meet this requirement, but in all cases, the requirement needs endless explanation to your business group and many hours of a developer's time to meet expectations somewhere in the middle. Building a workflow application has many of these challenges. It will be tempting to try technologies like ActiveX Controls or Java Applets through a browser; ultimately, however, you will run into security, performance, and web browser compatibility issues. This is why most development teams have chosen to stick to simpler methods to build their web applications. This is also why building complex applications can be so difficult for the web.

Creating the Workflow Solution

With a basic understanding of the roles of an automated workflow and of the current business process for the content that needs to be managed, let's look at how this can be pieced together to create a workflow solution. Refer back to Chapter 1, "Overview of Dynamic Publishing," to refresh your memory of the elements that need to be managed on the DuvalShock web site. The content management process on the business end will compliment the publishing rules and user experience process on the company web site.

After reviewing this section, look at Figure 13.3. By using the Basic Workflow model earlier in this chapter, we expanded the requirements out to meet the business process.

Figure 13.3 Example of a creation and approval process for DuvalShock marketing development.

Relating back to the business process earlier in this chapter, at this point we step through the illustration as a workflow application. Next, we describe the roles and authority of an automated workflow application.

Note

These are just some of the workflow application components that can be introduced. The possibilities are unlimited to meet the business processes that your organization follows. The goal is to simplify the business process when building this solution. When stepping through what a business unit goes through to create, approve, and publish content, you should be able to go back and compare your application design and show improvements to the process. You should be able to quantify where you are saving time, resources and cost by eliminating or streamlining certain manual tasks that took place. The requirements and design need to be well thought out before development begins. The architecture of the application should be considered for growth and change as additional requirements and business processes evolve.

Marketing Manager

In our workflow application, the marketing manager initiates a task requesting that his employee begin to create a product description for the Big Spark 200 Generator. After this is initiated, an automated task sends an email to the employee with a link to the task.

Creator or Author

The marketing employee receives the request and begins to create the content. If you built a feed from another digital asset into your content repository, you might have some of your content to work with to complete this task. The employee steps through a process of screens that ask for items such as title, date, and body description. You can also build in other items, such as metadata tagging and the target audience. In addition, you can provide tools like a word processing editor to format the content through this process, or you can require that a standard font size or style be used when the content is entered at this point. A WYSIWYG word processing HTML editor that includes features like spell checking can be an important piece of your workflow application. When this task is complete, the author submits the content into the repository for publishing approval.

Approver

In Figure 13.3, the requirements show that the marketing manager receives the completed task from the marketing employee. The role of the approver is to read over the content that is created for the new marketing news that needs to be released. If the approver decides the content is not complete or needs other changes, he can reject the content request and send it back to the author with information related to why it was not approved. If it is not approved at this point, it could be published to production or passed on to additional levels of approval.

Legal Approver

In this example, the requirements ask for additional sign off from the DuvalShocks legal department. This task can have the same characteristics as the marketing manager's approval. There is a key difference after the legal department approves the content. The end of this task is the final step before the content repository marks it staged for publishing.

Publisher

After the final approval occurs, the last task in this automated workflow is to publish the content to the DuvalShock web site. For the end user, this should be as easy as clicking a Submit button and having the content publish to the web site in the predefined format that is defined in the publishing requirements. Chapter 19, "Basics of Publishing," explains the publishing elements in detail as the next logical layer.

Increasing Efficiency and Accountability

We described the core components of an automated workflow, but now let's look at the other elements of your application that can assist in better business efficiency and accountability. The following components can add valuable functionality to your workflow application.

Authentication and Roles

Before you can enter a workflow application, you need to have a user login with an ID and password. Ultimately, they should authenticate against your organization's strategic user repository. By doing this, you have an opportunity to reuse groups that are already created for certain departments and granular roles that exist within the organization. Personalizing the workflow application becomes possible if a role is only allowed to manage certain categories in your web site. If your web infrastructure is mostly Microsoft IIS web servers, you are most likely going to be using an NT domain or Active Directory. Web infrastructures that use UNIX predominately go with a more open LDAP solution.

Email

Integration with your organization's email is a powerful facilitation and communication tool to assist the business process. It can be an automated event that can occur at certain points of the workflow. For example, if the marketing employee has completed a content contribution, an email event can send a message to the marketing manager notifying that a task is complete. In the email, can be a full description of the task along with a hyperlink to the content description that needs approval.

To take it a step further, if the task to approve or deny is not executed, then another email can be triggered to the marketing manager as a reminder that the task is still waiting for his action. Email can also be handy for senior executives who have read-only full-task descriptions and deny or approve important pieces of content via wireless devices.

Overuse of email can also be detrimental to your workflow application. Triggering emails at strategic points of a process ensures users that receiving an email from the workflow application is an important one and needs to be attended to.

Audit Tracking

Another feature that your internal audit or compliance unit might require in your workflow application is an audit tracking feature. This can be a utility that tracks completed tasks, dates completed, rollbacks, and, of course, which user is changing, deleting, editing, and approving content published to your web site. It can be a powerful reporting utility for a company that is concerned about the management activity of its web site.

Entry of Metadata, Keywords, and Categories

During the workflow, it is critical that the content being created is identified accurately and consistently. The workflow process can step a user through choosing the correct keywords for the category he is providing content for. Refer back to Figure 4.3 from Chapter 4.

The marketing employee can begin by choosing a category for which to edit content. In our business requirement case, the user might step through a screen flow to be certain that the category "Products" and the subcategory "Generators" is where the new keyword "Big Spark 200" is created. By forcing the user down a path on how and where the new content is created, you have ensured that the new content is located in the accurate taxonomy for proper searching and navigation.

Authoring of Content

Several options are available when a user needs to create or edit a content for font size, italic, bold, indenting, and so on. If you're creating a new keyword heading, or title that you can reuse in navigation, a page title, or a heading, you might not allow for full authoring capabilities and just provide a simple text box to enter the keyword "Big Spark 200." The body of text that describes the generator might have requirements to have full authoring capabilities.

Full authoring solutions in browsers allow for HTML and XHTML editing with most of the capabilities of a typical word processing interface. After a user completes editing using the tool, the content is submitted to the repository with the formatting intended for publishing to the web site.

Task Status

A business manager might request that he be able to view the status of content that is being created. As each task is completed, the status screen can show information like this:

  • Date task assigned

  • Date task completed

  • User assigned for creating, editing, or approving a task

  • Overall workflow status

  • User comments field

Of course, task status should not be limited to just business managers. Occasionally, some components of a status will be available for all audience levels in your workflow application.

Peachpit Promotional Mailings & Special Offers

I would like to receive exclusive offers and hear about products from Peachpit and its family of brands. I can unsubscribe at any time.

Overview


Pearson Education, Inc., 221 River Street, Hoboken, New Jersey 07030, (Pearson) presents this site to provide information about Peachpit products and services that can be purchased through this site.

This privacy notice provides an overview of our commitment to privacy and describes how we collect, protect, use and share personal information collected through this site. Please note that other Pearson websites and online products and services have their own separate privacy policies.

Collection and Use of Information


To conduct business and deliver products and services, Pearson collects and uses personal information in several ways in connection with this site, including:

Questions and Inquiries

For inquiries and questions, we collect the inquiry or question, together with name, contact details (email address, phone number and mailing address) and any other additional information voluntarily submitted to us through a Contact Us form or an email. We use this information to address the inquiry and respond to the question.

Online Store

For orders and purchases placed through our online store on this site, we collect order details, name, institution name and address (if applicable), email address, phone number, shipping and billing addresses, credit/debit card information, shipping options and any instructions. We use this information to complete transactions, fulfill orders, communicate with individuals placing orders or visiting the online store, and for related purposes.

Surveys

Pearson may offer opportunities to provide feedback or participate in surveys, including surveys evaluating Pearson products, services or sites. Participation is voluntary. Pearson collects information requested in the survey questions and uses the information to evaluate, support, maintain and improve products, services or sites; develop new products and services; conduct educational research; and for other purposes specified in the survey.

Contests and Drawings

Occasionally, we may sponsor a contest or drawing. Participation is optional. Pearson collects name, contact information and other information specified on the entry form for the contest or drawing to conduct the contest or drawing. Pearson may collect additional personal information from the winners of a contest or drawing in order to award the prize and for tax reporting purposes, as required by law.

Newsletters

If you have elected to receive email newsletters or promotional mailings and special offers but want to unsubscribe, simply email ask@peachpit.com.

Service Announcements

On rare occasions it is necessary to send out a strictly service related announcement. For instance, if our service is temporarily suspended for maintenance we might send users an email. Generally, users may not opt-out of these communications, though they can deactivate their account information. However, these communications are not promotional in nature.

Customer Service

We communicate with users on a regular basis to provide requested services and in regard to issues relating to their account we reply via email or phone in accordance with the users' wishes when a user submits their information through our Contact Us form.

Other Collection and Use of Information


Application and System Logs

Pearson automatically collects log data to help ensure the delivery, availability and security of this site. Log data may include technical information about how a user or visitor connected to this site, such as browser type, type of computer/device, operating system, internet service provider and IP address. We use this information for support purposes and to monitor the health of the site, identify problems, improve service, detect unauthorized access and fraudulent activity, prevent and respond to security incidents and appropriately scale computing resources.

Web Analytics

Pearson may use third party web trend analytical services, including Google Analytics, to collect visitor information, such as IP addresses, browser types, referring pages, pages visited and time spent on a particular site. While these analytical services collect and report information on an anonymous basis, they may use cookies to gather web trend information. The information gathered may enable Pearson (but not the third party web trend services) to link information with application and system log data. Pearson uses this information for system administration and to identify problems, improve service, detect unauthorized access and fraudulent activity, prevent and respond to security incidents, appropriately scale computing resources and otherwise support and deliver this site and its services.

Cookies and Related Technologies

This site uses cookies and similar technologies to personalize content, measure traffic patterns, control security, track use and access of information on this site, and provide interest-based messages and advertising. Users can manage and block the use of cookies through their browser. Disabling or blocking certain cookies may limit the functionality of this site.

Do Not Track

This site currently does not respond to Do Not Track signals.

Security


Pearson uses appropriate physical, administrative and technical security measures to protect personal information from unauthorized access, use and disclosure.

Children


This site is not directed to children under the age of 13.

Marketing


Pearson may send or direct marketing communications to users, provided that

  • Pearson will not use personal information collected or processed as a K-12 school service provider for the purpose of directed or targeted advertising.
  • Such marketing is consistent with applicable law and Pearson's legal obligations.
  • Pearson will not knowingly direct or send marketing communications to an individual who has expressed a preference not to receive marketing.
  • Where required by applicable law, express or implied consent to marketing exists and has not been withdrawn.

Pearson may provide personal information to a third party service provider on a restricted basis to provide marketing solely on behalf of Pearson or an affiliate or customer for whom Pearson is a service provider. Marketing preferences may be changed at any time.

Correcting/Updating Personal Information


If a user's personally identifiable information changes (such as your postal address or email address), we provide a way to correct or update that user's personal data provided to us. This can be done on the Account page. If a user no longer desires our service and desires to delete his or her account, please contact us at customer-service@informit.com and we will process the deletion of a user's account.

Choice/Opt-out


Users can always make an informed choice as to whether they should proceed with certain services offered by Adobe Press. If you choose to remove yourself from our mailing list(s) simply visit the following page and uncheck any communication you no longer want to receive: www.peachpit.com/u.aspx.

Sale of Personal Information


Pearson does not rent or sell personal information in exchange for any payment of money.

While Pearson does not sell personal information, as defined in Nevada law, Nevada residents may email a request for no sale of their personal information to NevadaDesignatedRequest@pearson.com.

Supplemental Privacy Statement for California Residents


California residents should read our Supplemental privacy statement for California residents in conjunction with this Privacy Notice. The Supplemental privacy statement for California residents explains Pearson's commitment to comply with California law and applies to personal information of California residents collected in connection with this site and the Services.

Sharing and Disclosure


Pearson may disclose personal information, as follows:

  • As required by law.
  • With the consent of the individual (or their parent, if the individual is a minor)
  • In response to a subpoena, court order or legal process, to the extent permitted or required by law
  • To protect the security and safety of individuals, data, assets and systems, consistent with applicable law
  • In connection the sale, joint venture or other transfer of some or all of its company or assets, subject to the provisions of this Privacy Notice
  • To investigate or address actual or suspected fraud or other illegal activities
  • To exercise its legal rights, including enforcement of the Terms of Use for this site or another contract
  • To affiliated Pearson companies and other companies and organizations who perform work for Pearson and are obligated to protect the privacy of personal information consistent with this Privacy Notice
  • To a school, organization, company or government agency, where Pearson collects or processes the personal information in a school setting or on behalf of such organization, company or government agency.

Links


This web site contains links to other sites. Please be aware that we are not responsible for the privacy practices of such other sites. We encourage our users to be aware when they leave our site and to read the privacy statements of each and every web site that collects Personal Information. This privacy statement applies solely to information collected by this web site.

Requests and Contact


Please contact us about this Privacy Notice or if you have any requests or questions relating to the privacy of your personal information.

Changes to this Privacy Notice


We may revise this Privacy Notice through an updated posting. We will identify the effective date of the revision in the posting. Often, updates are made to provide greater clarity or to comply with changes in regulatory requirements. If the updates involve material changes to the collection, protection, use or disclosure of Personal Information, Pearson will provide notice of the change through a conspicuous notice on this site or other appropriate way. Continued use of the site after the effective date of a posted revision evidences acceptance. Please contact us if you have questions or concerns about the Privacy Notice or any objection to any revisions.

Last Update: November 17, 2020