OmniBPM User Manual

Take leave request form as an example:

In OmniBPM system, it is a document.

A template is a blank form. For example, we call a blank leave request form a template. A template could produce many documents of the same kind, for example:

Usually a document is completed through contribution by different Users. For instance, a leave request is contributed by a requestor, supervisor of the requester, and maybe HR personnel. To complete a leave request, there will be three "Tasks”

Each task determines who is going to fill which field, and the order of completion between tasks. All tasks together form a Workflow.

The captioned is the most basic concept. The powerful functions of OmniBPM are all derivated from such, for instance when assigning users, they could be classified through their seniority and departments. Tasks could also be done through non-liner way, or even division. Further explanations will be featured.

The main purpose of setting departments and levels are used to determine each user’s immediate supervisor. When the department head is not set, the system will automatically identify the highest officers of the department as the department head. Departmental director may also be set separately. Departmental head setting does not limit to which department s/he belongs to.

During approval, a user’s immediate supervisor will be the director of his department. When a user is at the most senior ranking of his department, his immediate supervisor will be the parent department in charge of his department.

Roles of department heads in the system are:

Enterprises can set their own departments in accordance with their own organizations. Each user belongs to a department. After clicking “Department” on the left menu, press "+" button to create a department. Department can be of tree structure. When adding any sub-department, press "+" after the parent department to create a sub-department.

If you need to change the structure of departments, please press Modify and then move the department to the new designated parent department after pressing "+".

Setting department heads: Please also press "modify"

After clicking on the "rank" on the left menu, enter the designated name of level and press "+" button to add new ranks. People of senior levels will be placed at a higher place, and the general manager should be in the highest position. When the level of order is to be changed, you can use the mouse to drag.

To help each of the company’s employees to create a user account, click on the "User" button on the left menu, enter your account information and click the "+" button to create a user . To-Do list will be sent daily by e-mail to the preset account.

Click on the list below and edit the user. While editing, users’ agent could also be set but also can set the user

+ Groups ( Job Functions ) will be introduced in the next chapter.

Groups are a more flexible way of classification than department, an employee can belong to multiple groups, employees from different departments could also be added into the same group.

Please enter the group name and then press "+" to create a group.

This screen has two dark gray lists, the left refers to 'user not in the group , while the right one refers to "user within a group." To add a user or remove from the group , press the "》"or "《" to them from left to right or vice versa. After click the ‘group’ menu on the left, enter a group name , then select the user to be added from the user list on the left . Press "》" button to select the user to join the group , or select the user to be removed within the right of the list and press "《"button .

After selecting a user, please click "Save" to save the changes.

To edit a group, click the entry field of the name of the group, a group list will now appear. You can then edit. After editing, please click "Save" to save the changes.

When a staff needs to be removed the officer 's account, it will be necessary to delete the account to prevent leaking of business information. To delete any current user, administrator only needs to click on the user and then press " elete user" OmniBPM system’s approach is based on number of active users in an enterprise. Remove unused account also helps reduce the cost of system.

A user is deleted means that they can no longer enter the system, but the system does not delete any files. It is recommended to also conduct the following actions:

When any account is accidentally deleted, or when people get back to post, you can click the account and then click the "reactivate user" to restore the account.

Enter the name of the process. Here we enter the "Leave Request", then click " Create".

After a new workflow is created, the first step is to design the form used in the workflow by adding fields into the document.

Each document field should have their owndata type. System support the following data types: integers, real numbers (with decimal point) , text, date , date and time, boolean, formula, or the choice(drop-down) menus. OmniBPM can also add new tables to a form. Properties of each column of the table can also be used in accordance with the actual needs. To add a new field, following the required properties like "+integer", etc.

After pressing the properties of fields, the fields will then be added into template. At this time, the name of the field must be set and the interface are as follows:

In this example, we sequentially add six fields:

Below is the screenshot after adding these fields, please press "Next" to enter the workflow editor.

OmniBPM system has a very large flexibility and convenience towards the design of workflow or business process. The process is carried out one by one through the "task" components. Each "task" may consist of a specific person, department, group, or supervisor who is responsible for completing such tasks. Different tasks can be done "simultaneously", or may be carried out in order. The actual execution of a "task" may be assigned a groups, a persons in a group, a department, or supervisors of some task node.

While designing workflows in OmniBPM system, you only need to consider the workflow of successful completion of the job. Any exception or error condition will not need to be considered. When there are exceptions while executing the workflow, you may use the function of “Rejection" to return the form to any users who signed the form/document before. "Rejection" is a function which could be selected during the execution of the workflow. Therefore, no exception process design needs to be considered. This design allows users to complete the process of setting in a shorter period of time, when the processes are actually executed, it also retains maximum flexibility. Please refer Rejection of Documents chapter for use of the “Rejection” function.

When designing workflow, a [workflow initiator] will normally be added to the workflow which serves as the start point. During the execution of the workflow process, a “task-node” is satisfied if the following conditions are met:

If these conditions are met, the task will be considered as completed. When a particular task node’s incoming connecting tasks are all completed, all members of that node will receive notification and the task is now ready to be processed by the next team of people.

This concept is the core concept of the design process , we repeat it once again here.

Now we will continue to configure the workflow of leave request. In this step we shall define the sequence of the tasks and who will be approving such application.

The workflow of leave rquest is as follows :

While adding a new process node, press "+" and select the type of node.

Node of application could be established based on the following sequence .

This step specifies the fields which must be filled for each task. By default, all required fields must be all filled or otherwise the task will not be considered as be "completed". But you can also set some fields as optional. A form field can be specified to multiple tasks, representatives of these tasks can edit this field, documents shown will be based on the latest editing time. However, OmniBPM will still save old values for reference.

Taking leave application as an example, there are a total number of 5 tasks.

The operation procedure is as follows, first click on a “task” node at the top of the screen and it shall turn dark (indicating that the field to be filled in is now being set). Then, click on the form fields on the lower part of the screen to select fields that must be filled for the task. The selected fields which must be filled during workflow execution are dark in color now. If this field is optional (not required to be filled), you can check the "optional" button.

Workflow permissions can be set when the workflow design is complete . Alternatively, you can go to "Settings"→"Workflow and Form Settings" → "Workflow Permission" to update permission settings.. There are two different workflow permissions:

Just like the example gave in the design of Leave Request workflow, enterprise system manager can use the shortest time to standardize all related processes. In this section we will be introduced some advanced functions so that complicated workflow of enterprises could be implemented in the BPM system.

For the "group" and "department" tasks node , you can set the number of required approving officers. The task will only be completed when sufficient number of approval officers approve the application.

You will need to press “edit” in the following task node, set the “exit rule: required participants”. The preset value is 1 which means that approval from only one person will be good enough to have the task done, you may also set a particular task needs to be approved by all people.

When any tasks needs to be assigned a people in charge (PIC) by the supervisor (Hereinafter referred as “To be assigned”), you can press the "Edit" button under task node, and define the "assigner node". While the workflow is executed and reach “the assigner node”, the signing officer of the assigner node must specify a PIC for the node that "To be assigned" before complete the task. Details may refer to task assignment section .

When one job needs the same person repeatedly confirmed in different stages, the function of synchronizing task node could be used. Click “Edit” in the task that is executed later, under “assigner node”, check “sync task member with another task node”, and choose “task node” as “node executed earlier”.

When the flow reaches “node to be executed later”, the system will refer to “node executed earlier” and its PIC, and make it the PIC of “node to be executed later”. If PIC was assigned for the "node excuted earlier", the approving officer of “node to be executed earlier” will be the PIC of the “node executed later”.

We take a common workflow as an example. For instance, engineering support, where requests made from sales department are send to supervisors in engineering division. After processing by the engineer appointed by the supervisor, the task will be passed to the same supervisor to check whether it’s completed and conform to company standard. Then the result will be sent back to the sales unit for reply and they may be set in accordance with the following ways:

In OmniBPM system, the values of fields in a form can be automatically computed from other form field values by the system. With formula field, a lot of complicated arithmatic calculations can be automated and thus reduce human error as well as increase work efficiency. For example, in a purchase request, subtotals of each requestd item and the total amount of the entire request can be computed automatically from the unit price of each item and the number of units requested. In a leave request, the length of leave can also computed from the starting and the end of the leave.

We can also use formula field in a table.

In a complex workflow, the necessity of some tasks might dependend on values from filled form fields.

For example, in a RMA ( Return Merchandise Authorization ) workflow, it is necessary to have QA personnel be involved when the reason of the return is quality related issues. If the return is unrelated to quality issue, the QA personnel should not be involed. In this example, we can add a "Boolean" called "Quality Issue" to the RMA form. Other QA related form fields should also be added into the RMA form.

When designing the workflow ( process ), we should put QA process into the workflow. In QA related tasks, we need to configure conditions for skipping the tasks. When the condition is met (evaluates to True), the tasks will be skipped and all the reqirements for the task, including filling forms, assign people, etc, will be ignored. Here, the condition that QA task should be skipped is Not quality issue. Click "Edit" button of the task node, check "Skip this task node if the specified condition is met", and enter the condition "NOT([Quality Issue])".

For more detais on how to write conditions ( formula ), please refer to [Formula].

Completed workflow will appear in the workflow menu after selecting “Activate this version as running version” in the first step of workflow editor.

The preset category of any new workflow will be "uncategorized".

If you would like to classify workflow into categories, select “Settings”→"Workflow and Form Settings"→"Workflow Menu Settings" . Please enter the category name you want to set up , such as "HR", "QA" , and then drag the original "Uncategorized" workflow to “HR”, like this:

This is the final screen . You can see the menu has no "Uncategorized " category.

All workflows are version controlled. If any documents or fields within existing workflow needs to be modified, they could be changed accordingly. All completed documents will be kept at the state while the document is approved. All approving documents will be executed based on the workflow and form settings at the time workflow been initiated. All newly initiated process will be executed based on the newly effective form and workflows.

OmniBPM provides functions of generating reports. The report function let user gather all statistics and information in the BPM system. Each report can include information of one particular workflow. There are two roles when using the report function. The first one is “Report Designer” who design which fields are to be exported and the data filtering criteria, while the “Report User” who export reports according to the preset criteria (i.e., the report designed by “report designer”. Addition data filter can be added while exporting the final report. Ordinary users(Report Users) could go directly to the section generate reports.

For example, if we are creating a report on “total number of hours of sick-leave”, this report shall be linked to “Leave Request” workflow. The report collects all the forms that has “sick-leave” as leave type, and sum over the leave hours for each of the employee name. In this section we will divide into two sections, design report templates and generate reports.

"Report User" can choose the report you want to export from the menu .

When you want to export a report, select the report you want to export from the report menu.

Once the desired report to be exported is selected, the system will list out all selection criteria and those fields which could be exported. Criteria of yellow background color in this “current criteria” are those which can be edited. Users could also add “new filtering criteria” by themselves. Those fields in white background color are those which cannot be changed. “Current fields” are all fields which could be exported by users. Users can un-select those unnecessary ones. After clicking “Create Report”, the report will then be created.

After you export the report, in addition to the exported data displayed in the web browser, you can also press "Download" to download the Excel format file.

Operation of OmniBPM starts with initiating a workflow. Once a workflow is initated, the system will execute the following actions until the workflow is completed.

You may refer to Form Filling section while doing “fields that needs to be filled”, assigning PICs may refer to Job Assignment section.

User needs to log in first to initiate a workflow. After logging into the system (Please refer to Login, there will be a workflow menu on the top left hand corner. Select the workflow that you would like to execute.

After initiating the workflow, the system will bring out the forms required to complete in this workflow:

The top item in the list refers to the progress of workflow.

In this step, BPM system will ask users to fill required form fields configured in Specify form fields that must be filled in a task. All required fields of a task shall be filled until a document are to be sent out to the next step. At the moment when the workflow is initiated, the PIC of the first node is “Workflow Initiator”. For workflow initiator, even when there are no required fields in the form, the title of the document must be entered.

Workflow priority can be one of Urgent, Priority, or Normal. Workflow Initiator can change the priority anytime before its completion (Just click save). *Deadline could also be set.

Fields with dark gray background are required. They are the criteria for completion of a task node.

Optional fields do not have to be filled in, they may even be left blank

There might be one or more tables in a form. User can add table rows by "+data row" to add a table row.

Table columns are also classified into required and optional, as long as there is a table field being required, then at least one row of data will be needed to complete the task.

The function of copy is like the "carbon copy to(CC to)" function in email, which allows others to follow the progress and join discussions

People being copied the document, even though they are not part of the workflow, can still view the documents. (Details may refer to Todo list and document management)

After initiating the workflow, all people who have access to this document, regardless of whether it is approved, or whether it is completed, the document could be copied to any other person.

The interface is as follows;

Enter the “user” in the field “username”, and enter “comment” when necessary (you can also leave it blank), then click “submit” and the copy will be sent.

Those who are copied the files could view the files in their todo list.

If reply is required for the user receiving the copy, check "reply required" while making a copy, A comment textbox will be shown when the receiver open the document. Only when comments are entered and “reply” is clicked, the receiver is considered to fulfill the responsibility.

At the right side of this document, you can see a list of all copies, comments, and discussion of this document. All messages in the list will be marked Read, Unread or Pending Reply.

All users who can view the document can upload related attachments.

The uploading attachment block is located at the lower part of the form. Click "Browse" and select the file you want to upload.

If necessary, enter details in “File Description”. (You may leave it blank)

Finally, click "Upload" and you can see the uploaded file name appeared below .

Click on the red arrow at the right of the file name You can download the attachment.

Click "delete" on the right of the file name to mark the attachment as deleted. System does not really remove the attachment, they are only marked as deleted. Attachments which are marked as deleted may be restored through “recover”.

All users who can view the document could get access to the document and assign people in charge (PIC) of any node.

Node which could accept assigned PIC must be placed behind the current node and may be of the following cases:

Task node that can have PIC be assigned will have a blue specify member button, and the number within the blanket refers to the number of people required to complete the task.

Click the "specify members" , the system will pop up a dialog box that lists the user in line with the setting of node.

Select specified number of users and click "Save"

The significance of “Approval and Dispatch” is the PIC of node confirming their completion of all tasks in a node. When all PICs (One node could have several PICs) of the node approves, then the task will be passed onto the next stage.

Unless being rejected (Refer to Reject), contents of all fields will not be able to change after approval and dispatch.

If the task has not been completed on the node , the system will prevent the user to approve it, and the unmet requirements will be marked in yellow. The reasons could be:

Before approving, you can press the "Save" to save the contents of the form to fill in at any time . When the "Save" button is dark , it means the information is already up to date.

Rejection of documents is a mechanism to reverse the workflow. When the person in charge of the current task finds any problems, or for any other reasons, he wants to step back into the workflow a few steps, he can use this function.

All People who have access to the document could reject the documents.

Generally, those who perform rejection is the PIC of current node or Copied users.

"Cancel" button is located below the workflow chart at the bottom of the document.

Only Workflow Initiator can cancel a workflow.

Cancelled process will not be able to progress and not able to be copied to any person. It means that this flow is completed abandoned.

Completed documents could not be cancelled. If you would like to view the cancelled documents, click “cancelled” item in the “Todo list filters” (Please refer to Todo list filters).

To-do list is an important core function of OmniBPM.

Only if one of the four following conditions is met, document might appear in the “Todo” list (subject to other filtering conditions Todo list document fliters). This secures the document from unauthorized access. On the other hand, this also ensures that the file not related to me will not appear to enhance efficiency.

Documents are classified based on the user processing status and workflow status. We can use the following Todo list filters , the combination of user process status and workflow status to filter out the desired documents. "User processing status" includes current, signed, archived, and all. "Workflow status" includes Processing, completed, and canceled.

To sort the documents by its attribute, clicking the column header of that attribute with the exception that the "Tag" column can not be sorted.

There are two types of tags: Personal tags and Public tags. Personal tags are visible only by the user that create them, and public tags are visible to all users within an organization.

We can add one or more tags to any documents which increases the flexibility of management of document classification.

For example, one can put public tag "Project A" on all documents related to project A. Everyone in the organization can see "Project A" tag. User can even use "Project A" as a document list filter. One can also put "Done this week" personal tag on all documents that need to be done this week.

TIPS: One can add tabs on todo list with a tag filter. Please refer to New tag page in todo list.

To be able to find out a tagged documents quickly, adding tag tab is a very useful method. At the top of the todo list, click "+" and the following filter will appear, click “Tag” in the menu.

Click on the text box right to the dropdown box, the system automatically lists all the personal tags and public tags. From the previous example, we select "Urgent from BOSS" , and click the blue plus sign at the right of the blue, it is done.

After that, just click on the top of the list of todo 's "tag: Urgent from BOSS" tab, it will filter documents with this tag immediately.

OmniBPM has a comprehensive todo filtering system towards the pending tasks, working well with tags, and can be used as a project management tool.

Please refer to tag management for information on public tags, and Workflow permissions on accessibility permission settings of workflows.

Supervisor of Project Management and Document Management may need to have the permission to export all data of a workflow type(See Workflow permission). If the permission is granted to the supervisor, even the workflow does not go through the supervisor, he can still list the document in the todo list.

If supervisor needs to list out all related documents of a project as soon as possible, you will need to mark those documents with the same public tags.(see tag management for more info on public tags ). At this moment the public tags could be named after the project. When the supervisor needs to list out all related documents, s/he may make use of tab for a tag in todo list and filter on the public tag, and choose "all" items in Todo list filter, all documents with this public tag will be listed out.

When the manager needs to track a particular progress, s/he can choose the workflow name under tab for a tag in todo list tab and choose "all" items in Todo list filter, all documents could then be listed out.

When a document could not be processed now and need to wait a certain period of time, user can use "archive" function to temporarily remove the document from the default todo list. This function can help user to manage documents that can be processed immediately and documents that need a certain time before it can be processed.

As long as the status is "Processing" (either "current" or "signed") , user could see the “Archive” button at the top or the bottom of the document.

For those archived files, they will neither be deleted or cancelled, after the designated archiving period, they will reappear in the todo list. Appropriate use of archive can help highlight the priority documents, it will also enable the file to be processed more timely and fit with personal schedule.

There are four options, namely 1 day, 3 day, 1 week or ‘Others’. Archive for 1 day means that it will appear in the to-list after 24 hours and so on. When selecting ‘Others’, please enter the designated days of archive.

After pressing the "Archive" button , the button will change to "Cancel Archive ," also shows the duration of archiving.

Press the "Cancel Archive " button will release the sealed state of the file, the file will appear immediately on the todo list.

If you want to list out all archived files in the todo list, simply check the todo list filter "archived ". You may also click on the "archived" to select the "archive" tab of todo list which has the same effect with “Archieved”/”Processing” selections and all files related will be listed out.

Like tabs for a tag in todo list, we can also add new tabs in the todo list for different workflows.

Click “+” at the top and choose "document type". You can directly click on the "document type" input field, or enter part of the name, the system will automatically list the files in line with the classification in typed.

If you also need to add tag filter, you can enter the label at the blank. Leaving it blank is also OK.

After completion, press the blue "+" at right, tab of the workflow will then be added. Click on todo lists and select the tab, the list will then list out all related documents.

To setup external database connection, go to "Settings" → "External Database Settings" → "External Database Connection".

"Connection Name" is the name of the connection. It is used when setting up external database views. "Database" is the brand of the database. OmniBPM currently supports Postgresql, MSSQL, MySQL, and Oracle. "Database Name" is the name of database in the external database where the view resides.

When the connection info is properly set, we can use "test" button to test database connection. If the connection test is done successfully, the system will shows "true".

After database connection is set, the database views of interest must also be set. OmniBPM will only access the views give by the users. To setup database views, go to "Settings" → "External Database Settings" → "External Database View".

The "Database View Name" is used when refering to this view while designing forms.

There are two method to add views to OmniBPM system. One is to use existing views in the external database. The other way is to use a SQL SELECT statement. OmniBPM will use the SQL statement as a subquery to retrieve data from external database.

If the view setting is successful, the columns of the view will be displayed in the database view table.

OmniBPM can use external database as datasource. The BPM system can automatically match data from external database and autocomplete fields when user fills forms. While designing forms, user can give the correspondence between columns of external database view and form fields.

When designing forms, user can add multiple "Field Autocomplete Groups". Form fields in the same "Field Autocomplete Group" will be automatically filled at the same time with the data from corresponding columns of the same row in external database.

To add a new "Field Autocomplete Group", look for the text box on the right of the form while designing forms.

Enter group name and select an external database view and push "add" to add a new group.

To set the correspondence between a form field and a database column, press "edit" → "more options", and select the "Field Autocomplete Group" the form field belongs to, and then select the column name.

If filling the form field will trigger system to autocomplete all other fields in the same "Field Autocomplete Group" with data from columns of matched row based on this field, trigger-autocompletion must be checked.