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This guide takes you through step by step instructions to create a Leave Approval Workflow. This tutorial uses the form you created in the Getting Started with Forms tutorial.
| Tip |
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We strongly recommend that you jump directly to the Workflow Tutorial if you are already comfortable using the Workflow Designer. The Workflow Tutorial teaches you important workflow design patterns and increases your skills using the many workflow designer features. |
A common example of a workflow is a Leave Approval workflow, where an employee requests vacation and the manager must either approve it, reject it or send it back to the employee for corrections. Typically, the process is paper or email-based. The employee fills out a paper form and hands it to the manager for a signature. The form is then faxed or delivered to HR where it is saved in a folder or scanned into the HR or document management system.
Using Live Forms, you can automate this workflow so that it is completely electronic and paperless. Further, you can integrate the workflow with Google Apps, a document management system such as Digitech ImageSilo/PVE, your database or custom business system so that the leave approvals are stored online.
The steps for the Leave Approval workflow are as shown in the figure:
- The employee goes to a web page that embeds the workflow. Live Forms makes this very easy to do.
- The form is configured so that the employee only sees the relevant portion of the form, i.e. the employee does not see the Manager Approval section or the HR Review section. The employee information and manager ID are automatically populated by .
- The employee fills in the form, digitally signs it and clicks a Submit Request button.
- puts the leave approval request on the specific manager's task list, [optionally] notifies the Manager by email and displays a confirmation message to the employee.
- The manager logs in
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- and visits a web page that displays an electronic task list. All pending leave approval requests will be displayed in the task list.
- The manager clicks to perform an approval. The Manager-specific portions of the form are now visible. The data entered by the employee is automatically populated for the manager to review.
- If the manager requires corrections, the form can be sent back to the employee to make changes.
- Once approved, the manager digitally signs the form and clicks Submit Request.
- In the final step, the workflow is sent to the HR department to update records and/or make comments.
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Live Forms In-house Only
If you are using Live Forms In-house software installed locally on your own machine, then the 1st step is to login as the admin user and create your 1st tenant. Follow the steps below:
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Creating the Leave Approval Workflow
- Logon to your tenant as the designer user i.e.designer@mycompany. Replace mycompany with the name of your tenant.
On the My Project homepage, click the project name My Company HR that you created in the Getting Started with Forms tutorial. You can also select
Open from the
- You will see the Forms and Workflows homepage.
- Click the
- Click anywhere in the General Settings section of the Properties Navigator or click the
If you completed the Getting Started with Forms exercise, you should have a Leave Approval Form listed in the palette. Drag the Leave Approval form you just created from the Palette and drop it into the Guide box on the canvas. This creates the first step in the workflow. It will be named Step ##. Click on the step. Click the
In our example we will use the same form three times, once each for the Employee, Manager and HR steps. Select the Employee step and click the
Click on the first linked step. Click the
Click on the second linked step. Click the
Make Changes to the Leave Approval Form
You can edit a form in the Workflow designer as well as the Forms designer.
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Be aware that changes made to a form in the Workflow Designer are not reflected in the original form in the Forms designer. If you want your changes reflected in both designers, make the changes in the original form in the Forms Designer, then replace the updated form in your workflow in the Workflow Designer. |
Let's make some changes to the Leave Approval form so we can add a rule to prefill the user name, id, email address and manager's name on each step of our workflow. Follow these steps:
- Click on the Employee step. Click the
- Change the label of the First Name control to Employee Name. Change the Name of the First Name control to EmployeeName (no space).
- Change the label of the Last Name field to Employee Id.
- Change the Name of the Last name field to EmployeeId.
- Make sure that the Name field of each control is properly set. This is a critical step to ensure that business rules work. The controls are named as shown in the table below. Make sure that the Control Name field is exactly as shown below including case-sensitivity.
Uncheck the Enabled checkbox for each control. The control values will be automatically filled in by a business rule.
Click the
- Click the
| Control Label | Control Name | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Employee Name | EmployeeName | the current user's full name |
| Employee Id | EmployeeId | the login id of the current user |
| Manager Id | ManagerId | the login id of the current user's manager |
| Employee Email | the current user's email address |
Setup the steps in your workflow
- Edit the Leave Approval Workflow.
- Click on the Employee step. Click the
- Click on the Assignment tab. Assign the Employee role to this step by selecting it from the Assign to Role dropdown. Click Submit.
- Click on the Manager step. Click the
Click on the Assignment tab. Type a left curly brace followed by Man in the Assign to User field. When you see {ManagerID} in the dropdown, click to select it. {ManagerID} is an example of a template. At runtime, will evaluate the user id in this field and sent the task to the Employee's manager. The ManagerID field will be populated by a business rule explained below when the workflow step loads.
- Click on the Messages tab.
- Add a customized message in the Pending Message field. Tom will see this message when he clicks the Send to Manager button. Ex: Your request has been forwarded to your manager for approval.
Add some text in the Task Information field so manager Jerry can identify the task when he sees it on the Task List. You can use a template in the message. A template is a control in your form encased in curly brackets. will resolve the template at runtime and replace the field in the Task Info with the data that is entered into it. If you want to show the Employee Name in the Task Information, enter Leave Approval for {EmployeeName} in the Task Information field so the approving manager will know who the request is for when it appears on their task list. .
- Click Submit.
- Click on the HR step. Click the
- Click on the Messages tab.
- Enter "Leave Approval for {EmployeeName}" in the Task Information field.
- Enter a Pending Message that Jerry will see when he clicks the Send to HR button. Ex: The Leave Approval for {EmployeeName} has been forwarded to HR.
- Click Submit.
- Customize the message the HR user will see when the workflow is completed.
- Click on the
- Click on the Workflow Actions tab. Select the Display Message when user submits workflow wizard.
- Enter your customized message
- Click Finish.
- Click the
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A great way to test your workflow is to use a space. A space is a frevvo website that is very easy to create. Your deployed forms/workflows are automatically added. Follow these steps to create the space:
- Ensure the visibility of your Expense Report workflow is set to public in tenant and that it is deployed to production:
- In Workflow Properties, select the Access Control Tab. Set "Who can start the workflow" to "Anyone (login not required.)
- On the Forms & Workflows Homepage, click the
- In Workflow Properties, select the Access Control Tab. Set "Who can start the workflow" to "Anyone (login not required.)
- Click on the Spaces Tab. Click the
- Click the
- Copy the share url for your space then logoff .
- Paste the space url into another browser or a new tab of the browser you are using. Login as tom@<your tenant name>. automatically makes your project a tab on the space menu and your Leave Approval Workflow an option on the menu under the tab. Your space should look something like this:
Click on the tab for your project and then click on the Leave Approval workflow. This brings you to the first step in your workflow. The workflow automatically has a navigation bar to indicate which step you are currently in as well as the next steps that are coming.
Fill in the fields in the 1st step, remember to sign and click the Send to Manager button to route the workflow to the Manager for approval.
Tom should see the customized pending message that you set up on the manager activity in the workflow.
- Logout of your space then login to the space as the manager jerry - jerry@<your tenant>.
- Click on the Important Items tab, then click the Task List. Jerry will see the pending Leave Approval request from Tom. Note the Task information that we set up on step 2 of the workflow using the template - Leave Approval for {EmployeeName}
- Click the
- The manager name and email fields are populated by our business rule.
- Add a comment and sign the section.
- Click the customized Send to HR button. The pending message that you set up on the HR step of the workflow displays.
- Logout of your space and login as sue@<your tenant>.
- Click on the Important Items tab and then on the Task List. The pending task for the HR department displays. Note Sue, the HR employee, sees the Employee Information section, the Manager Approval section and the HR section.
- Click the Finish button to complete the workflow. The workflow's configured form action message displays.
Logout of your space.
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- Read the general documentation on designing workflows for a detailed discussion of workflows and their features
- Like forms, a workflow has three accessibility states. See making forms/workflows public for more details.
- Like forms, a workflows's doc and form actions are configurable. Go back into the frevvo workflow designer for one of your workflows to use the Form Action and Doc Action buttons. See submitting your form for more details.
Workflows can be custom styled to fit the look & feel of your existing web site. See Layouts and Styles.
Refer to Workflow Design Patterns for a discussion of useful design patterns for workflows.
See the Business Rules chapter for the details and examples of how to add behaviors to your forms/workflows using the Visual Rule Builder.
- Make your forms/workflows more interactive by using templates.
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