Add new workflow to Alfresco

Question

I am new to Alfresco / Activiti.

Our company uses Skelta BPM.NET (in integration with our own RMS), and now we would like to take a look at other BPM software.

In the past days, I found how to create a new workflow using Eclipse and import them into a standalone Activiti installation.

Now I would like to publish this workflow to share Alfresco. Is there an easy way to do this? I searched all day on Google but found nothing useful.

And one more question about the installation: Is it possible to install Activiti with all its web applications on the same cat in which alfresco works? This Apache Ant can only create a standalone installation. So can this app be combined?

Thanks for your info, Anze

Answer 1

If you place the BPMN 2.0 process XML definition somewhere in the path of the Alfresco class, you can use the Alfresco Workflow console to deploy the definition.

For example, I always place my workflows under WEB-INF / classes / alfresco / extension / workflows / someFolder, where someFolder is a unique folder for each process definition that I use.

The workflow console is located at http: // localhost: 8080 / alfresco / faces / jsp / admin / workflow-console.jsp . Assuming you are using 3.4.e, which is a preview release showing Activiti integration, you can deploy the process through the workflow console using this command:

deploy activiti /alfresco/extension/workflows/activiti/activitiHelloWorld.activiti 

You can see other useful workflow console commands by typing help.

Alternatively, as Gagravarr suggests, you can use Spring to deploy your workflow when Alfresco starts up. Spring configuration file must have a name ending in "-context.xml". Usually I put mine in WEB-INF / classes / alfresco / extension.

  <?xml version='1.0' encoding='UTF-8'?> <!DOCTYPE beans PUBLIC '-//SPRING//DTD BEAN//EN' 'http://www.springframework.org/dtd/spring-beans.dtd'> <beans> <bean id="someco.workflowBootstrap" parent="workflowDeployer"> <property name="workflowDefinitions"> <list> <props> <prop key="engineId">activiti</prop> <prop key="location">alfresco/extension/workflows/activiti/activitiHelloWorld.bpmn20.xml</prop> <prop key="mimetype">text/xml</prop> <prop key="redeploy">false</prop> </props> </list> </property> <property name="models"> <list> <value>alfresco/extension/model/scWorkflowModel.xml</value> </list> </property> <property name="labels"> <list> <value>alfresco.extension.messages.scWorkflow</value> </list> </property> </bean> </beans> 

If you need work examples of some simple workflows, with the same workflows that were implemented for both jBPM and Activiti for easy comparison, check out this blog post: http://ecmarchitect.com/archives/2011/04 / 27/1357

Jeff

Answer 2

For the second part of your question:

If you want to use Alfresco with Activiti, you should try 3.4.e release (or recently nightly build). 3.4.e is activated by Activiti, so you do not need to merge webapps. All of this is already there for you.

For the first part, if you are using 3.4.e (or a later nightly build), then you should be able to deploy Activiti in much the same way as you previously deployed in JBMP. This Workflow With Activiti page should help you with this as well as this wiki .