Work Item Transfer Utility

The migration tool in EPX provides users with a way to move data from one EPX system to another. If the objects (i.e., users, groups, roles, etc.) being migrated already exist in the system, most of them will be overwritten. However, in the case of process flows, a new flow will be created with “-migrated” appended to the original flow name. Now, users have a way to transfer all the work items from one process flow to another.

Work items can be transferred from a process flow, or from a subflow and are described either as a source flow or a target flow. If a source flow contains a subflow activity that is mapped to a subflow activity in the target flow where the subflows are different, the work item versions that are in the source subflow will have to be transferred to the target subflow in a separate operation from the main flow transfer.

If some of the activities from the source flow have not been mapped to target activities, the transfer utility will create a hidden activity in the target flow where these unmapped work item versions can be placed so that they are not lost. Only work item versions that are not current will be placed in the hidden activity. The hidden activity name will be deleted_activity, and the activity will be marked as deleted so that it will not appear in the Design Console for the flow. Any work item version that is placed in this hidden activity will also be marked as deleted.

If the actor at a target activity is different than the actor at the corresponding source activity, the actor will be changed to the target activity’s actor for work item versions that are current at the target activity. If the actor has been changed to a dynamic actor role or to a selection role, the work item will not be transferred. If the actor has been changed from one automatic activity to another, the BIC manager will need to be restarted in order to recognize the change.

If the work item contains a work item version in the process flow or subflow that is current and is at an activity that has not had a target activity mapped, the work item will not be transferred.

If an error occurs during transfer, everything is rolled back and none of the changes are committed to the database. A log file is created on the server with the name witransfer_timestamp.log where timestamp is the time that the transfer began.

Note: Before transferring work items, it is recommended that the tomcat services be stopped so that no work occurs during work item transfer. If this is not an option in production, the BICs should be disabled temporarily and then enabled after the transfer.

After work items have been transferred, the Process flows need to be renamed and the old flow’s starting points disabled.

Transferring Work Items

  1. Launch Design Console.
  2. Click on the Tools menu and then select the Work Item Transfer option.
  3. The Work Item Transfer Utility window appears onscreen.

Click on the checkbox of Transfer Enroute Work Items if you want to transfer work items that have been introduced into a workflow but have not reached the final activity within the workflow. Click on the checkbox Transfer Completed Work Items if you want to transfer work items that have reached the final activity within a work flow. Select either one of the two or both of them if you want to transfer all the work items.

Note: At least one of the checkboxes must be selected otherwise no work items will be transferred.

  1. Click on the Source Selection... button. Select a single flow that will be used as the Source Flow for the work item transfer.

Note: If a target flow has not been selected, all process flows that the user has read permission on will be displayed in this dialog window. However, if a target flow has been selected, all process flows that are of the same type as the target flow that the user has read permission on will be displayed in this dialog window.

  1. Click OK. The Source Activity column on the Activity Mappings table will be populated with the activities for the selected source flow.

If you clicked on the Clear button, it will clear all the contents of the Source Activity column on the Activity Mappings table.

If you clicked on the Cancel button, no changes will be made to the source flow or the Activity Mappings table.

  1. Click on the Target Selection... button. Select a single flow that will be used as the Target Flow for the work item transfer.

Note: If a source flow has not been selected, all process flows that the user has read permission on will be displayed in this dialog window. However, if a source flow has been selected, all process flows that are of the same type as the target flow that the user has read permission on will be displayed in this dialog window. Also, both the source flow and a target flow must be of the same type.

  1. Click OK. The Target Activity column on the Activity Mappings table will be populated with the activities for the selected target flow. If you clicked on the Clear button, it will clear all the contents of the Target Activity column on the Activity Mappings table. If you clicked on the Cancel button, no changes will be made to the target flow or the Activity Mappings table.

By default, target activities are matched to source activities with the same name and activity type. If you want to change the target activity being displayed on the Activity Mappings table, select the activity on the Target Activity column and click on the button. The window below will appear, select an activity and click on OK.

Both the source and target activities must be of the same type.

  1. To start transferring the work items click on the Transfer button or click on Transfer from the menu and then select the Transfer option.