IBM BPM, V8.0.1, All platforms > Authoring services in Integration Designer > Developing business processes

Building human tasks

To create and manipulate tasks that will be assigned to human staff members in the runtime environment, use the human task editor.

Use the human task editor to configure human tasks that can be wired to other components within the IBM Integration Designer family of tools.

Human tasks can only be deployed to the IBM Process Server.

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• Human tasks
  A human task is, quite simply, a unit of work that involves a human. Quite often, this task requires that the human interact with other services, and thus becomes a task within a larger business goal.
• Create human tasks
  To create a new human task, follow these instructions.
• Assigning roles to your human task
  A role is a set of employees who share the same level of authority. When it comes to working on tasks, the role that the person belongs to defines their authorization.
• Configure the people directory
  Use this task to configure the LDAP or VMM people directory provider that Business Process Choreographer uses to determine who can start a process or claim an activity or a task.
• Defining the people assignment criteria
  People assignment criteria are constructs used in the task model to identify sets of people that can be assigned to an instance-based authorization role. At run time, the people resolution uses the people assignment criteria to retrieve the user IDs and other user information, for example, for composing emails.
• Defining substitution for absentees
  The substitution feature allows a user to indicate when they will be absent so that a substitution policy can be applied, and the work items can be assigned to somebody else.
• Setting duration values for your human task
  

  You can set a duration value for your human task to specify how long the task will hold before it is either due, set to expire, or set to be deleted.

• Use custom properties for human tasks
  Custom properties are used to categorize a task, and can be useful for querying, sorting, and filtering tasks.
• Create an escalation for your human task
  An escalation is a notification that is sent out when an expected result from a task has not been achieved within a set period of time.

  For example, an escalation could be used to alert a manager when a staff member is unable to complete a task by the deadline.

• Ad hoc collaboration
  When you create or modify a task in the user interface of the runtime environment, you can dynamically define a task either as a subtask or a follow-on task.
• Transferring work items
  In the runtime environment, if a person who has claimed a task finds that they are not able to complete it, they can transfer the work item to another person or group.
• Locked tasks
  When a human task is imported from IBM WebSphere Business Modeler some of the items in the editor will be locked. This locking is designed to ensure interoperability between IBM WebSphere Business Modeler and IBM Integration Designer.

  If you unlock and modify any of the locked items then your human task might no longer be synchronizable with IBM WebSphere Business Modeler exports. It is, therefore, recommended that you do not unlock items.

• Set up a user interface for your human task
  The human task editor provides various client types that you can use to customize a user interface through which users can interact with the tasks in the runtime environment.
• Testing human tasks
  

  You can test several aspects of a human task before you deploy the task to the test environment or production server.

• Task tags
  Use task tags in your project to make sure that important tasks are completed.
• Sticky notes
  Sticky notes identify areas that serve as a reminder for a software task or human task in your project.
• Programming support for human tasks
  Additional programming support for human tasks is available through a set of APIs.
• Extend human tasks using plug-ins
  Business Process Choreographer provides an event handling infrastructure for events that occur during the processing of human tasks. Plug-in points are also provided so that you can adapt the functionality to your needs. You can use the service provider interfaces (SPIs) to create customized plug-ins for handling events and the processing of staff queries.
• Limitations for human tasks
  There are current limitations that you should be aware of when using the human task editor, or when working with human tasks.

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