Configuring the Start Event to Submit Data

Let's get started! This tutorial includes the following sections:

Configuring the Start Event

1. To implement the leave approval process, drag a Start Event  to the design canvas.  

   Every BPMN process should start with a Start Event and end with an End Event.

   

2. To implement the scenario, in which the employee submits a leave application form, click Form in the Properties tab of the Start Event.

3. To create the application form, click New and add a new entry for each of the following fields. 
   

   id	Name	Type	Date Pattern	Readable	Writable	Required
   numberOfDays	Number of days	long	-	true	true	true
   startDate	First day of holiday (dd-MM-yyyy)	string	dd-MM-yyyy hh:mm	true	true	true
   vacationReason	Reason	string	-	true	true	true
   employeeName	Name of employee	string	-	true	true	true

   

4. To add an admin user as the initiator of the process, enter admin as the value of the Initiator field in the Main Config section of the Properties tab. 
   
   
5. Add an End Event to the diagram and connect the Start Event to it.
   
   

Creating the deployable archive

1. Press Ctrl+S to save all the artifacts, which you created in WSO2 EI Tooling.

2. Right click on the name of the project in the Package Explorer window, and click Create deployment artifacts.

   If you do not have the Package Explorer view, click Window → Show View → Other, select Package Explorer and open it.

   This creates the BAR file under the deployment folder of the project. This archive file contains of all the artifacts of your BPMN project for you to deploy it in the Business Process profile of WSO2 EI.
   

   
   

1. Start the Business Process profile of WSO2 EI. For instructions see Starting the Business Process profile.

2. In a web browser, open the Management Console of the Business Process profile, and log in with the default credentials (username: admin and password: admin).
   

3. Click Main → Manage → Processes → Add → BPMN, browse the BAR file of the BPMN Project and click Upload.

   If you are unable to locate the BAR file, right click on the name of the BAR file in the Package Explorer window and click Properties to find it as shown below.

   

   If you upload a package with an existing name, the processes in the package gets versioned. This retires all the old processes in the package and deploys the new version. Since only package-level versioning is available, the new package will include all the processes defined in the old package, even though you may only need to update a single process in that package. 

4. Once you uploaded the artifacts successfully you will view the new processes added to the list as shown below. 

   If you do not view the new processes, refresh the browser or click Main → Manage → Processes → List → BPMN.

   

    Undeploying a BPMN Project

   If you want to undeploy a BPMN Project, there are two ways of doing it as follows.

   1. From the Management Console of the Business Process profile:
      
      1. Log in to Management Console, click Main → Manage → Processes →  List →  BPMN.
      2. Click the Package Name you want to undeploy.
      3. The Package Dashboard page appears. Click on the Undeploy link.
         
   2. By deleting the BPMN ZIP file from the file system. 
      
      1. Delete the BPMN package from <EI_HOME>/wso2/business-process/repository/deployment/server/bpmn directory.
    Suspending process instances

   In the Management Console, click Main → Manage → Instances →  BPMN to suspend a process instance that is created by a deployed process.

   

Testing the output

Follow the steps below to test the output.

1. Log in to the BPMN-explorer at https://localhost:9445/bpmn-explorer using admin for both the username and password.
2. Click PROCESSES in the top menu, and click the Start option of the Leave Approval Process.
   

3. Initiate the process by filling the form and click Start.

   
   You view the following message.