Monitoring Workflows with a Profile

Workflows can be monitored via Workflow Profiles. Profiles are maintained on the Profile sub-tab of the STEP Workflow navigator tab. Profiles are available to users with the 'View and Maintain STEP Workflow Profile' privilege. A Profile can contain a wealth of information about workflows, such as: number of exceeded deadlines, how long the tasks have been assigned to the assignees, what is the workflow throughput this month versus the last six months, etc. This is all configured using the STEP Workflow Profile Wizard.

Note: A workflow profile definition can be exported as comments and submitted to an external source control system for comparison purposes. For details, refer to the Configuration Management documentation here.

To create a new Profile, navigate to the STEP Workflow tab, select the Profile sub-tab, and click the Create new link at the bottom of the Profile sub-tab.

For Label and Type, provide an ID, Label (name), assign a Setup Group, and choose a Domain (from the options in the following table).

Domain	Description	Example
States	Allows a user to view data focused on workflow states.	How many objects are in the various states of a workflow Who the state tasks are assigned to How long the objects have been in the states Number of exceeded deadlines How long the objects have been in the states that are assigned to a particular user or group How many objects have passed through the states today versus yesterday, versus the day before, etc.
Assignee	Allows a user to view data focused on assignees.	How many tasks are assigned to the various assignees How long the tasks have been assigned to the assignees If the assignees have tasks with exceeded deadlines How many tasks the assignee has completed this week versus the week before, etc.
STEP Workflows	Allows a user to view data focused on entire workflows.	How many objects are currently in the workflows How long the objects have been in the workflow, on average What is the workflow throughput this month versus the last six months, etc.

For STEP Workflow Filtering, determine the workflows or workflow states (within one or multiple workflows) that the profile should contain as defined below.

The options differ somewhat for each domain (selected in the previous step). Since profiles are not limited to a single workflow, a user could have an Assignee-domain Profile that shows information for tasks in numerous workflows.

The domain chosen previously impacts the options available in this step.

States domain or Assignee domain: Specify whether the profile should contain data from all workflow states or if it should be limited to specific workflow states only. If 'All States with tasks' is selected, the profile will contain data from every workflow state, from every workflow in the system. The 'Hide States with no Tasks' checkbox is only available when Specific States are selected.

STEP Workflows domain: Only entire workflows can be chosen for this option. Data cannot be filtered down to the task level.

For Collection Filtering, a user can optionally filter the profile results to contain information only for objects in a given collection.

For example, a user could create a profile that only shows data for objects that are to go live at a certain date, or only shows data for objects in a particular part of the tree hierarchy.

For User / Group Filtering, a user can filter the profile results to contain information only for tasks that are assigned to specific users or user groups. This step is disabled for the STEP Workflows domain.

For example, in the Assignee domain, the 'Specific Users / Groups' option is valuable to view the workload for a number of users. If the 'Assignees' option is selected, users with no tasks will also be included in the profile.

For Display, the profile options are different depending on the domain was selected in step 1.
- For the States and Assignees domains, the profile will consist of two tables: a Master Table and a Details Table.

Table	Description
Master Table	Displays more general information about the states or assignees.
Details Table	Appears when a row in the Master Table is selected—displays more specific information about the objects that are contained within a state or assigned to an assignee.

For the STEP Workflows domain, there is a single Master Table. Step 5 is where a user specifies which columns should be shown in these tables.

Common to all domains are the two divisions of the Master Table settings shown below.

Table Settings	Description
Live Data	Data that can be kept up to date automatically — data for workflow instances in their present state.
On Demand Data	Historical data that is retrieved from the object's State Logs.

For On Demand Data, this data is generated on demand for all three domains and allows the user to specify a time period of days, weeks, or months for which they would like to generate historical data. For example, if you select three (3) days, the generated On Demand table will display three columns, one for each selected day (e.g., "Throughput today," "Throughput yesterday," "Throughput 2 days ago.")

The following sections explain the different options by domain, for step 5.

States Domain

Table Settings	Description
Master Table- Live Data	Show count column: Number of objects currently in the state Show average time in State column: Average time that the objects have been in the state Show STEP Workflow column: Name of the workflow to which the state belongs Show exceeded Deadlines column: Number of exceeded deadlines for objects in the state, followed by the average exceed time Show maximum time in State column: The longest period an object currently in the state has been there
Master Table-On Demand Data	Show historical throughput: Number of objects that have exited the state within the given period (day / week / month). The number is increased each time an object exits the state, regardless of whether the object has been in and exited the state earlier. Show historical average time in state: Average time that objects—which have exited the state within the given period (day / week / month)—were in the state
Details Table	Show STEP Workflow column: Title of the workflow to which the state selected in the Master Table belongs Show time in State column: How long the object has been in the state Show Assignment time column: How long the task (which the object-in-state represents) has been assigned to the current assignee Show Deadline column: The deadline, if any Show Assignee column: The assignee Show Status Flag column: The current status

Assignees Domain

Table Settings	Description
Master Table- Live Data	Show count column: Number of tasks currently assigned to the User / Group Show average Assignment column: Average time the current tasks have been assigned to the user / group Show exceeded Deadlines column: Number of exceeded Deadlines for Tasks assigned to the user / group, followed by average exceed time Show maximum Assignment time column: Longest period that a task has been assigned to the user / group
Master Table-On Demand Data	Show historical number of assignments: Number of assignments within the given period (day / week / month). i.e., how many times during the period have tasks been assigned to the user / group Show historical number of completed tasks: Number of tasks that were completed within the given period (day / week / month) while assigned to the user / group Show historical average assignment time: Average time tasks were assigned to the user / group within the given period (day / week / month) Show historical average completion time: Average time within the given period (day / week / month) that it took a user / group to complete a task, once assigned
Details Table	Show STEP Workflow column: Name of the workflow in which the task exists Show State column: The state in which the task exists Show Assignment time column: How long the task has been assigned to the current assignee Show Deadline column: The deadline, if any Show time in State column: How long the task has existed, i.e., how long the object has been in the state Show Status Flag column: The current status

STEP Workflows Domain

Table Settings	Description
Master Table- Live Data	Show count column: Number of objects currently in the workflow that are not in a final state on the outer level Show average time in STEP Workflow column: Average time the objects have been in the workflow
Master Table-On Demand Data	Show historical throughput: Number of objects that have reached a final state on the outer level during the given period (day / week / month) Show historical avg. time in STEP Workflow: Average time that it took objects to reach a final state on the outer level (from time of workflow initiation) during the given period (day / week / month)

Click the Finish button.

Profile Editor

Once a profile has been configured, you can generate the On Demand data by clicking the 'Update on-demand data' button at the top of the Profile tab. You can also edit the configuration and copy the master table data into the clipboard, so you can paste it into a spreadsheet (e.g., Excel).

Note: The 'Update on-demand data' button option is available only if at least one of the 'On Demand Data' checkboxes are checked. If the button is not available, edit the configuration to enable it.

Clicking the 'Update on-demand data' button creates a background process, and updates the table. This displays the number of objects that have exited the workflow (for STEP Workflow domain) within the given period or based on the average time in state.

Note: Data from Workflow Profiles can be represented in widgets on the Global Dashboard in workbench. For more information, refer to the Global Dashboard topic in the Data Profiling documentation here.