Task

A task in Emakin represents a work item defined and executed in scope of a business process. It needs to be completed, either manually (requiring user intervention) or automatically (handled only by the system), for the business process to advance and eventually finish.

When you enter a pending task a specific form is shown, containing relevant information and interactive fields to collect user inputs. Emakin’s top bar will display additional controls specific to the task at hand.

The task form and task controls are defined on a per task basis, when designing the business process. Nevertheless, let’s explore some aspects and functionalities that are common to every task.

Task toolbar

Emakin’s top bar is populated with task related controls when you enter a task. We call it the task toolbar.

The controls available to you will vary depending on your permissions, the task status, and the task configuration defined at business process design time.

Open

Task toolbar.

The task toolbar has five buttons, by default, for an open task (described below, from left to right):

• Menu button, to show/hide Emakin’s sidebar (a.k.a. navigation menu);

• Close button, to exit the task and return to the previous screen;

• Print button, to print the task information (i.e. task form);

• History button, to view the task history;

• Forward button, used for task delegation.

Specific task action buttons may be present to the right of the Forward button.

Task lock

A task may be available to several users at the same time (i.e. functional position, organization unit, or user group) while remaining unassigned. When one of those users enters the task, Emakin automatically creates a task lock on behalf of that user. The other users are still allowed to enter the task, but the task form is now displayed in read only mode, to prevent eventual conflicts of concurrent changes done by multiple users, and the task toolbar will display information about the active lock. When the first user exits, delegates, or completes the task, Emakin automatically removes the task lock.

Open

Locked Task toolbar.

Every task lock has a predefined timeout as a safeguard, preventing a user from locking a task indefinitely. Upon task lock timeout expiration Emakin removes the lock automatically and the task becomes available again to all intended users.