Workflow Forms

A Workflow Form is a specification for how the action request is approved after a user requests the access to perform some action in the software. Put simply, a Workflow Form defines who receives and decides to approve or reject a request.

Terminology

The application action request approval process involves the following terminology.

• Workflow Form is the configuration of how a request should be approved.
• Level is the unit of a request approval process. When all approvers on the workflow form level approve a request the process moves to the next level. When all levels are approved, the request is considered Approved. When any single approver rejects a request, the request is considered Rejected.
• Approver is a user or a group that can approve a request on their level. When one of the approver approve the level, the level is considered approved.
• Workflow Selector is a set of requirements for certain target users or groups to request access to the Action under specific circumstances, such as an IP location of time of the day. Only after request approval, as defined in the workflow form, a requester is granted access to the action.
• Request Action is an action a user requests to access. Examples of the actions include Service Request, View secret credentials or grant a permission.
• Request Target is a user or a group that is required to approve access to the request action before executing it.
• Request is the submitted application by a requester to gain access to the specified request action.
• Request Approval is one of the level approvers who approves or rejects the request.
• Type defines how the form handles the request approval process. The following Type options are available:
  • Automatic: Automatic workflow form allows the application to approve a requested action automatically while also generating an event log about the request and the automatic approval.
  • Interactive: Interactive workflow forms require the request to go through a potential multi-level approval process based on the request approval workflow specification defined in the workflow form. Each level might define a set of alternative approvers. An approved state is only reached in an interactive type when each level of the workflow form has approved the request. Any single rejection, will result in the entire request being rejected.
  • Restricting: Restricting workflow form removes access to this action making it unavailable to the user defined in the form selector.

Note

In an interactive type, when a user is specified as the approver, the approval of this user approves the level. When a group is specified as the approver then the approval of several members of this group approves the level. The specific number of users in the group that is sufficient to approve the level is specified in the Weight property of the approver. For example, a level Weight of 3 means that three approvals must be submitted on this level before the approval process will advance to the next level.

Creating a Workflow Form

Workflow Forms are created and managed by site Request Managers or site Administrators.

1. Log in with a Request Manager or Administrator account.
2. Navigate to Management > Workflow Forms and click the Add button.
3. Click on the parameter name for details about each or follow the guidance provided here:
   1. Form Name: Enter a unique and recognizable name that will reference this form in Workflow Selectors and Requests.
   2. Type: Select a type that will process the approval process. Available options include: Automatic, Interactive or Restricting. If Interactive is selected, populate the following parameters to configure the interactive approval process:
      • Level n: Add Approver: use this button to add a user(s) or group(s) as an approver on this level.
        • Weight: Defines the number of users in the approver group that have to approve the request to approve the level. Note that a Weight value can only be defined when assigning a group to the approver role of a level.
          For example, if an approver group includes 10 members and the Weight value is set to 3, then any three of those ten members are required to approve the request to advance its progress to the next level. Use caution because if the group has only 2 members and the Weight value is 3, this level cannot advance because there aren't enough members to meet the Weight requirement.
      • Level n: Remove Level: use this button to remove this entire level. Please note that an interactive type requires at least one level.
      • Add Level: use this button to add an new level to the end of this approval process. Please note that a level requires at least one approver (user or group) to be included.
   3. Enabled: Indicates whether the workflow form is enabled for usage.
4. Click the Save button to complete this operation.