IntegratingJBPMIntoAppFusePartDeux

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About this tutorial

Table of Contents

• [1] Install Process Design Tool for Eclispe
• [2] Create a simple Process Defintion
• [3] Write test case to validate Process Definition execution
• [4] Apply patch to prevent process definition redployment across server restart
• [5] Create and load identities into jBPM database
• [6] Enhance Process Defintion by creating and assigning tasks
• [7] Write test case to validate Process Definition execution
• [8] Enhance Process Defintion by creating ActionHandlers (DecisionHandler)
• [9] Write test case to validate new Process Definition execution
• [10] Wire spring beans inside jBPM Actions
• [11] Test spring bean execution

[#1] Install Process Design Tool for Eclispe

[#2] Create a simple Process Defintion

Create the following packages:
org.appfuse.jbpm.process - will contain process defintions
org.appfuse.jbpm.action - will contain jbpm actions
org.appfuse.jbpm.ant - will contain ant tasks (such as loading identities, cleaning schema, etc)

All the processes will live under the .process package. Whenever you create a new defintion, the process designer creates a new package with that name.
So lets start off by creating a simple test process.

i) Create a new process definition file.

ii) Give the process a name - test.

iii) That should give you the graphical tool interface as such.

We are now ready to start designing!

Before we really begin we have to reference the definition in org/appfuse/jbpm/dao/hibernate/applicationContext-hibernate.xml:

 <!-- jBPM Configuration -->
    <bean id="jbpmConfig" class="org.springmodules.workflow.jbpm31.LocalJbpmConfigurationFactoryBean">
	<!-- pass in existing sessionFactory -->
		<property name="sessionFactory" ref="jbpmSessionFactory"/>
		<property name="configuration" value="org/appfuse/jbpm/jbpm.cfg.xml"/>
		<property name="processDefinitions">
			<list>
				<ref local="testProcess"/>
			</list>
		</property>
		<property name="createSchema" value="false"/>
	</bean>

	<bean id="testProcess" class="org.springmodules.workflow.jbpm31.definition.ProcessDefinitionFactoryBean">
		<property name="definitionLocation" value="org/appfuse/jbpm/process/test/processdefinition.xml"/>
	</bean>

1) Click on one of each process states(Start, State, End) on the left panel and draw them in. You can edit the names of the states by clicking on thier name.

2) Choose transition from the left panel and click once on the start state and then on helloWorld state. Then from helloWorld to end.

Congratulations you have created a process definition using the process design tool!

Let's write a test case to validate our process definition.

[#3] Write test case to validate Process Definition execution

protected void onSetUpBeforeTransaction() throws Exception {
      ...
      definition = context.getGraphSession().findLatestProcessDefinition("test");
  }

public void testProcessDefinition() throws Exception {

      ProcessDefinition def = context.getGraphSession().findLatestProcessDefinition("test");
      
      assertNotNull("Definition should not be null", def);
  }

public void testTransitions() throws Exception {
        .....
        assertEquals("Instance is in 'helloWorld' state", inst.getRootToken().getNode().getName(), "helloWorld");
        .....
  }

It time to recompile and run our junit test. Execute ant refresh.



Select the project's context menu by right clicking on the project root(jbpmtutorial) and choosing the refresh option.



And finally select Project from the Eclispe's menu above and choose clean.



Now you can run the ProcessTest. Ensure you have ProcessTest open and selected and then choose Run As -> Junit Test



Upon execution JbpmConfiguration will deploy the 'test' process definition, and run through the tests.

You have successfully deployed and tested a process definition.

[#4] Apply patch to prevent process definition redployment across server restart

For production usage it is not ideal to redeploy process definitions on every startup. Once you have played around with your process defintions and are quite certain they will not change. You can apply the following patch to have the JbpmConfiguration not deploy a process definition every time you restart, rather have it redeployed only if the processdefinition.xml on the file system is out of sync with the database version

 <!-- jBPM Configuration -->
    <bean id="jbpmConfig" class="org.appfuse.jbpm.config.CustomLocalJbpmConfigurationFactoryBean">
    ....
    ....

newdef3.jpg		23693 bytes
CustomLocalJbpmConfigurationFactoryBean.java		5625 bytes
test3.jpg		11009 bytes
newdef2.jpg		30770 bytes
test2.jpg		32009 bytes
newdef4.jpg		60839 bytes
newdef1.jpg		50306 bytes
test5.jpg		164921 bytes
test4.jpg		84699 bytes
testpackage.jpg		78539 bytes
test1.jpg		107150 bytes