How To K2

Building Mobile Solutions with K2

k2eric — Mon, 12 Sep 2011 23:57:00 GMT

With the recent release of the K2 Task List mobile client for iPhone and BlackBerry, K2 processes leave the desktop and arrive in the hands of the on-the-go corporate decision maker. K2 process-oriented mobile applications offer a tremendous opportunity to deliver innovative solutions that reach beyond the confines of the office. In the video below see how the K2 Workflow client services and the K2 Mobile Worklist applications allow for rapid Mobile process application development.

SmartObject Services and BCS

k2eric — Thu, 01 Sep 2011 17:03:00 GMT

K2 SmartObjects give you the ability to build business entities against a wide variety of backend systems. Once surfaced as a SmartObject the obvious initial benefit is that this object can be used for read/write purposes in K2 processes. The benefits however extend far beyond just working with the entity in a process. Any K2 SmartObject can be automatically exposed as a WCF and REST endpoint. This gives you the power to integrate the entity into many more systems and applications. In the video below I explain how you can take a K2 SmartObject that is surfacing information out of Microsoft Dynamics CRM and through the WCF endpoint make this entity available as an external list in SharePoint by using Business Connectivity Services (BCS).

Advanced Task Allocation

k2eric — Fri, 01 Jul 2011 23:02:00 GMT

K2 blackpearl has two main out of the box SmartObjects for doing advanced task allocation. One for working with K2 Roles and the other is for working with Active Directory. Here are the methods for each object.

Role Methods
- Get Least Work – gets the user in a role with the least number of task items
- Get Most Work – gets the user in a role with the most number of task items
- Get Round Robin – gets the next user in a round robin role
- Get Fastest User – gets the user in a role with the smallest average task duration
- Get Slowest User – gets the user in a role with the largest average task duration
- Get Role Peers – gets the users in a role with one defined user excluded
Active Directory Methods
- Get Manager – gets the manager of the supplied user from Active Directory
- Get Direct Reports – gets the direct report users for a supplied user from Active Directory

As you can see these methods provide some interesting possibilities for dynamically assigning tasks as part of a K2 process. The “Least Work” and “Round Robin” methods are great for balancing load across a particular role of users. The “Get Direct Reports” method is handy for things like performance review processes.

To see these methods in action check out the video below.

Building a K2 Process with InfoPath and SmartObjects

k2eric — Fri, 17 Jun 2011 23:04:00 GMT

InfoPath is a powerful forms technology that allows users to build rich forms without having to write code. In the videos below I show you how you can use an InfoPath form as the user interface for both initiating a K2 process and delivering tasks within that process. I also show you how you can externalize your form data into a SQL database, without writing any code, using K2 SmartObjects. Externalizing data is important when capturing business data that needs to be securely stored and easily reported on. A K2 InfoPath process does not require that you externalize your data. A standard InfoPath form using data stored in the main data source is also supported along with a combination of the two where some data is in the form and some data is external. It is also important to note that you can have multiple InfoPath forms associated to a single K2 process. You can even have tasks within an InfoPath integrated K2 process that use other form technologies like for example ASP.net.

In the first video I take you through building the InfoPath form and the basic K2 process.

How to K2: Building a K2 Process with InfoPath and SmartObjects Part 1

In the second video I show you how to extend the process to save a read-only copy of the InfoPath form into SharePoint. I also deploy the process and show you the end user experience of final solution.

How to K2: Building a K2 Process with InfoPath and SmartObjects Part 2

The third video shows an alternate approach to designing an InfoPath process using the K2 designer for SharePoint which is hosted with in the browser.

Using the Workflow Client Services

k2eric — Wed, 15 Jun 2011 18:58:00 GMT

The K2 Workflow Client Services provide platform free access to Process and Worklist objects for use in building powerful integrated process driven applications. Previously if you wanted to build a process initiation page, a task page, a custom worklist, or any other application that integrated with a K2 process at runtime it required a direct reference to the workflow.client API. This approach can work well with .net based applications but in today’s world of Service Oriented Architecture there is a need to be able to provide a set of standardized services for consuming and interacting with K2 processes. The Workflow Client Services have recently been introduced to address this need.

There are 3 main service endpoints that are provided in the Workflow Client Services:

WS.asmx – Standard Web Service endpoint
WCF.svc – Windows Communication Foundation (WCF) endpoint
REST.svc – Representational State Transfer (REST) endpoint. Supports XML, ATOM, and JSON data formats

Each of these endpoints provides worklist and process instance interactivity similar to the worklist.client API. They also support SSL for secure communication.

There is a lot of good information in the help files on how to use these services but I have put together a bit of example code for the REST and WCF endpoints and attached it to this post as well as providing a brief overview video (below)

The REST example uses javascript, Jquery and the REST service to provide a completely client side html K2 worklist.

The WCF example provides very basic workflow initiation and task pages using ASP.net.

Check out the video below for an overview of the example code.

How to K2: Workflow Client Services

Starting Processes from Libraries that Implement Content Types

Joseph — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 18:39:21 GMT

The Problem
When using K2’s SharePoint Event Integration you are provided with multiple trigger/hook points to which you can tie your process for initialization. Commonly, in a non-content typed library, you simply select “Item Added” hook and move on in the wizard.

However, because of the order in which the “Item Added” event and metadata save events are triggered by SharePoint, metadata will not be available immediately for use in your process. If you expect to make decisions in your process based on metadata within moments of the item being created you will be sorely disappointed.

First Attempts
The first workarounds leveraged to avoid this SharePoint timing issue involved implementing a start rule on a process or activity instructing it to wait for x seconds. This opens up a nasty can of worms if the servers involved are under unexpectedly high load or if process execution speed is paramount to the business need. Additionally you COULD violate best practices and check for the data in a SmartObject event and if the metadata isn’t ready, loop back and wait x seconds before trying again – but doesn’t that seem messy? and it couldn’t be good for performance..

New Perspective
So, what other events in SharePoint do we have access to that won’t keep this metadata limitation until Office 2010? Well, I’m glad you asked. In fact, SharePoint’s “Update Event” does respect timing in regards to the metadata. In every test I’ve performed when firing a process based on the update event, the metadata is ready and waiting for me when I need it from a SmartObject event. But that isn’t the best part; The metadata you can map to process datafields and the folio in the SharePoint Events Process wizard in K2 works flawlessly when the process is triggered from SharePoint’s update event, so you’ll probably be able to make the decisions necessary just based on this initial data keeping your decision making lightweight.

Decisions Decisions
Besides the fact that the method I’m describing keeps you from violating best practices with start rules and loopbacks, there are other advantages to creating a control process to handle the processes you want to tie to a particular SharePoint list.

You may have an approval process associated with a Document Library for all but one content type. In the case of the final content type, you need a more complex approval solution and therefore need a completely different process associated with it. Having a control process triggered by the update event will allow you to make decision regarding which approval process to execute.

As above, you may have a particular content type that requires no approvals at all, you can allow for the control process to simply do nothing in the case of this content type.

You may want to take control of an approval process under certain scenarios. For instance, if a capital expenditure is up for approval and someone updates the document or metadata, you can add logic to the control process, to send the Approval process back to the beginning and notify the SharePoint user that they just made the approval start over.

Example

Here I’m integrating with a document library that has two content types. Both content types have a yes/no column named “Process Started” which will allow us to make our first decision in the control process: Is there already a process in motion to handle this document? We don’t want an approval process to get kicked off every time someone or some system updates the data, so we create a control process that looks something like this and leverage the “ProcessStarted” yes/no data.

A series of wizard highlights I snapped while creating this example

Within the Sharepoint Events Integration wizard, opt for the “Item Updated” Event:

Still in the Event Integration wizard, map your decision making field, “ProcessStarted”, from the SharePoint event to a a process datafield for easiest access in your line rules:

Configure the 1st line rule for the scenario when a process had already been set in motion, so the control process can just end silently and set the other line rule for the inverse “<>”:

Add an IPC event as pictured above in the activity “IPC-StartDocumentApproval” and be sure to map any data you will need in the child process such as the document name, folder, site/list url, and any Content Type columns that you mapped in the Sharepoint Events Process wizard:

Finally, add a SmartObject event to your control process to update the “ProcessStarted” status successfully. Instead of a yes/no column, I’d also recommend using a text column that you can also purpose as a status field. As the approval process reaches each milestone (ie. Started, Approved, Complete) you can use a SmartObject event to publish that status directly in the Document Library lessening load on your reports and bringing pertinent data closer to your users.

Now, each time a SharePoint Update event is triggered, K2 will evaluate the current conditions and decide whether to start an approval process for the document in question. Additionally, the K2 control process can be expanded to make decision based on other available metadata and start one of several or multiple processes to handle the business rules associated with a particular content type, document type and/or matching data relationship.

Using “code behind” with InfoPath forms, SharePoint and K2

chrisg — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 20:49:53 GMT

IP and Codebehind

Some additional great info

http://www.k2distillery.com/2008/12/deploy-infopath-as-feature-with-managed.html

http://www.k2distillery.com/2008/10/deploy-infopath-as-feature.html

Also from the K2 documentation, check out the step by step instructions. (be aware you will also need to have some type of digitally signed form in many cases for this to work 100%)

InfoPath integration using Code Behind

When integrating K2 blackpearl with InfoPath FormServices and the InfoPath form contains Code Behind the following steps will need to be performed:

1. Create your Form, add your C# or VB code, set it to Full Trust and save the template on the local machine

2. Open your K2 Project

3. Open the InfoPath Process Integration Wizard

4. Select Add

5. Browse to your Template saved in step 1

6. On the Deployment Location page select Local or Network location

7. Complete the Add InfoPath Template and InfoPath Integration wizards

8. Deploy your process when done with your design

9. After successful deployment browse to the Deployment Location selected in step 6

10. Right Click the file and select Design

11. Select Publish from the File menu

12. Enter your Site URL and click Next

13. Select Enable this form to be filled in Using a browser and Continue to the next page

14. Enter the Template filename which will have to be uploaded by an administrator using the Central Admin and complete the rest of the wizard

15. Close InfoPath

16. Open the MOSS Central Admin site

17. Navigate to Central Admin > Application Manager > Manage Form Templates > Upload Form Template

18. Browse to the File saved in step 14 and select Upload

19. When this completed navigate to Central Admin > Application Manager > Manage Form Templates

20. Find the template uploaded in the previous step, open the file’s drop down menu and select Activate Template on Site Collection

21. Select the site on which you would like to use the template and click on OK

22. Browse to the site on which you activated the Template and navigate to the library on which you wish to add the template as a content type

23. Ensure that the Library is set to display as a Web Page and apply the changes

24. Still on the Library settings page find the Content Types Section and select Add from existing site content types

25. Add the Content Type that you enabled on the Site Collection in step 22

26. Navigate to the Document Library and Open the content type added

27. This should now open the Browser

How To K2 Process Portals

chrisg — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 15:05:28 GMT

Process Portals

Learn more about the K2 web designer in blackpoint

chrisg — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 14:44:00 GMT

K2 web designer for blackpoint

Learn more about K2 studio

chrisg — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 18:17:00 GMT

How To K2

How to K2 Kerberos edition

chrisg — Thu, 06 Nov 2008 20:32:00 GMT

Hello all,

Well its been some time since I have posted anything up here but this video is a long one, but also very important. IT IS KERBEROS. Since this one is so long and covers so much I added an index/TOC to it, Simply open the HTML file associated with this project in the ZIP. If you do not want to use this you can just watch the straight WMV.

One item that I did not explain very well was the Kerberos Time Sensitivity. By default if there is greater than 5Min difference between 2 systems involved in a authentication Kerberos will fail. Check out the following article for more info.

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc780011.aspx

for advanced information on Constrained Delegation and Protocol Transition check out the following link

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc739587.aspx

For wireshark info

http://www.wireshark.org/

The SETSPN tool is in the 2003 support tools downloadable from here

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=96a35011-fd83-419d-939b-9a772ea2df90&DisplayLang=en

and finally the video

Here is the Link to the zip download

http://k2underground.com/files/folders/howtok2/entry27136.aspx

After you watch the video Here are some great resources.

http://blogs.msdn.com/james_world/archive/2007/08/20/essential-guide-to-kerberos-in-sharepoint.aspx

http://www.pluralsight.com/wiki/default.aspx/Keith.GuideBook.HomePage

http://blogs.msdn.com/martinkearn/archive/2007/04/23/configuring-kerberos-for-sharepoint-2007-part-1-base-configuration-for-sharepoint.aspx

http://www.digwin.com/view/moss-and-kerberos-configuration

http://www.microsoft.com/msj/0899/kerberos/kerberos.aspx

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/windowsserver2003/technologies/security/tkerberr.mspx

http://windowsitpro.com/article/articleid/97376/use-kerberos-to-secure-moss-2007.html

http://www.sharepointblogs.com/spfromscratch/archive/2008/02/11/configuring-kerberos-autentication-on-moss-2007.aspx

http://technet2.microsoft.com/windowsserver/en/technologies/featured/kerberos/default.mspx

http://blogs.inetium.com/blogs/jdevries/archive/2006/04/21/more-on-kerberos-and-delegation-troubleshooting.aspx

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/907272

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=99B0F94F-E28A-4726-BFFE-2F64AE2F59A2&displaylang=en

A Great book

http://www.amazon.com/Windows-Server-2003-Security-Infrastructures/dp/1555582834/ref=sr_1_14?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1213632286&sr=8-14

Deployment Troubleshooting

chrisg — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 21:16:22 GMT

Another is ready for your viewing pleasure. Its on Deployment Troubleshooting

In WMV

http://k2underground.com/files/folders/howtok2/entry25321.aspx

In Packaged Format

http://k2underground.com/files/folders/howtok2/entry25322.aspx

Also make sure you check out the following KB article as it contains some great info for this topic as well

http://kb.k2workflow.com/Articles/KB000188.aspx

So you say you want to debug?

chrisg — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 19:28:32 GMT

We are on a roll this week and I have 2 more How to K2 videos ready for you. A huge thanks to our own "bobopedia" Bob Maggio for all his help on these videos.

Debugging a Service Broker

This will show how the Visual Studio Debugger can be utilized to debug a custom K2 Service broker.

In this scenario the configuration method is debugged, so K2 workspace is used to trigger the debugging event, as opposed to some sort of actual Create or Update method.

Note: in some environments the K2 server may need to be enabled for remote debugger. Refer to the below link for more details:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/910448

(Packaged)

http://k2underground.com/files/folders/howtok2/entry25114.aspx

(WMV)

http://k2underground.com/files/folders/howtok2/entry25115.aspx

Debugging a K2 Process

This will show how the Visual Studio Debugger can be attached to the K2 server and used to step through the code of an executing process.

Note: in some environments the K2 server may need to be enabled for remote debugger. Refer to the below link for more details:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/910448

(Packaged)

http://k2underground.com/files/folders/howtok2/entry25112.aspx

(WMV)

http://k2underground.com/files/folders/howtok2/entry25113.aspx

Process Error Repair

chrisg — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 17:34:00 GMT

The How To K2 video series is back in action. This video will go over process error repair, mainly utilizing the process management functionality in Visual Studio.

I hope you enjoy.

WMV Format

http://k2underground.com/files/folders/howtok2/entry25066.aspx

Packaged

http://k2underground.com/files/folders/howtok2/entry25067.aspx

Roles and Destinations

chrisg — Fri, 04 Apr 2008 17:51:53 GMT

Hello all!

The latest and greatest "How to K2" video is now live, and this one is a big one, it is on Roles and Destinations. I spent a lot of time talking to MikeyT, Holly and Koos to make sure what I was telling you is exactly correct. This is an often confusing area so I hope that it helps out.

You can download them here

WMV

http://k2underground.com/files/folders/howtok2/entry22964.aspx

Packaged

http://k2underground.com/files/folders/howtok2/entry22966.aspx

IPOD

http://k2underground.com/files/folders/howtok2/entry22965.aspx

I also refer in the video to the AWESOME whitepaper that MikeT wrote, it is located here http://k2underground.com/files/folders/technical_product_documents/entry20948.aspx

So now go out there, watch it build something and have FUN!