With Comidor BPMN 2.0 Designer, you can map and optimize any process that takes place in your company.
To access Workflow Designer, click on the App Factory icon > Process Automation > Process Designs.
Learn how to create and manage workflows step by step.
Workflow Design
In the Design tab, you can start the Workflow creation.
Workflow Components
Basic Components:
Comidor offers the following BPMN 2.0 basic workflow components:
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- Tasks and escalations
- Subprocess
- SMS
- Notification
- Timer
- AND/OR/XOR gateways
- Annotation
- End
Integration Components:
Additionally, designers cover their integration needs with the following workflow components:
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- RESTful Web Service
- OpenAI ChatGPT
- Message Queue
- Teams integration
- Google Integration
- Zoho projects API
- Zoho leads API
- Freshdesk API
- Salesforce API
Data Components:
Designers use low-code data workflow components for data input and output.
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- Comidor DATA (insert/update/delete)
- Shell Command
- File Reader
- Export Data
- Convert Data
- Digital Signature
- Document Creator
- QR Generator
- Table Extractor
- Excel Processor
- Graph Creator
- Blockchain
RPA Workflow Components:
Other workflow components can be added within the workflow design to enhance automation in business processes with RPA and ML/AI. Those components are:
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- RPA Caller/ Receiver
- Sentiment Analysis
- Document Analyzer
- Text Classification
- Predictive ML
- Selenium RPA
- Image Classification
- Web Scraper
Code Components:
Users without development skills can add the following workflow code components into the workflow designs to replace commands and queries:
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- Set values
- Existence check
- SQL Creator
- String Utilities
- JSON Array to Excel
- Deserialize JSON
Basic Components
Flow Objects
In the Workflow Design panel, you may see flow objects like:
- Events
- Activities
- Gateways
Events
Having Standard Start Event and End Event already in the design area, you can add more flow objects with drag-and-drop in your Workflow. The Start Event Notation can be only one; a workflow may start when:
- a Process (of any type: Generic Process, Project, Opportunity, Event, Training, Issue, Ticket, Topic, Job Posting, Campaign) connected with this Workflow is set as “Running”
- a Process Template is initiated with the initial state “Running”
- a Process Schedule is triggered
Still, you may have as many End Events as you needed.
Other Intermediate Events exist:
- Email: The email element is a Throwing-Message Intermediate Event that can be used to create and send custom emails through your automated process.
- Timer: The timer element is a Catching-Timer Intermediate Event that adds a timer counting delays in hours or days in your workflow.
- System Notification: Sends pre-defined or custom system messages to specific Comidor users.
Timer boundary Events and Conditional Events are depicted in Comidor differently than within Activities.
Events affect the process flow and have a cause (trigger) and an effect (impact/result).
Activities
Activities refer to work performed by the user(s)/group(s) (atomic or non-atomic) which can be a Task or Sub-Process (sub-process may be of any type: Generic Process, Project, Opportunity, Event, Training, Issue, Ticket, Topic, Job Posting, Campaign).
- Tasks (atomic or choreography): a task is used when the work is not broken into a finer level, while the choreography task is used when more than one participant is involved and needs to exchange messages. This piece of work is depicted in Comidor with a Workflow Task that can be assigned to one or more Personnel/Group leader(s) of a team/whole team and can be broken down manually to sub-tasks later, while the process is on the go.
- Sub-process: a process that can be broken down into a set of smaller activities (other workflows with tasks and sub-processes or call activities) and can involve one or more participants.
- Escalation is also available. The user can set specific conditions that will trigger actions or notifications as per the user’s needs and requirements.
In the task you wish to apply the escalation to, click on the upwards arrow button. A new window opens, where you can create and manage the escalations for this particular task.
Click on the “+” button to create a new escalation. In the “Basic” tab, fill in the Description, Priority, and Repetition Days fields. Workflow and Stage fields are automatically set and cannot be edited.
In the “Conditions” tab, choose the conditions based on which an action or notification should be triggered. For example, in case the completion of the task is delayed by a specific amount of hours or more, a predefined action could be triggered or notifications/emails could be sent to specified users/groups.
In the “Actions” tab, you have the option to perform an action in a field related to the mother process or to a global field. In this example, when the task’s finish is delayed over 3 hours, the mother process state will be paused. The “+” and “-” buttons allow you to add or delete actions.
In the “Notifications” tab, you can select the users/groups that should receive the notification. In addition, you can add related comments in the “Content” field. The users will receive the notification in the System Notifications button of the main Notification bar.
Similarly, in the “E-mails” tab, you can either select the users/groups that should receive a predefined email or type a specific email address. In order for your email to be sent, you have to set up first an email account.
Once all the above have been completed, click on “Save” or “Save and New” if you wish to create more escalations for this task. Otherwise, click on”Cancel” if you do not want to save your entry.
Gateways
A gateway is used to determine the branching, forking, merging, and joining of paths drawn by sequence flow. In Comidor we have Exclusive, Inclusive, and Parallel gateways.
- Inclusive (OR) Gateway: Inclusive Gateway refers to activating one or more flows when dividing. For incoming, all paths may be taken/fulfilled, from one to all.
- Parallel (AND) Gateway (Fork/Join): Parallel Gateway refers to dividing into two or more flows (fork). For incoming flows, the parallel gateway will wait for all incoming flows before continues (join).
- Exclusive (XOR) Gateway: Exclusive Gateway refers to choosing “either/or” and will limit the outcome to exactly one single flow of the output branches.
Connectors
We use sequence flow connecting objects in Comidor.
Conditional Flow shows the order of activities; it may hold a condition (conditional flow) or stand as default flow. It connects activities/events/gateways that exist in the same pool/lane.
Learn more about each Workflow Component in detail.
Swimlanes: Pool and Lanes
- Pool and Lane define the responsibility for activities (tasks/sub-processes)
- Lanes exist inside a Pool and pool boundaries represent the process that is automated with the workflow
- We may have a Pool with different Lanes (participants such as the user(s)/group(s) for process automation) or have different Pools with one Lane for different sub-processes of an automated mother process
- You can add Lanes in the Pool by clicking on the upper-left-side “+” button in the Designer. A Lane name is a free text – you may add a name of a person, department, or role
- You can click on the pencil button to edit the name of a Swim Lane, and change its position with the arrows.
Manage Workflows Design
In general, there are some workflow management actions either referring to Design or Workflow ID:
- Choose how the conditional flow is depicted in Paths. Choose between Free, Classic, or Classic – Ignore Obstacles based on your preferences.
- Define the workflow validity period by clicking on the mini calendar icon.
- Add private or public tags to this workflow design for easier tracking and search capability.
- Leave a comment in Notes; people having access to the workflow will be notified accordingly.
Click here to view some Workflow Examples.
