BMC Remedy Action Request System 7.5.00 Concepts Guide

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BMC Remedy Action Request System 7.5.00

Concepts Guide

January 2009

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Contents

Preface 7

AR System documents . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

Chapter 1 About AR System 11

What is AR System?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12Example of a service desk solution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12AR System adaptability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

AR System architecture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14AR System clients . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15AR System mid tier . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17AR System server. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17Database servers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18Heterogeneous environment provides flexibility. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19Distributed environments provide scalability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

Application components . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20How application components work together . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22

Administrator responsibilities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23Developer responsibilities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23Programmer responsibilities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

Chapter 2 Forms and applications 25

About AR System forms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26Types of forms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27Form views . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

Using fields in forms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29Characteristics common to all fields. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30Core fields in a regular form . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

Attaching menus to fields . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32Bundling forms into applications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33Localizing applications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

Chapter 3 Workflow 35

Workflow in general and in AR System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36How workflow components differ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36

Events versus time. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37Client versus server. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37

Contents 5

Collections of workflow components . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38Workflow actions and execution options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38

Workflow actions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39Workflow execution options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41

Workflow qualifications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44Keywords in qualifications. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45

Chapter 4 Access control 47

About access control in AR System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48User and group access . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48

Types of access control groups. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49Additive permissions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49Membership in multiple groups . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50

Role-based access . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50Multitiered access control model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51How licensing affects access control . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53

Chapter 5 Extending AR System 55

AR System foundation products . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56BMC Atrium products . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57AR System–based solutions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57Other BMC products . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58Integration with third-party products . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

Chapter 6 Putting it all together 59

About the wild animal park . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60Goals of the animal tracking application . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60Planning and design considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61

Analyzing data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62Analyzing workflow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62Defining business rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62Mapping business rules to workflow components . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62Considering integrations. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63

Planning and design decisions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63Decisions about forms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63Decisions about access control . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64Decisions about business rules. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64Decisions about workflow components . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65

Putting the application to work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65A tiger is acquired . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65The tiger is injured . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67The tiger is traded to another zoo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68

Glossary 71

Index 85

6 Concepts Guide

Preface

BMC Remedy Action Request System (AR System) is the foundation for a wide range of business solutions, from service desk call tracking to inventory management to integrated systems management.

This guide discusses core concepts of AR System. It is primarily for new administrators who will use AR System to create or modify applications. Other audiences, including business managers and persons evaluating and prototyping applications based on AR System, might also find this guide helpful. Procedures, performance, and other topics are documented in the books listed in the following section.

AR System documents The following table lists documentation available for AR System products.

Unless otherwise noted, online documentation in Adobe Acrobat (PDF) format is available on AR System product installation DVDs, on the Customer Support website (http://www.bmc.com/support_home), or both.

You can access product help through each product’s Help menu or by clicking Help links.

Title Description Audience

Concepts Guide1 Overview of AR System architecture and features; includes information about add-on products that extend AR System functionality and a comprehensive glossary for the entire AR System documentation set.

Everyone

Installation Guide Instructions for installing AR System. Administrators

Introduction to Application Development with BMC Remedy Developer Studio

Information about the development of AR System applications, including an introduction to using BMC Remedy Developer Studio.

Developers2

Form and Application Objects Guide

Information about AR System applications and their user interface components, including forms, fields, views, menus, and images.

Developers

Workflow Objects Guide Information about the AR System workflow objects (active links, filters, and escalations) and how to use them to create processes that enforce business rules.

Developers

Preface 7



Configuration Guide Information about configuring AR System servers and clients, localizing, importing and exporting data, and archiving data.

Administrators

BMC Remedy Mid Tier Guide Information about configuring the mid tier, setting up applications for the mid tier, and using applications in browsers.

Administrators

Integration Guide Instructions for integrating AR System with external systems by using web services, plug-ins, and other products, including LDAP, OLE, and ARDBC.

Administrators/Developers/Programmers3

Optimizing and Troubleshooting Guide

Information about monitoring and maintaining AR System and AR System applications to optimize performance and solve problems.

Administrators/Developers/Programmers

Database Reference Database administration topics and rules related to how AR System interacts with specific databases; includes an overview of the data dictionary tables.

Administrators/Developers/Programmers

BMC Remedy Distributed Server Option Guide

Information about implementing a distributed AR System server environment with BMC Remedy Distributed Server Option (DSO).

Administrators

BMC Remedy Flashboards Guide

Instructions for creating, modifying, and administering flashboards to display and monitor AR System information.

Administrators/Developers

C API Reference Information about AR System data structures, C API function calls, and OLE support.

Programmers

C API Quick Reference Quick reference to C API function calls. Programmers

Java API Information about Sun™ Java™ classes, methods, and variables that integrate with AR System. For the location of the JAR file containing this online documentation, see the information about the Java API in the Integration Guide.

Programmers

Java Plug-in API Information about Java classes, methods, and variables used to write plug-ins for AR System. For the location of the JAR file containing this online documentation, see the information about plug-ins in the Integration Guide.

Programmers

BMC Remedy Email Engine Guide

Instructions for configuring and using BMC Remedy Email Engine.

Administrators

Error Messages Guide Descriptions of AR System error messages. Administrators/Developers/Programmers

Master Index Combined index of all books. Everyone

BMC Remedy Approval Server Guide

Instructions for using BMC Remedy Approval Server to automate approval and signature processes in your organization.

Administrators

Release Notes Information about new features, compatibility, and international issues.

Everyone

Release Notes with Open Issues

Information about new features, compatibility, international issues, installation planning, and open issues.

Everyone

BMC Remedy User Help Instructions for using BMC Remedy User. Everyone


8 Concepts Guide

AR System documents

1 The full title of each guide includes BMC Remedy Action Request System 7.5.00 (forexample, BMC Remedy Action Request System 7.5.00 Concepts Guide).2 Application developers who use BMC Remedy Developer Studio.3 C and Java programmers who write plug-ins and clients for AR System.

BMC Remedy Data Import Help

Instructions for using BMC Remedy Data Import. Administrators

BMC Remedy Alert Help Instructions for using BMC Remedy Alert. Everyone

BMC Remedy Mid Tier Configuration Tool Help

Instructions for configuring BMC Remedy Mid Tier. Administrators


Preface 9


10 Concepts Guide

Chapter

1
About AR System
Every company, whether it makes bicycles or provides worldwide telecommunications services, has its own business needs and processes. BMC Remedy Action Request System (AR System) enables you to automate many business processes without learning a programming language or complex development tools.

This chapter introduces AR System architecture and application components and explains how they fit together to address your organization’s needs.

The following topics are provided:

� What is AR System? (page 12)� AR System architecture (page 14)� Application components (page 20)� Administrator responsibilities (page 23)� Developer responsibilities (page 23)� Programmer responsibilities (page 23)



What is AR System? AR System is a professional development environment that

� Leverages the best practices of the IT Infrastructure Library® (ITIL®)

� Provides a foundation for Business Service Management (BSM) solutions

Using AR System, nonprogrammers can build powerful business workflow applications and deploy them simultaneously in web, Windows, UNIX®, and Linux® environments.

Applications built with AR System can automatically track anything that is important to the processes in your enterprise. Companies use AR System applications to track such diverse items as stock trades, benefits data, inventory assets, spare parts, and order fulfillment. One of the most common uses of AR System is to automate internal service desks. The following example illustrates a service desk solution in which AR System solves an employee’s problem.

Example of a service desk solution Ramona’s printer would not work, so she logged in to her company’s service desk portal and entered information about the problem. The system automatically offered several knowledge base articles that might apply to her problem, but none resolved the issue for her.

Ramona then opened a service desk request through the portal to get further assistance from the IT department. When she entered her phone number into the blank request form on her screen, details of her configuration and location automatically appeared in the form. Ramona filled in the remaining details about her problem and submitted the request. She immediately received a message informing her that the case had been assigned to Becky.

Becky was automatically paged and used her computer to review the problem. Using her knowledge of similar problems, she fixed the printer and marked the case closed. Ramona was then notified that the problem was fixed.

If Ramona’s problem had been an emergency that was not handled within an hour, the system would have automatically paged the appropriate support personnel and sent an email message to Ramona, informing her of the request status.

In this example, AR System automated the offer of knowledge base articles, the entry of information in the form, the assignment notification, the paging system, the closure notification, and the emergency response.

A service desk application and other ready-to-use AR System applications are available from BMC and its partners (see Chapter 5, “Extending AR System”). You can also create your own custom solutions.

12 Concepts Guide

What is AR System?

AR System adaptabilityAR System strikes a balance between hard-coded applications, which are typically inflexible, and development toolkits, which often require extensive technical knowledge and time to use. Instead, AR System provides a platform from which even nonprogrammers can modify ready-to-use BMC applications or create custom applications to fit their unique enterprise.

Figure 1-1: AR System adaptability

Perhaps the best way to understand the adaptability of AR System is through an example. Paul owns a small video store and installs AR System to help track inventory. Initially, he builds a simple application that has one form. The form collects the video title, rating, format, number of copies, and rental fee. When his business grows and he needs to track employees, he adds a form that collects the employee number, salary, start date, training, and time card.

Next, Paul links his application to a credit/debit verification system by using the AR System open application programming interface (API). Later, he adds an order tracking and purchasing application to automatically order items through web services. He then creates a website to enable customers to order movies and pay rental fees online, and to store their rental history in a knowledge base. He further automates the system to provide proactive movie suggestions based on this rental history.

Thanks to the rapid growth of his business and the flexible, adaptable architecture of AR System, Paul opens new stores in cities across the country. He links all the stores into one system and uses real-time graphic flashboards to track his entire operation. Paul can track incidents, inventory, employee information, order processing, and customer satisfaction from his office, and he can easily extend or modify his system whenever changes occur in his organization.

Ready-to-useapplications

AR SystemAdaptable applications

Development toolsAR System provides a platform on which a rich collection of ready-to-use applications can run. It also provides the customization power traditionally associated with development tools.



AR System architecture AR System is based on a multitiered client/server architecture:

� Client tier—Contains AR System clients. Most clients present information to application users and receive input from them, but the tools for migration and application development are also clients.

� Mid tier—Contains components and add-in services that run on a web server, enabling users to view applications on the web.

� Server tier—Contains the AR System server, which controls workflow processes and access to databases and other data sources in the data tier. This tier also contains server-side applications (such as Approval Server, Email Engine, and the Flashboards server) and the C and Sun Java plug-in servers with plug-ins.

� Data tier—Contains database servers and other data sources that can be accessed by the AR System server. The database server acts as the data storage and retrieval engine.

Figure 1-2: AR System architecture

AR System server

Mid Tier and Web services

ClientTier

MidTier

ServerTier

DataTier

AR Systemdatabase

Otherdatabases

Other datasources

Desktopapplications

Browser

The data tier holds data that applications create and manipulate.

The AR System server runs applications and workflow. It also enforces business logic.

The mid tier lets you access the AR System server from a browser and makes web services accessible.

Client tools are used to access, manage, and build applications.

14 Concepts Guide

AR System architecture

AR System clients AR System clients can be broadly divided into user clients and developer clients.

User clients The user clients use standard interfaces for their respective environments:

User client Platform Description

Browsers Provide a user interface to AR System applications through the mid tier

Can be used for these functions:� Submitting, searching for, and modifying

requests � Charting data� Generating reports� Receiving and responding to AR System

notifications� Performing administrative tasks such as

license management and AR System server configuration

BMC Remedy User Provides a Windows-based user interface to AR System applications

BMC Remedy Alert Windows Sometimes considered a “desktop pager,” this client notifies users about events by flashing an icon, beeping, playing a sound file, running a process, or opening a message window. For example, it can display a message (an alert) to notify service desk personnel that a reported problem has been assigned to them.

Note: A similar functionality is available through browsers. In browsers, alerts are displayed in the Alert List form, which can be refreshed automatically at specified intervals or manually at any time.



Developer clients The developer clients are used to create, modify, and extend AR System applications:

Integration clients BMC and its partners also offer the following tools for expanding the capabilities of core AR System. These tools act as clients of AR System.

� BMC Atrium Integration Engine (AIE)

� BMC Remedy Knowledge Management

� Network management platform integration accessories

� Systems management integration utilities

See Chapter 5, “Extending AR System.”

Developer client Description

BMC Remedy Developer Studio Used to create and modify all the components of an AR System application, such as forms and workflow elements.

BMC Remedy Data Import Used to load external data into AR System forms. For example, employee information can be extracted from a human resources application and loaded into the People form as a batch process, eliminating the need to retype data. This client is also used to import AR System data from one AR System server to another.

BMC Remedy Migrator Used to migrate applications, objects, and data between servers, servers and files, or files. This client reduces the difficulty and time required to synchronize AR System servers in development and production environments.

Note: For limitations on using BMC Remedy Migrator with other BMC applications, see the BMC Remedy Migrator Release Notes on the Customer Support website (http://www.bmc.com/support_home).

16 Concepts Guide




AR System mid tier BMC Remedy Mid Tier translates client requests, interprets responses from the server, handles web service requests, and runs server-side processes that provide AR System functionality to web clients. For example, unlike BMC Remedy User, a browser is a generic client that has no inherent knowledge of applications that run in it. By acting as an interpreter, the mid tier enables a browser to become a fully functional AR System client.

The mid tier requires a supported Sun JavaServer™ Pages (JSP™) engine. For example, you can install the Apache Tomcat servlet engine with the mid tier. For a list of other supported JSP engines, see the BMC Remedy compatibility matrixes on the Customer Support website (http://www.bmc.com/support_home).

AR System server The AR System server processes all data entered through a client. As the workflow engine between client and database, the server writes data to the database when a request is created and retrieves data from the database when a client requests it. The server verifies that a user has permission to perform each transaction, thereby enforcing any access control defined in an application. The server also continuously evaluates the data in the database and each transaction to determine whether the server should perform workflow. The server might also perform workflow on a timed basis. See Chapter 3, “Workflow.”

The AR System server communicates with the mid tier, AR System clients, and external applications by means of a well-defined API. The server is available for each of these operating systems:

� Hewlett Packard HP-UX

� IBM® AIX®

� Linux (Red Hat and Novell SuSE)

� Microsoft Windows Server

� Sun Microsystems Solaris™

NOTE For the most accurate information about supported platforms and software, always see the BMC Remedy compatibility matrixes on the Customer Support website (http://www.bmc.com/support_home).

Server groups To provide scalability and increase reliability, you can connect a group of servers to the same database and manage them as a unit. Servers in a group act as a single server to support the applications that they run. They can be configured to spread the load of shared services, and they can provide backup to each other to ensure that those services are always available.





Database servers AR System uses standard relational databases to store and retrieve data. Architecturally, the database server processes are completely separate from the AR System server processes. Physically, the database server processes can run on the same computer as the AR System server or on a different computer.

Because the AR System server manages all workflow, applications are independent of the database. Therefore, applications created on an AR System server running one type of database can easily be moved to a server running a different type of database. BMC provides a simple export/import utility for this purpose.

AR System can use any of these database platforms:

� IBM DB2®

� IBM Informix Dynamic Server

� Microsoft SQL Server

� Oracle®

� Sybase ASE

NOTE For the most accurate information about supported platforms and software, always see the BMC Remedy compatibility matrixes on the Customer Support website (http://www.bmc.com/support_home).

AR System workflow components can search for records (requests) in the AR System database and act on the results of the search. Clients can use the following types of searches:

� Query-by-example (QBE)

� Advanced search

� Predefined

� Recent

An administrator can create and store searches that are commonly performed by users. A user can define personal searches for forms to which the user has access.

AR System can also work with data stored in external databases and other data sources that are not managed by AR System. AR System accesses these data sources through view forms. In addition, AR System can use AR System database connectivity (ARDBC) to work with data not stored in databases as if the data were locally owned.

18 Concepts Guide



Heterogeneous environment provides flexibility Because the multiple layers of AR System are independent of one another, you can combine platforms to fulfill different functions. The heterogeneous environment enables you to mix and match clients and servers. For example:

� BMC Remedy Developer Studio on a computer running Windows can manage forms on a UNIX or Linux server.

� Browsers can use a Windows-based mid tier to access forms on a UNIX server.

� An AR System server on Windows can interact with a database on UNIX.

Distributed environments provide scalabilityUse BMC Remedy Distributed Server Option (DSO) to build large-scale, distributed environments that behave like a single virtual system. DSO enables you to share common information among servers and to keep that information consistent. For example, as illustrated in Figure 1-3, you can transfer copies of a request to other servers and ensure that any changes made to the copies are also made to the original request. The way that you define the processes for transferring information is similar to the way that you define business processes for an application. First, managers at each site must agree on what information to transfer from one application to another, what conditions drive transfers, and which sites control the ability to update a record. An administrator at each site then uses DSO to implement these decisions.

Figure 1-3: AR System in a distributed environment

AR SystemClients

AR System ServerTokyo

with Distributed Server Option(Owner of Request)

Transfer

Update

AR System ServerNew York

with Distributed Server Option

AR SystemClients



Application components Applications developed with BMC Remedy Developer Studio are fully customizable and extensible. You can add your own fields, objects, and templates to any application, whether it was created by you, purchased from BMC, or acquired from a third party. AR System provides extensive authoring capabilities for applications built for web and Windows environments.

This section introduces the main components of an AR System application.

� Form—The main AR System application component that users interact with is a form. Each form is composed of fields. A field can be a unit of information, such as an employee’s last name, or it can be a visual element, such as a line or a box. You can design different field arrangements, or views, of forms for different user functions. When a user fills in the fields and saves the data, the system creates a request to track. In database terms, each request is a record.

You can bundle related forms into an application. For example, a human resources application might include forms for basic employee data, health benefits, and salary information. You can deploy the application to multiple servers to make it accessible to employees in different locations. You can also display your application on the web to allow access from a browser on any platform, as shown in Figure 1-4. See Chapter 2, “Forms and applications.”

Figure 1-4: Console application viewed in a browser

20 Concepts Guide

Application components

� Menu—Menus are lists that you create to guide the user in entering information in fields on forms. A menu can contain all possible values for a field, or it can contain some possible values, enabling users to enter text that is not on the menu. You can design dynamic menus, which change their contents based on the data already entered in the form. See “Attaching menus to fields” on page 32.

� Workflow—While forms provide the mechanism to structure data capture and menus offer options for specific field data, additional components—active links, filters, and escalations—act on the data to automate business processes, or workflow. These components trigger actions in response to execution options that you define. In AR System, workflow generally refers to the operations triggered by these components, but AR System also addresses the broader meaning of workflow, which consists of the processes that your organization uses to run itself. See Chapter 3, “Workflow.”

� Active link—An active link is an action or group of actions performed on the client. Active links are triggered by user actions in a form. They can be used to perform a variety of tasks, such as giving quick responses during data entry and auto-filling fields. For example, an active link can verify a value entered in the Employee ID field of a request and then pull information from a supporting People form to fill in other fields on the request, such as Requestor Name, Department, and Phone Number, dramatically reducing the time required for support staff to fill out a request.

An active link guide is a group of active links. Because active link guides run on a client, they can augment training by leading users through the steps necessary to fill in one or more forms to accomplish a specific task. For example, when an employee clicks a Request Business Cards button on a human resources form, an active link guide might open a business cards form and then display input instructions, field by field, until the card request is complete and ready to submit. Active link guides can also be used as subroutines to accomplish common tasks.

� Filter—A filter is an action or group of actions performed on the AR System server. Filters are used to enforce business rules and to ensure system and data integrity. As the server processes a request, the filters associated with that form and action evaluate the data in the request. For example, you can verify the values in a completed form by using a filter to compare them against your business rules and return an error if the request violates any of those rules.

A filter guide is a group of filters that can be used as a subroutine in workflow. Because filter guides run on the server, they cannot be used like active link guides to lead users through a form.

� Escalation—An escalation is an action or group of actions performed on the server at specified times or time intervals. Basically, an escalation is an automated, time-based process that searches for requests that match certain criteria at specified times and takes actions based on the results of the search. For example, an escalation can trigger AR System to notify the next level of management if a problem is not assigned to a technician within one hour of submission.



How application components work together In the example on page 12, when Ramona entered her telephone number into the Telephone # field, the following sequence occurred, as illustrated in Figure 1-5:

1 An active link searched the Employee form to retrieve the name, configuration, and location associated with the telephone number.

2 After Ramona finished entering information into the form and submitted it, filters triggered an external paging system integrated with AR System to notify Becky that Ramona’s printer was not working.

3 Becky fixed the problem.

4 Becky changed the status of the request, and a filter notified Ramona that her problem was solved.

Figure 1-5: Automated workflow example

.

If the situation had been flagged as an emergency and no one was assigned to the request within an hour, an escalation would have paged all required support personnel, and a filter would have sent Ramona an email message informing her of the status of her request.

1

2

3

4

Active link

Data entry finished

Problems Form

Telephone #

Name

Configuration

Location

Status

Employee Form

Name

Configuration

Location

555-1212

Ramona

PC

B2

Becky paged

When Statusbecomes "solved,"

a filter notifiesRamona

Problem solved

Filters fire

22 Concepts Guide

Administrator responsibilities

Administrator responsibilities Typically, AR System administrators are responsible for some or all of these tasks:

� Installing AR System software

� Defining their organization’s work processes and business rules

� Determining how to allocate server and database resources

� Managing AR System access control by assigning permissions for AR System applications and their components

� Maintaining AR System by adding and deleting users, groups, and roles; backing up AR System servers; importing data from other systems; and so on

Developer responsibilities Typically, AR System developers are responsible for some or all of these tasks:

� Creating an AR System application that reflects a set of work processes and business rules, or working with a consultant to create an application

� Localizing an AR System application for use in other languages or countries

� Modifying an AR System application to reflect changes in the organization’s work processes

Programmer responsibilities Typically, AR System programmers are responsible for some or all of these tasks:

� Writing plug-ins and custom clients that use the AR System C API, Java API, or Java plug-in API

� Integrating external applications with AR System



24 Concepts Guide

Chapter

2
Forms and applications
Forms are the foundation of AR System. Forms can be grouped into applications.

This chapter describes forms and how forms are used in applications. It also describes localization features for applications.


� About AR System forms (page 26)� Using fields in forms (page 29)� Attaching menus to fields (page 32)� Bundling forms into applications (page 33)� Localizing applications (page 33)



About AR System forms A form captures and displays information. For example, a service desk form captures information needed to fix a user’s computer problem. A purchase requisition form captures the information needed to purchase an item. Figure 2-1 illustrates an AR System form.

Each form contains fields. Some fields, known as data fields, capture a certain type of information, such as a user name or problem details, and have their own set of rules about who can view or modify that information (see “Using fields in forms” on page 29). Some fields can have attached menus that help users fill in the form (see “Attaching menus to fields” on page 32).

Figure 2-1: Example AR System form

Each form in an application is like a template. When a user opens a form to perform a task, the template is presented to help the user complete the task. When the form is filled in and submitted to AR System, the system creates a request, also known as a record in database terms.

26 Concepts Guide

About AR System forms

Users can create, modify, or search for requests if they have appropriate access permissions (see Chapter 4, “Access control”). Users can also create reports based on requests that match their search criteria. They can use the AR System native reporting capability or Crystal Reports, a reporting package that you can integrate with AR System.

Forms are stored as tables in the database. Each data field on the form corresponds to a column in the table. A request corresponds to a row (or record) in the table.

Figure 2-2: A form from the view of the database

Types of forms You can create the following types of forms, as illustrated in Figure 2-3:

Help Desk Form

Request ID Submitter Problem Impact Assigned To Status

000056 Adrian Web pages load slowly Low Paul Assigned

000032 Rachel Printer not working Medium Laura Closed

000019 Cynthia Can't send email High Rob Work in progress

000092 Steve Network is down High Laura Escalated

000018 Hannah Need more memory Medium Paul Closed

Field(column)

Request(row)

Form type Description

Regular Information submitted through and displayed in regular forms is stored in database tables. These forms are typically the main forms in applications. They are also called data forms.

Display-only These forms contain display-only fields that enable users to accomplish specific tasks. These forms are typically used to create control panels, which are launch points from which users choose other tasks. Display-only forms can also be used to create dialog boxes, which prompt users as they fill out a form. Display-only forms do not contain data, so no database tables are associated with them.

Join These forms are composed of fields from two or more existing forms. Join forms are useful when you have information in multiple forms that you want to display in a single form. Join forms do not contain data, so they have no database tables associated with them. The data is contained in the underlying forms that make up the join form.

View These forms enable users to connect to database tables created outside of AR System. These forms enable you to bring data from other applications that is stored in a database into AR System without replication or programming.

Vendor These forms enable users to connect to external data sources—such as text files, spreadsheets, or database tables residing on local or remote servers—through an ARDBC plug-in. Some programming is required to connect to the data source.



Figure 2-3: Types of AR System forms

Database external to AR System

Other data sources

AR Systemdatabase

Information displayed in regular forms is stored in AR System database tables.

Display-only forms are used to create dialog boxes, control panels, and consoles. They have no database table associated with them.

You can merge information from two forms into a join form.

Regular Form

AR System database

Database external to AR System

Field 1

Field 2

Field 3

Form

Field 1

Field 2

Field 3

Service Console Display-Only Form

New Request Search Requests

Form

Field A

Field B

Field C

View forms are used to connect to database tables that were not created by AR System.

Vendor Form

Field 1

Field 2

Field 3

View Form

Field 1

Field 2

Field 3

Join Form

Field 1

Field 2

Field A

Field B

Vendor forms are used to connect to external data sources—such as text files, spreadsheets, or database tables residing on local or remote servers—through an ARDBC plug-in.

ARDBC plug-in

28 Concepts Guide

Using fields in forms

Form views A view is a visual representation of a form. To reuse a form for diverse groups while accommodating each group’s unique needs, you can create a different view of the form for each group. This enables you to customize the interface of an AR System application so that each group sees the system as its own.

You can create as many views of a form as you need. For example, you can provide views customized according to the following criteria:

� Users’ roles (requesters, managers, and so forth)

� Size of the screen (for example, laptop or desktop)

� Language or locale (for example, Brazilian Portuguese)

When creating form views, you can

� Change the layout of the form

� Use different fields in different views

� Tailor views to provide the best result in the target display environment, such as browsers

� Use terminology or language specific to the group using the view

Using fields in formsFields enable you to control how information is captured and displayed in forms. You can include the following types of fields in forms:

Field type Description

Data Contains data values stored in database tables. You can set these characteristics of data fields:� Whether users can access the field and, if so, whether they can only view the field or

also change its contents.� The type of data that the field can contain (such as characters, integers, dates, or times).� The amount of information that the field can contain (field length).� Whether the field is visible or hidden. � Whether the field is enabled or disabled. � Whether the field is required, optional, or display-only. (A display-only field is a

temporary field for which no space is allocated in the database.)� Where the field appears on the form.� How the field is displayed (for example, its label and physical appearance).� How information is entered into the field (for example, by typing or by selecting items

from a list or a menu).� The field’s default value.� Whether fields are indexed for faster searches.

Table Displays data from other requests in the context of the current request. Table field styles are list view, tree view, cell-based, results list, and alert list.



You can add as many fields as you need to a form (within the limits of your database) to capture and display the information required by your application.

You can use workflow to manipulate the attributes of fields. For example, you can set permissions for a group of trim fields or active link control fields so that they are inaccessible to certain groups of users, or you can add tabs in a panel field that are visible to some users (such as managers or support staff) but not to others.

Characteristics common to all fields All fields in AR System share these characteristics:

� They can be disabled (dimmed) or hidden.

� They have a unique field ID and field name.

� They can be used in workflow.

� They can have context-sensitive help associated with them to help users learn more about them.

� Their display properties (including their location on a form and their appearance) can be changed.

� Permissions can be set to specify which users can access them.

� AR System automatically records their history, including their owner (the user who created them), the user who last modified them, and the date and time that they were last modified.

Attachment Attaches files to requests.

View Provides a browser window in a form. The browser can display any URL, HTML content, or file format (including contents of attachments) that is compatible with a browser.

Data visualization Augments AR System with HTML-based content—such as web pages, flashboards, and other graphics—that can interact with the field’s parent form through workflow.

Application list Displays a list of entry points. An entry point is a link that users click to open forms on the correct server in the required mode (New or Search). AR System automatically generates the contents of the application list. The entry points that a user sees in the list are only those to which the user has access.Any form that contains an application list field can be used as a home page. A home page is a single point of access into AR System.

Horizontal and vertical navigation

Enables users to navigate to the correct screen in an application quickly and easily.

Control Triggers active links. Control fields include buttons, menu items, and toolbar buttons.

Panel Organizes other fields on forms into smaller containers that can be hidden when not needed. Panel fields can have various formats, such as tabbed, collapsible, splitter, and accordion.

Trim Adds boxes, lines, and text to enhance the visual appearance of forms.

Field type Description

30 Concepts Guide

Using fields in forms

Core fields in a regular form A regular form automatically contains these core fields, as shown in Figure 2-4:

� Request ID—Unique tracking number assigned to each request by AR System.

� Submitter—Login name of the user who submits a request.

� Create Date—Date and time that a request is created.

� Assigned To—Person assigned to handle the request.

� Last Modified By—User who last modified the request.

� Modified Date—Date and time that the request was last modified.

� Status—Current status of the request.

� Short Description—Brief description of the request.

� Status History—Time the request’s status was last changed and who changed it. This field does not appear in forms. To view the information in this field, users must display a request and choose View > Status History.

These fields provide basic capabilities that most application designers need. For more information, see the Form and Application Objects Guide.

AR System has templates for blank forms and forms with core fields. You cannot delete core fields from a form created with them, but you can hide them from a user’s view and change their labels, location, and appearance.

Figure 2-4: New regular form with core fields

The following table shows the meaning of the field label styles:

Style Description

Bold Field requires a value—default, user-entered, or from workflow—when a user submits a request.

Italic Field is automatically populated by AR System.

Plain Field is optional. Users can enter information in it or leave it empty.



Attaching menus to fieldsUse menus to help users enter data and to ensure that the data is consistent. You can attach a menu to any character field (character fields are data fields that hold alphanumeric characters). Menus can be statically defined, dynamically built by searching AR System databases and external databases, or read from text files written by other applications.

Menus are separate objects stored independently of a form. This means that you can create a single menu and use it for multiple forms and for multiple fields in one form.

AR System defines these types of menus:

Menu type Description

Character Stored and maintained as a list of items in AR System. These menus are useful for fields that have a predefined series of choices that change infrequently. They can have submenus.

File Contains items that are created and maintained in a plain text file. The file can be stored on the system where BMC Remedy User is running or on the AR System server. File menus are convenient when you do not want to store the data in the AR System database. To change a file menu, simply update the file; the changes are applied when the menu is refreshed. File menus can have submenus.

Search Retrieves information from requests stored in AR System databases. The information is used to build a menu dynamically in the current form. Search menus are often used when the choices in a menu depend on values entered in fields on the current form.

SQL Also retrieves information from databases, but the databases can be outside AR System. When you access an SQL menu, AR System uses an SQL query to extract the data and then generates the menu from that data.

Data dictionary Retrieves lists of fields and forms from an AR System server. These menus are useful for creating special configuration interfaces. They are generally not used to help users perform their work.

32 Concepts Guide

Bundling forms into applications

Bundling forms into applicationsAn AR System application is a server object that contains references to one or more forms. When an application references a form, AR System automatically includes all the workflow and other components (such as menus) associated with the form.

Sometimes a single form can contain all of an application’s functionality. For example, a small application that tracks product defects can use a single defect-tracking form to capture and display all required information.

Most applications, however, need several forms to capture, track, and organize information. One or more forms make up the application’s main forms (sometimes called primary forms) that users interact with directly. Often, the main form is a console that serves as a navigation and information center. The application can also have other forms, called supporting forms, which supply information needed by the main forms.

You can create the following types of applications:

� Deployable applications are designed to be used in multiple server environments. These applications use permissions based on roles defined in the application. When the application is deployed, the administrator maps the roles to groups on the local server. Other features available to deployable applications include the ability to gather statistics about the application and to map the same role to different groups for different application states, such as test or production.

� Local applications use permissions based on groups defined on the local server. Therefore, these applications are usually used on a single server.

For information about groups and roles, see Chapter 4, “Access control.”

Localizing applications Localization is the process of customizing an application for use in various languages, countries, and cultures. AR System provides an internationalized environment for building, testing, and localizing applications.

A locale describes the language, country setting, and other characteristics of the local system’s user interface. You can create an AR System application to run in a particular locale, or you can make your application simultaneously available in multiple locales.



The development environment enables you to localize all aspects of the user interface:

� Language used for labels, messages, help text, reports, menus, and any other words that are part of a form’s user interface

� Separator symbol for decimal numbers that include a fraction

� Separator symbol for numbers greater than 999

� Format for dates and times

� Layout, colors, and images

You can store each localized version of a form as a view. Therefore, the same application can provide separate user interfaces (views) for British English, Australian English, Mexican Spanish, and Peruvian Spanish.

NOTE Although the user interface is tailored to each user’s locale, the data and workflow are the same for all users. Therefore, you need to agree on the language for the data before the application is made available.

The localization features are automatic for the user and easy to implement for the application builder. To localize an application for a given locale, an administrator need create views only for that locale and add corresponding messages to the message catalog. Utilities are available to assist with this work. See the Form and Application Objects Guide.

34 Concepts Guide

Chapter

3
Workflow
Forms, with the help of menus, capture the crucial data needed to run your business. Processing that data in accordance with your business needs is the function of workflow. You use workflow components—active links, filters, and escalations—to enforce business rules in a variety of ways, including notifying people of events, escalating problems to a higher level, automatically routing information, and checking whether key data is correctly entered.

This chapter describes the workflow components.


� Workflow in general and in AR System (page 36)� How workflow components differ (page 36)� Collections of workflow components (page 38)� Workflow actions and execution options (page 38)� Workflow qualifications (page 44)

For detailed information about workflow, see the Workflow Objects Guide.



Workflow in general and in AR System In general, workflow can be defined as the set of processes that your company uses to run itself—for example, tracking defects or administering employee benefits.

In AR System, workflow automates your company’s processes through the use of active links, filters, and escalations. For example, if your organization decides that purchase orders for amounts above a certain level need director approval, you can design workflow that allows only correctly approved purchase orders to be automatically forwarded to the purchasing department.

You define AR System workflow by specifying the actions that active links, filters, and escalations should perform under specified circumstances. The circumstances are called execution options. You can create workflow components for a single form, or you can share workflow components with multiple forms. (Workflow components cannot exist independently of forms.)

Some of the actions that workflow components can take to automate processes and ease data entry include

� Overriding user-entered values by changing them to values that you specify

� Manipulating a form (for example, enabling or disabling fields, or changing menus associated with fields)

� Checking for errors

� Opening new windows for data entry or display

� Communicating with users by means of onscreen messages or notifications sent by email, BMC Remedy Alert, or other methods

� Running an active link guide or a filter guide as a subroutine (a predefined sequence of commands)

For a list of actions, see “Workflow actions” on page 39.

How workflow components differ This table summarizes how and where you use workflow components:

Component Triggered by Where action is performed

Active link Events Client

Filter Events Server

Escalation Time Server

36 Concepts Guide

How workflow components differ

Events versus time Filters and active links are triggered by events, such as a user action or a change in the state of some data. For example, a filter can notify a support manager whenever a request is submitted with a priority of High or Critical. The submission of the request is the event. Other events that can trigger filters are updating, deleting, and retrieving requests. Actions that can trigger active links include opening or closing a window, displaying a request, clicking a button on a form, pressing Enter when the cursor is in a field, or selecting a menu item.

Escalations implement time-based business rules. They are triggered by the passage of time. The trigger (or execution option) can be either absolute time, such as “every day at 2:00 p.m.,” or a time interval, such as “one hour between escalation runs.” For example, an escalation can warn a group of users that in one hour their manager will be notified that a problem has been unsolved for too long.

Client versus server Active links are executed on the client side in response to actions that users perform in forms. For example, active links can change how a form looks or behaves, validate data entered by users, or use data in a form to find other data for the form.

Unless an active link queries the AR System server for information or runs a process on the server, it can complete its operation without sending a request to the server. This capability helps decrease overall network traffic and improves the performance of an application.

In contrast, filters and escalations are executed on the server. They implement business rules by examining newly created or changed requests and taking actions—such as changing data in the request, creating other requests, or sending notifications—based on the new data and the business rules. For example, if your business wants to avoid handling purchase orders that are not properly approved, you can create a filter that stops AR System from processing such purchase orders after they are submitted to the server and then notifies the requester accordingly.

Actions associated with filters and escalations take place after the transaction is transferred to the server for processing. Then, processing can return to the client, where more active link actions can take place.

NOTE API calls to the server trigger filters but not active links. If a business rule must be fired on any input (including user input and input from an integrated process using an API), the business logic must be in both an active link and a filter.



Collections of workflow components You can collect active links and filters and run them as procedures. These collections are called active link guides and filter guides.

The workflow components in guides are organized in a processing sequence. Using guides enables you to give a name to a set of workflow operations that accomplish a specific task.

In addition, interactive or navigational active link guides can interact with users by requesting information and then waiting for input. This enables you to create tasks that guide users through application processes in a way similar to wizards.

Workflow actions and execution options The basic questions about workflow are “What can I do, and when can I do it?” The actions that workflow can take are the what, and the execution options are the when. For example, users could click a button labeled Display My Active Cases to display a list of all requests assigned to the user.

Figure 3-1: Example of basic workflow

You can refine execution options by specifying a qualification that must be met before an action is taken. Qualifications are often required to ensure that workflow actions apply only to certain requests. In addition, carefully designed qualifications make workflow components more efficient and powerful. See “Workflow qualifications” on page 44.

You can specify a primary action and an alternative action. If an operation meets the qualification, the primary (“if”) action is performed; if not, the alternative (“else”) action is performed, as shown in Figure 3-2.

Figure 3-2: Example of workflow with qualification

Execution optionoccurs

Action

User clicks Display MyActive Cases button.

List displays all requestsassigned to the user.

Qualification:Last Name field

is filled in.

Met

Not met

Alternative action:Message displays“Fill in last name.”

Primary action: First Name, Extension,

and Email Addressfields are filled in from

a supporting form. User presses Enterin Last Name field.

Execution optionoccurs

38 Concepts Guide

Workflow actions and execution options

Workflow actionsThe following table lists some of the actions that active links, filters, and escalations can perform. For a complete list, see the Workflow Objects Guide.

Action Description Active link Filter Escalation

Change Field Changes the appearance of fields. For example, a Change Field action can perform one or more of these actions:� Moves the cursor or keyboard focus to a field.� Hides or displays a field. For example, an active

link might hide all fields related to telephone problems when users report network problems.

� Changes a field’s accessibility to read-only, read/write, or disabled.

� Changes the color of a field label or trim text.� Changes the menu attached to a character field.

For example, if a form for scheduling a meeting has a field for the building, the menu of meeting rooms attached to the meeting room field might change to match the specified building.

� Refreshes the data in a table field.� Changes the label of a field. � Expands or collapses a collapsible panel field.

+

Close Window Closes the current window. +

Message Prompts with advice, gives reactive information, warns of a particular situation, or presents an error message and stops the processing of current workflow. Active links execute on the client, so they can display messages immediately. For example, when users fill in a particular field, an active link could warn that a related field must be filled in first. Active link messages can appear in different display formats, such as a dialog box, the Prompt Bar, or a tooltip.Filters execute on the server, so they are useful for checking entire transactions and sending error messages or informational messages. For example, a filter could display a message indicating that the support staff has been notified about a problem.

+ +

Notify Sends event notifications to users or groups by email, BMC Remedy Alert, or a custom mechanism, such as a Windows service that pages users. For example, a filter might notify support staff when they are assigned a request. Or an escalation might notify the service department when an asset warranty has expired.

+ +



Open Window Opens a window of any type in the client. The action can open a New window and load some default data. Or it can open a Modify window with requests matching a specified qualification.This action can also open a dialog box. Data can be passed between the dialog box and the window that calls it. Processing of active links from the calling window is suspended until the dialog box interaction is completed.

+

Push Fields Changes the values of fields in another request to the values in the current request (that is, it “pushes” the values from the current request to another request). This action can also change the value to a keyword or a function.You can use Push Fields to set values in related requests or to create requests that are associated with the current one. For example, you can use this action to create multiple work orders for a telephone connection, a network address, and new furniture when an employee is hired.

+ + +

Run Process Runs a separate process (program) on the server for filters and escalations or on the Windows client or server for active links. For example, a filter can send a page, or an active link can launch a browser on a user’s desktop.

+ + +

Service Works with an AR System web service to obtain external services or with a Set Fields filter action to consume an internal AR System service.

+ + +

Set Fields Sets fields on a form to specified values. For example, a filter can automatically set the Status field to Assigned every time a name is entered into the Assigned To field.The value set in a field can be static (always the same), a keyword value, or a value retrieved from another data source.

+ + +

Action Description Active link Filter Escalation

40 Concepts Guide


Workflow execution optionsExecution options determine when workflow runs. For active links and filters, you specify what event triggers the workflow; for escalations, you specify the execution schedule for the workflow. For all workflow components, you can refine the execution option by adding a qualifying statement that tells the system which set of actions to run if the additional criteria are met and which set to run if the criteria are not met.

Active link and filter execution options The following table lists examples of execution options for active links and filters. For a complete list, see the Workflow Objects Guide.

Execution option Description Active link Filter

Button/Menu Field Executes when a user selects the button or menu item associated with the active link.

+

Gain Focus Executes when a user or a Change Field action moves the cursor to a field.

+

Display Executes after a request is loaded into a form but before the request appears in the Details pane.

+

Hover on FieldHover on DataHover on Label

Executes when a user hovers the mouse pointer over a field, field data, or a field label. To display tooltips, use a Hover execution option to trigger a Message action.

+

Lose Focus Executes when a user or a Change Field action moves the cursor out of a field.

+

Menu Choice Executes when a user chooses an item from a character menu associated with a specified field.

+

Modify Executes after a user modifies an existing request but before the request is sent to the AR System server (for active links) or to the database (for filters). An active link with this execution option does not run during a Modify All operation.

+ +

Service Enables filters to be called by the Service action. +

Submit Executes after a user submits a new request but before the request is sent to the AR System server (for active links) or to the database (for filters).

+ +

Table Refresh Executes when a user updates a table’s contents by loading the field, sorting, refreshing, or displaying the previous or next part (chunk) of the table.

+

Window Open Executes when a user opens a form or dialog box or changes a form to a different mode. This is especially useful for establishing initial environments. It executes before any data is loaded into the window.

+



Execution options and user actions

Some execution options depend on how a user interacts with fields on the form. For example, if the user does not click a particular button, that active link does not fire (the user “controls” whether the active link fires). Use “user-controlled” execution options to provide additional helpful information, such as a list of nearby printers.

Active links that are not under a user’s control, however, fire whenever the user finishes a task. That is, if the user follows the normal steps, from opening a window through closing the window, the active links not under explicit user control always fire. (Of course, if a user does not submit or modify the request, the active links that fire on Submit or Modify do not execute.) Use execution options that are not controlled by users to ensure that consistent, complete data is maintained regardless of whether users perform certain actions. For example, to guarantee that every submitted request includes the host name, an active link could retrieve the host name of the client and copy it into a field in the form whenever a request is submitted.

Execution order of active links and filters

Active link execution options have an implicit order in relation to one another and to the interaction between the client and server. You can use this order to control when the active link runs. For example:

� If field values were required for workflow processing before a request is displayed, you would set them on Window Open. However, to set any values that you want the user to see when a request is displayed, you would use the Display execution option.

� An active link that runs on Window Open might check the user’s permission to open a Modify All window and, if the user does not have permission, generate an error message, preventing the window from opening.

More than one active link or filter can run on the same execution option. In this case, you can specify the order that you want it to fire in relation to the other active links or filters. One reason to do so is that the output of one active link can affect another active link. By carefully ordering a group of active links, you can perform very complex operations.

When active links and filters are bundled into guides, execution order within the guides is ignored. Instead, workflow executes in positional order within a guide. This enables a guide procedure to run without affecting the order of workflow outside the guide.

42 Concepts Guide


Escalation execution options In contrast to active links and filters, which react to events, escalations respond to the passage of time. You can trigger an escalation at a specific time, such as every Monday at 6 a.m., or at a time interval, such as eight hours after each run of the escalation.

When the specified time arrives, the server searches for requests in the database that meet the escalation’s qualification (see “Workflow qualifications” on page 44). If it finds any, the server runs the escalation’s primary (“if”) actions for each matching request. If no requests meet the qualification, the server runs the escalation’s alternative (“else”) actions, if any, once. Figure 3-3 illustrates how escalations work.

Figure 3-3: How escalations work

An alternative (“else”) action for the example in Figure 3-3 might be to notify the manager that all requests comply with the assignment rule. This action would run only if no requests meet the escalation qualification.

1 p.m.

Escalation runs. Primary actionoccurs? No

2 p.m.

2:05 p.m.

3 p.m.

Business rule: If a high-priority request is not assigned within 3 hours, notify a manager.

Escalation execution option: Run the escalation every hour on the hour.

Escalation qualification: Priority = High Assigned = No Current Time – Create Time >= 3 hours

Escalation primary (“if”) action: Notify manager about problem request.

Request B StatusPriority = HighAssigned = NoSubmitted 1.5 hrs ago

Request A StatusPriority = HighAssigned = NoSubmitted 2.5 hrs ago

Escalation runs. Request B StatusPriority = HighAssigned = NoSubmitted 2.5 hrs ago

Request A StatusPriority = HighAssigned = NoSubmitted 3.5 hrs ago

Manager assignsRequest A to

Yucheng Wong.

Escalation runs. Request B StatusPriority = HighAssigned = NoSubmitted 3.5 hrs ago

Request A StatusPriority = HighAssigned = YesSubmitted 4.5 hrs ago

Primary actionoccurs?Yes: Manager is notified about Request A status.

Primary actionoccurs?Yes: Manager is notified about Request B status.



Workflow qualifications Specifying a qualification when you create an active link, filter, or escalation enables you to define the data condition that causes the workflow component to take action. You can use qualifications to check values in fields, the amount of time that has passed since a specified event occurred, and many other factors. For example, a qualification might check whether the priority of a request is High or Critical or whether the day is a weekend day.

Qualifications with active links and filters work differently from qualifications with escalations:

� Active link and filter qualifications control which actions, if any, are run for the current request. For example, an active link can run actions whenever a specific field is filled in (execution option), or it can run actions whenever the field is filled in and the value in the field is invalid (qualification).

� Escalations are run whenever the scheduled time arrives. The qualification is an essential part of most escalations, not simply a refinement. It determines the requests on which the primary (“if”) escalation actions are run. Without a qualification, the primary actions are run on every request (record) in the form to which the escalation is attached. For example, if an escalation simply sent a notification every hour (execution option), the notification would be meaningless. A meaningful escalation, however, might check every hour (execution option) whether three or more hours have elapsed since a request was submitted and the request is unassigned (qualification), and then send a notification listing the unassigned requests to a manager. If no requests meet the qualification, the escalation might specify alternative (“else”) actions that are executed once, such as sending the manager a notice that all requests comply with the assignment rule. For an illustration of how qualifications are used in escalations, see Figure 3-3.

For filters, the qualification can check the value of a field in the database, in the current transaction, or both. This makes it possible to check whether the value of the field is changing. For example, if you have a business rule that service desk requests can be closed only if they have been fixed, a filter could check all transactions that change the status of a request to Closed. If the database value of the status is Fixed, the request can be modified; otherwise, the change is not allowed.

44 Concepts Guide

Workflow qualifications

Keywords in qualificationsKeywords are used to build qualifications. A keyword is a variable whose value is defined by AR System. Keyword names are uppercase and enclosed in dollar signs. For example, $USER$ represents the name of the user who is currently logged in, $TIMESTAMP$ represents the current date and time, and $OPERATION$ represents the operation currently in progress.

Keywords can be used almost anywhere a qualification can be defined or a value specified:

� Defining qualifications for search menus and for workflow. For example, workflow can check the value of the keyword $OS$ to ensure that the operating system can run a process that you specify in workflow.

� Specifying a value in the Set Fields action.

� Defining searches and macros.

For a complete list of keywords, see the Workflow Objects Guide.



46 Concepts Guide

Chapter

4
Access control
Keeping information secure can be a major undertaking in client/server environments. It is sometimes a balancing act for administrators. You want to rigorously control who can access data, yet you do not want security to be so complex that it intrudes on your user community or is difficult for you to implement or maintain.

AR System enables you to meet these seemingly opposing security goals. It provides a rich set of features that protect your data from unauthorized access. In addition, it has a logical, multitiered access control structure that is straightforward for you to implement and for users to understand.

This chapter describes access control in AR System.


� About access control in AR System (page 48)� User and group access (page 48)� Role-based access (page 50)� Multitiered access control model (page 51)� How licensing affects access control (page 53)



About access control in AR System AR System enables you to control which users can access data and perform certain actions such as modifying a request or triggering an active link. User access is determined by these conditions:

� The groups users belong to

� The licenses users are granted

AR System uses a multitiered approach to control access at these points:

� Server

� Form (or table)

� Field (or column)

� Active link and active link guide

� Request (or row)

This approach provides a wide range of control over data access, enabling you to restrict access broadly at the highest levels (server and form) and narrowly at the request and field levels. Because you can refine your data access criteria so precisely, you can use a single form for many different purposes simply by setting the appropriate permissions.

User and group access Individuals who need to access AR System are registered as users by an administrator. The administrator then assigns the users to access control groups.

Each access control group is defined for a particular server. An access control group has permissions that determine whether and how its members can access application components, such as forms, requests, fields, active links, and active link guides. (Administrators can also set default permissions for each component type so that whenever they create a component, selected groups automatically have access to it.)

Users are assigned to groups according to their need to access information. For example, you might create a group called Employee Services Staff whose members are permitted to view and change only certain fields in an Employee Information form. You might have another group called Employee Services Managers whose members are permitted to view and change all fields in the Employee Information form, including salary information.

AR System has predefined groups that perform specific functions (see “Types of access control groups” on page 49). In addition, you can create any number of custom groups in AR System to enforce access control. You can also permit unregistered users to access AR System as guests. Guests are members of the predefined Public group.

48 Concepts Guide

User and group access

Types of access control groups This table lists the types of access control groups:

1 AR System provides these access control groups.2 You must add these access control groups to your system.

For more information, see the Form and Application Objects Guide.

Additive permissions Access control in AR System is additive. This means that each user in AR System starts out with no access permissions. Administrators then add users to access control groups as needed. In this way, AR System implements strict access control: administrators must make a conscious decision to add users to groups on a case-by-case basis.

Type of access control group Description Predefined groups1 Custom groups2

Explicit A group to which you must assign users.

� Administrator� Sub Administrator� Customize

Any regular and computed groups that you create.Regular groups are groups to which you assign a specific list of users. Computed groups are groups to which users are assigned based on their memberships in groups included in an expression. For example, you can create a computed group definition such as (A AND B) OR C AND NOT D. This computed group includes users who are members of both groups A and B, or members of group C, but not members of group D.

Implicit A group to which a user automatically (or implicitly) belongs by virtue of the contents of certain fields in a request. You cannot assign users to implicit groups.All users are members of Public. You use the other types of implicit groups to control access to requests (row-level database access).

� Public� Submitter� Assignee� Assignee Group

Any dynamic groups that you create.Dynamic groups use the contents of special fields to determine group membership.



Membership in multiple groups Users often belong to multiple groups in an organization. They inherit permissions from each of the groups to which they belong.

If a group has permission to access a form, field, request, active link, or active link guide and a user belongs to that group, the user has access, even if the user belongs to other groups that do not have access.

Figure 4-1: How permissions work

Role-based access In deployable applications, access permissions are based on roles. Like groups, roles have permissions to access forms, fields, active links, and so on. Unlike groups, however, roles are defined for an application (groups are defined for a server).

Roles make deployable applications easy to install on a variety of servers. You assign users to groups and then associate the groups with roles This enables you to install an application on servers that have different groups without redefining the application’s object permissions for each server.

NOTE For simplification, the following sections discuss user access in terms of group permissions. In deployable applications, which use role permissions, user access is ultimately determined by which groups are mapped to which roles.

GraphicsSupportgroup

Browsergroup

Publicgroup

Erin is a member of three groups.

Because Erin belongs to a group with permission to change the Short Description field on the Graphics Tools form, she can change the field even though she belongs to other groups that do not have change permission.

Nopermission

Permissionto view

Permissionto change

Short Description field

50 Concepts Guide

Multitiered access control model

Multitiered access control model AR System uses a multitiered (hierarchical) approach to control data access. At each level in this hierarchy, a user’s permissions are checked. If access is permitted, a “gate” opens that allows the user to proceed to the next level. If access is denied at any point except active links and links guides (workflow), the user cannot proceed. (If access is denied at workflow, the user might be able to proceed, but his data access capabilities will be limited.)

For example, if a user is denied access to a form, the user cannot see any fields associated with the form. For another example, a user’s ability to access a request depends on whether he belongs to a group that has access to the Request ID field.

Figure 4-2: Access control in AR System

AR Systemserver

Forms

Requests

Active linksand active

link guides Fields

Authenticateuser

Validate formpermissions

Validate formelement permissions

Validate requestpermissions

Name

Form

Last Name

First Name

Email Address



The access control model comprises the following levels:

Access level Description

AR System server Users must pass an initial checkpoint when they start an AR System client, such as a browser or BMC Remedy User. At this point, users must enter a valid user name, a password, and, as an option, an authentication string. AR System servers check the user name, password, and authentication string each time a client requests a transaction, such as when opening a form or changing a field.

Note: If your AR System server is configured to allow guest users, such users can log in to the server without a valid user name or password. See the Configuration Guide.

Form As an administrator, you give groups access to forms according to each group’s need to view or change information in the form. Visible access enables users to access a form from the Object List. Hidden access makes a form available only through workflow. If a group is not given access to a form, members of that group cannot view the form or change the requests that it contains.

Field You can control access to each field on a form, including nondata fields such as trim fields, table fields, and active link control fields. You can make a field visible to users or hide the field so that it is accessible only through workflow. For data fields, you also specify whether a group can only view field information or also change it. If a group cannot access a field, the field does not appear when members of the group open the form.

Active link In addition to controlling access to form and field data, you can control access to active links, which trigger a variety of workflow actions. For example, you might allow support staff to trigger several active links appropriate to their work but not allow other users to trigger those active links.Groups do not automatically have access to the field associated with an active link. You must grant them access to the active link and to the field. For active links that fire when users click a button or choose a menu item, the users must have access to both the button or menu item and the active link to trigger the active link.

Active link guide When you create an active link guide, you specify the groups that have access to it. To access an active link guide, a user must have permission to each active link in the guide and to the guide itself. If a user has access to all active links in a guide but not to the guide, the guide does not appear.

Request You can strictly control who can access requests associated with a form. For example, you might want only managers to access requests with confidential employee information. Or you might provide an outsourcing service in which you use AR System as the central service desk for several companies, and you do not want one company to see requests from another company.

52 Concepts Guide

How licensing affects access control

How licensing affects access control Although licensing is not a component of access control, licensing can affect a user’s ability to perform an operation that you grant her permission to perform. For example, if a user is a member of a group that has Change permission to a field but you did not give her the appropriate write license, she cannot change the field.

You can assign the types of user licenses listed in this table:

An AR System server provides three fixed write licenses and unlimited read and restricted read licenses. You can purchase additional fixed write licenses and floating write licenses from BMC or from an authorized reseller.

For more information about licensing, see the Configuration Guide.

License Description

Read Enables users to search for and display requests within their assigned permissions. Administrators can configure the AR System server to enable users with Read licenses to submit requests and to modify requests that they submit.

Restricted Read Enables users to search for and display requests within their assigned permissions. Administrators can configure the AR System server to enable users with Restricted Read licenses to submit requests. But users with Restricted Read licenses cannot modify any requests, including their own.It does, however, allow the same login account to access AR System from multiple IP addresses simultaneously, such as when you browse a knowledge base or complete online surveys.

Fixed Includes all the capabilities of a Read license, and also enables users (based on the permissions of the groups to which they belong) to modify and save requests that they did not submit. AR System administrators and subadministrators must have a Fixed license. Other AR System users who consistently need to modify requests must also have Fixed licenses.A fixed write license is associated with a user name and is always “reserved” for that user. Users who have a fixed write license can access the AR System server at any time.

Floating Includes all the capabilities of a Read license, and also enables users to modify and save data for requests that they did not submit based on the groups to which they belong. Multiple users can use the same Floating licenses, one user at a time: they are available on a first-come, first-served basis. This type of license is designed for users who occasionally need to modify and save requests.A user with a Floating license is temporarily logged in to AR System with a Read license. When a search, modify, or submit is performed, AR System checks for an available Floating license. If a license is available, the user is granted write access to requests. If no licenses are available, the user is notified and continues to use the Read license until a Floating license becomes available.Generally, Floating licenses are shared by all AR System users. You can, however, define license pools to reserve a set of Floating licenses for a group of users. This enables you to prioritize the availability of Floating licenses. For example, you can allocate a number of licenses to department managers to make sure that they can immediately approve essential requests. Users who do not belong to this group cannot acquire any of the reserved licenses.



54 Concepts Guide

Chapter

5
Extending AR System
The core AR System product—clients (BMC Remedy Developer Studio and BMC Remedy User), mid tier, and AR System server—is the foundation for the BMC Remedy product line. Beyond the core environment, BMC offers add-on products that provide additional services and capabilities. This chapter provides brief overviews of these products.

In addition, third parties have developed a wide range of products for integration with AR System. Some of the most popular integration areas are discussed in this chapter.


� AR System foundation products (page 56)� BMC Atrium products (page 57)� AR System–based solutions (page 57)� Other BMC products (page 58)� Integration with third-party products (page 58)



AR System foundation products These BMC Remedy products add functionality to the core AR System environment:

� BMC Remedy Distributed Server Option (DSO)—Enables you to send and receive data from forms that reside on physically separate servers. See “Distributed environments provide scalability” on page 19 and the BMC Remedy Distributed Server Option Guide.

� BMC Remedy Encryption products—Enable the AR System server and its clients to communicate securely over a network by encrypting the messages sent between them. Standard BMC Remedy Encryption is built into the BMC Remedy products. Optional BMC Remedy Encryption Performance and BMC Remedy Encryption Premium are sold separately. The optional encryption products provide a higher level of security than standard encryption. They also enable you to comply with Federal Information Processing Standards (FIPS) 200. All BMC Remedy Encryption products use third-party encryption technology software developed by the OpenSSL Project for use in the OpenSSL toolkit (http://www.openssl.org/). See the BMC Remedy Encryption Guide.

� BMC Remedy Full Text Search (FTS)—Provides a search mechanism that is typically much faster than the native database searching functionality for searching in long text fields. It is also the only search method available in AR System for searching text within documents attached to requests. See the Configuration Guide.

� BMC Remedy Migrator—Provides a fast, easy way to move forms and applications between AR System servers, servers and files, or files. This tool helps you transfer data and workflow objects from a development environment to a production server, while ensuring the integrity of all migrated changes. See the BMC Remedy Migrator Guide.

NOTE For limitations on using BMC Remedy Migrator with other BMC applications, see the BMC Remedy Migrator Release Notes on the Customer Support website (http://www.bmc.com/support_home).

56 Concepts Guide



BMC Atrium products

BMC Atrium products Together, AR System and BMC Atrium Core provide the foundation for BMC Business Service Management (BSM) solutions.

The following AR System–based BMC Atrium Core components address the best practices for configuration management. They also support IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL)–defined processes, such as change and service management.

� BMC Atrium Configuration Management Database

� BMC Atrium Integration Engine

� BMC Product Catalog

The following BMC Atrium applications, though not based on AR System, provide powerful visualization, decision support, and data discovery capabilities. They are preintegrated with BMC solutions for BSM and ready to use out of the box.

� BMC Analytics for BSM

� BMC Dashboards for BSM

� BMC Discovery Solution

For more information, see the BMC Software website at http://www.bmc.com.

AR System–based solutions The following BMC Remedy solutions for IT service and customer relationship management are based on AR System:

� BMC Remedy IT Service Management (ITSM) Suite—Offers a complete, integrated solution to technology life cycle management. Its applications compress business cycles with custom routing of approvals and consistent enforcement of business rules. The suite includes

� BMC Remedy Asset Management

� BMC Remedy Change Management

� BMC Remedy Service Desk (includes BMC Remedy Incident Management and BMC Remedy Problem Management)

� BMC Service Level Management

� BMC Service Request Management—Enables IT to define its services, publish them in a Service Catalog, and give users self-service options, which reduce the requests that must be handled by service desk support staff.

� BMC Remedy Knowledge Management—Gives call center support staff easy access to a vast array of information needed to resolve problems.

For more information, see the BMC Software website at http://www.bmc.com.


http://www.bmc.com

http://www.bmc.com


Other BMC productsMany other BMC products—such as BMC Atrium Orchestrator, BMC Service Impact Manager, and BMC Performance Manager—integrate with AR System or applications based on AR System. Together, these products provide a complete solution to Business Service Management (BSM).

For more information about BSM from BMC, see the BMC Software website at http://www.bmc.com.

Integration with third-party products AR System is designed to be used with third-party products to create an integrated solution. Popular areas in which third parties have integrated their products with AR System are

� Web services

� Network and system management

� Computer telephony, including automated call distribution (ACD) and integrated voice response (IVR)

� Asset/inventory management

� Groupware

� Legacy management

� Report writers

� Remote access

� Fax/pager/email

� Knowledge bases

� Accessibility for disabled AR System users

AR System is an open system with several well-defined interfaces for linking to other products. For an in-depth discussion about integrating with third-party products, see the Integration Guide.

For the latest information about products that have been integrated with AR System, see the Customer Support website (http://www.bmc.com/support_home).

58 Concepts Guide



http://www.bmc.com

Chapter

6
Putting it all together
In previous chapters, you learned about important AR System concepts: forms, menus, workflow components, and integrations with other products. Now that you know the pieces of the puzzle, you need to understand how to put them together to form a useful whole.

This chapter brings those concepts together by showing how a sample organization—a wild animal park—might plan and design an AR System application. Like any business, the park needs to take a systematic approach to automating its processes. This chapter walks you through the planning process that the hypothetical park staff uses to evaluate and address its business needs.

As you will see, you can create AR System applications to track any kind of asset allocation or business process. With sufficient planning, even workflow-intensive procedures can be automatically maintained in an orderly manner.


� About the wild animal park (page 60)� Goals of the animal tracking application (page 60)� Planning and design considerations (page 61)� Planning and design decisions (page 63)� Putting the application to work (page 65)



About the wild animal parkFor many years, the wild animal park grew successfully with paper-based record keeping combined with isolated computer-based procedures. Recently, however, employees noticed a number of redundant or inefficient processes, so the park staff decided to use AR System to automate the following processes:

� Tracking and managing animals associated with the park

� Tracking and managing public relations, such as attendance statistics, public inquiries, membership renewals, and group tour information

� Tracking and managing the maintenance of on-site visitor facilities, including snack bars, restrooms, first-aid stations, and park transit systems

� Managing the botanical gardens adjacent to the park

This chapter focuses on the first application, managing and tracking animals.

Goals of the animal tracking applicationThe park needs to accomplish these goals with the animal tracking application:

� Track the type and number of animals grouped together in enclosures.

� Track births, deaths, acquisitions, trades, and sales.

� Track daily observations of each animal, including behavior and medical condition.

� Track the complete medical history of each animal, including preventive care such as dental work, vaccinations, and parasite checks.

� Track animal feeding.

� Immediately alert the veterinary staff about medical emergencies.

� Alert the animal handlers if any animal escapes its enclosure.

60 Concepts Guide

Planning and design considerations

All these goals relate to tracking animals throughout their life at the park, as shown in Figure 6-1.

Figure 6-1: Animal tracking overview

Planning and design considerations After defining the application goals, the staff begins more detailed planning. This section discusses various questions that any organization needs to consider to create a useful application. The following section, “Planning and design decisions” on page 63, discusses the answers to these questions.

NOTE The planning and design process is thoroughly covered in the “BMC Remedy AR System 7.x: Application Requirements Analysis, Design, and Development” course offered by BMC. See http://www.bmc.com/education.

Loss of animals throughtrade, sale, or death

Acquisitions or births of new animals

Care and feedingof animals


http://www.bmc.com/education


Analyzing dataAs the park staff members begin to plan their animal management application, they think about the types of data that they need to capture. They also ask themselves how this data is stored in their current system (for example, in a legacy database or in paper forms).

After determining the kind of data that they need to capture and how that data interrelates, the staff can determine what forms (main and supporting) and fields need to be created. They also need to decide whether to include menus on the forms and, if so, which kinds are most appropriate to help staff members fill in fields.

Analyzing workflowNext, the staff considers the park’s current organizational processes:

� What are the processes?

� What are the stages or steps of each process?

� Which groups of people participate in the processes?

� To manage, access, and track the processes, what information do the groups need?

Defining business rulesAfter examining their business processes, the staff members also consider their business rules, the fundamental policies that govern day-to-day life at the park. The rules frequently provide the basis for making important decisions. For example, one of the rules might be that every animal must be checked by a veterinarian within 24 hours of arrival. If the rule is broken, that might indicate a need to hire more medical staff or to increase clinic capacity.

Questions about business rules include

� What conditions and events require decisions and actions?

� What should happen when various conditions or events occur?

� What is the flow of information through the existing systems?

Mapping business rules to workflow components Next, the park determines how to translate its business workflow (rules and processes) into AR System workflow components:

� Which processes can be accomplished by using active links?

� When would it make more sense to use a filter?

� What types of escalations are needed to enforce business rules? For example, an escalation might be used to enforce the rule that animals must be checked by a veterinarian within 24 hours of arrival.

62 Concepts Guide

Planning and design decisions

Considering integrationsThe staff considers what other software products or databases must initially be integrated into the application and what future integrations are desirable:

� The staff must be able to enter data while they are out in the park, perhaps using handheld devices.

� Future integration with a sister zoo must be possible.

� Integration with an international database of endangered species is also necessary, partly to locate new individual animals that can contribute to the gene pool at the park.

� Eventually, the staff might want to integrate information about the botanical gardens at the park, although this could be maintained separately.

Planning and design decisions Based on their research, the park staff makes the following decisions about the types of forms needed to capture data, the groups of people that must use AR System, and the workflow components that they would put in place to automate their processes.

Decisions about forms The staff determines that they need these forms (shown in Figure 6-2 on page 64) to capture information:

� Animal form—Contains detailed information about each animal. The staff considers using panel fields to organize the form modularly, keeping related fields together.

� Species Info form—Contains details about a particular species, such as feeding requirements, life span, medical needs, and whether it is endangered. This is a supporting form.

� Feeding form—Contains information about each animal’s feeding schedule.

� Enclosure form—Contains information about the number and types of animals each enclosure can hold and so forth.

� Medical History form—Contains the complete medical history of each animal.

� Former Resident form—Contains information about animals that no longer reside in the park.



Figure 6-2: Forms for animal tracking application

Decisions about access controlSome of the AR System groups or roles that the park needs are

� Veterinarians, who provide health care for the animals.

� Animal handlers, who provide day-to-day care for the animals.

� Curators, who handle acquisitions and transfers.

� Horticulturists, who maintain the animals’ naturalistic habitats.

� Researchers, who conduct animal-related studies.

Appropriate permissions will be assigned to each group or role according to the information that they need to access.

Decisions about business rulesBusiness rules for the park include

� Animals will be not be kept in temporary enclosures longer than 48 hours.

� Specially trained animal handlers will be notified immediately if a dangerous animal escapes.

� Every animal must be checked by a veterinarian within 24 hours of arrival.

A

B

C

D

A

B

C

A

B

C

A

B

C

DA

B

C

D

A

B

C

Species Info Form

Medical History Form

Animal Form

Enclosure Form

Feeding Form

Former Resident Form

64 Concepts Guide

Putting the application to work

Decisions about workflow componentsSome of the workflow components that the park needs are

� A filter to notify animal handlers whenever an animal needs to be moved.

� Active links that help users fill out forms.

� An escalation to notify keepers when an animal has not been fed within one hour of its scheduled feeding time.

Putting the application to workAfter the planning and design process, the park develops an application that covers its diverse requirements. When staff members begin using the application, they note which features work well and which ones need adjustment. Developers make changes to the application based on that feedback.

Each of the following scenarios illustrates a complete process, but not every component of the process is discussed in detail. For example, enough detail might be given about the function of one workflow component to enable you to make assumptions about other components.

A tiger is acquiredAs shown in Figure 6-3 on page 66, when a Sumatran tiger named Karuna is obtained, a staffer fills in the Animal form, and then clicks a button called List Enclosures. An active link opens a dialog box displaying the Enclosure form with a table field that lists enclosure information, including availability and habitat. The staffer can double-click any enclosure in the list to get more information.

Next, the staffer selects an appropriate choice—in this case, enclosure 16—and submits the request. A filter notifies the Animal Handlers group and sends a message to inform the staffer that the appropriate persons have been notified. In addition, the Status field changes from New to Move Pending.

During trial runs of the system, the application developer realizes that the animal handlers are frequently away from their computers and rarely check email. The developer integrates the application with a paging program and has the filter notify the handlers about new animals with a page. Handlers can then use their cell phones to get information about their assigned tasks.

Gary from Animal Handlers receives a page that says a new tiger must be moved from the temporary cages to enclosure 16.

After he transfers the tiger, Gary changes the Status field from Move Pending to Permanent. When he saves his changes, workflow components create new requests in related forms and notify the Veterinarian group and the Animal Handlers group to begin the care and feeding of the new animal. These requests and notifications illustrate one way of handling work orders in AR System.



Figure 6-3: Active link and filter in the animal tracking application

Similar process, different applicationThis process is similar to moves, adds, and changes (MAC) in an employee services application.

1

23

Active Linklists all enclosuresand their capacity.

User chooses Enclosure 16,clicks Continue, and "16" is entered.

User submits request.

Action 1.Notify Animal Handlers group via email: "New Sumatran tiger must be transferred to Enclosure 16."

Action 2.Notify Submitter: "Animal handlers havebeen informed of tiger’s arrival."

Animal Form

Name

Type

Status

Karuna

Filter

Sumatran Tiger

New

Assigned toEnclosure

ListEnclosures

Enclosure Form

Dialog Box

Number Status Habitat

4 Full Waterhole

5 Full Steppe

16 Available Jungle

20 Available Steppe

Cancel Continue

16

66 Concepts Guide


The tiger is injuredOne morning when the keepers are making their daily rounds, they notice that Karuna has been injured, so they notify the veterinarians. A veterinarian looks at the Animal form and checks a table field that contains data from the Medical History form, as illustrated in Figure 6-4. She discovers that Karuna has no history of serious injury or illness.

To be treated, Karuna must be tranquilized and moved to the veterinary hospital for surgery. He has been tranquilized before without incident as indicated by the Tranquilizer Notes field on the Animal form, so the veterinarian computes the dosage and sets out with several animal handlers to bring in the tiger.

Figure 6-4: Table field in the animal tracking application

During the prototyping phase, staffers had to open the Medical History form separately to learn about Karuna’s record with tranquilizers. The veterinary staff pointed out that they wanted that important information readily available during an emergency. So the Tranquilizer Notes field was added to the Animal form, and a filter that executes on Submit was added to post a message to the veterinarians, reminding them to update the Tranquilizer Notes if necessary.

Similar process, different applicationThis process is similar to handling a customer call in a technical support application. The technical support representatives might decide that they need important information about a customer on a main form rather than on a supporting form.

Animal Form

Reason Date Tranq.? Desc.Injury 1/5/97 Y LegCheckup 6/17/97 N RegularSurgery 10/4/98 Y Dental

Karuna

Standard dosageNo side effects


Name

Reason

Date Tranquilized?

Description

Vet

Vet's Note

Drugs used

Name

Tranquilizer Notes



The tiger is traded to another zooAfter several years, the animal park determines that it should have a different male tiger to maintain genetic diversity in its tiger population. By examining a database maintained by zoos worldwide, the staff discovers a tiger that is available and has no common ancestors with Karuna or with the park’s female tigers. They decide to trade Karuna, and a staffer changes Karuna’s status from Permanent to Trade Pending, thereby triggering the same notification filter that was used when Karuna arrived. This time, it notifies the animal handlers to move Karuna to a temporary cage, as shown in Figure 6-5.

Figure 6-5: Notifications in the animal tracking application

User changes Statusto "Trade Pending" and submits request.

Main Form

Animal Form

Name

Type

Status

Karuna

Sumatran Tiger

Trade Pending Action 1.Notify Animal Handlers group via pager: "Karuna must be transferredto temporary cage."

Action 2.Notify Submitter: "Animal handlers have been informed of tiger's transfer."

68 Concepts Guide


After Karuna leaves the park, his status is changed to Traded. When the changed request is submitted, a filter uses a Push Fields action to move all of Karuna’s data from the Animal form to the Former Resident form, as shown in Figure 6-6.

Figure 6-6: Push Fields action used in the animal tracking application

The Medical History form is not archived or changed because the staff might, at any point, want information from the medical records. For example, they might want information about all tiger surgeries performed at the park.

Similar process, different applicationThis process is similar to retiring an asset in an asset management application: you need to track the problem history of an asset during its active use and after its retirement.

User changes Statusto "Traded" andsubmits request.

Main Form Main Form

Animal Form

Name

Type

Status

Former Resident Form

Name

Type

Status

Action:Push Fields

Karuna

Sumatran Tiger

Traded

Karuna

Sumatran Tiger

Traded

All medical historystays "current" ratherthan being archived.

Supporting Form


Name Karuna


Name Karuna


Name Karuna



70 Concepts Guide

Glossary

access control An AR System security feature used to limit the access that users have to forms, to specific fields or records in a form, to workflow, and to specific functions in the system. See also group, permission, role, user.

access point A form or guide in an application that is used as an interface to other applications or workflow, such as in Push Fields or Call Guide actions. When creating workflow that references forms and guides, a developer can identify access points.

active link A workflow component that causes an AR System client to perform specific operations in response to specific user actions. Active links are generally employed to help users interact with the system. They run on the client computer or on the mid tier.

active link guide An ordered sequence of active links that accomplishes a specific operation. Active link guides can lead users through a task (like a wizard) or can be used as subroutines to accomplish common tasks. See also filter guide.

administrator An individual responsible for the management of AR System, including installing AR System software and maintaining AR System by adding and deleting users, groups, and roles; backing up AR System servers; importing data from other systems; and so on.

administrator default The value that AR System developers assign to a field when designing a form. Users can override the administrator default by assigning their own default or by entering a different value. See also user default.

Administrator group One of several special access control groups that AR System provides. Members of this group have full and unlimited access to AR System, including unlimited ability to create definitions and to access and modify data. See also explicit group, Sub Administrator group.

advanced search bar The row of buttons, the Search Criteria field, and the Fields menu list that appear at the bottom of the Details pane when users click the Advanced search button in a browser or in BMC Remedy User. Use this bar to specify complex search criteria.

alert A message from an AR System server or other program to notify a user that certain events— such as a request being submitted or progress being made in resolving a request—have occurred. You can use BMC Remedy Alert, an optional Windows program, to notify users when they receive alerts

alert list The list of alerts belonging to a user. The list can be displayed in a browser or in BMC Remedy User.

Glossary 71


allowable currency typeA currency type that appears in the currency field menu. Users can use only allowable currency types when entering currency values. See also currency data type, functional currency type.

APISee application programming interface (API).

application A group of forms and associated workflow related to a business function, such as Employee Care or Service Desk. An application is a server object in BMC Remedy Developer Studio. See also deployable application, local application.

application list field A field that displays entry points. See also entry point, entry point guide, form entry point, home page.

application programming interface (API) A set of functions or classes that provides application programmers with access to the full functionality of a product. The AR System C API is documented in the C API Reference, and the Java API is documented in the Java API HTML documentation.

application state The development state of a deployable application, such as Test or Production. Roles can be mapped to different groups based on application state to limit access to the application during testing or modification. See also deployable application, group, role.

AR SystemSee BMC Remedy Action Request System (AR System).

AR System client The AR System programs that enable users to access an AR System server. AR System clients include BMC Remedy Developer Studio, BMC Remedy User, the web client (mid tier), BMC Remedy Data Import, and BMC Remedy Alert.

AR System database connectivity (ARDBC) A mechanism by which the AR System server uses a plug-in to access data stored outside the AR System database as if it were in AR System.

AR System external authentication (AREA) A mechanism by which the AR System server can access and use authentication services from outside the AR System environment. A plug-in is used to access the external subsystem.

AR System ODBC driver A connectivity solution that enables AR System to communicate with ODBC (Open Database Connectivity) clients. ODBC is an SQL-based communication standard developed by Microsoft.

AR System server The AR System program that processes all data entered by a client. The AR System server is the workflow engine between client and database. It also verifies that a user has permission to perform each action, thereby enforcing any access control defined in an application.

ARDBCSee AR System database connectivity (ARDBC).

AREASee AR System external authentication (AREA).

Assignee group One of several special access control groups that AR System provides. The user whose name is in the Assigned To field of a request automatically belongs to this implicit group for that request. See also Assignee Group group, dynamic group, implicit group, Submitter group.

Assignee Group group One of several special access control groups that AR System provides. If the Assignee Group field in a request contains a user name, that user is automatically a member of this group for that request. If the Assignee Group field contains a group name, all users in that group are automatically members of the group. See also Assignee group, dynamic group, implicit group, Submitter group.

72 Concepts Guide

Glossary

attachment data type The data type used for fields that hold files. This type enables you to store text, graphics, audio, or video attachments in the database.

attachment pool field A field that contains one or multiple related attachment fields associated with a request.

BMC Remedy Action Request System (AR System) Adaptable client/server software that provides a foundation for creating applications that can automate, track, and manage a wide variety of business processes.

BMC Remedy Alert The AR System client through which an alert can be sent to a user. See also notification.

BMC Remedy Approval Server A module in AR System that routes forms to generate the appropriate signoff signatures. This module also creates an audit trail for authorizing AR System application forms.

BMC Remedy Data Import The AR System client tool used to transfer data records from an archive file into a form.

BMC Remedy Developer Studio The AR System client used by AR System developers to develop applications. Use this client to create and change object definitions and to set access permissions that determine which users and groups can view or modify each form or specific parts of a form.

BMC Remedy Email Engine A server-based module provided with AR System that communicates with both the AR System server and an email server. Email Engine receives email messages and can parse and interpret the messages to execute specific instructions on an AR System form. It also sends email messages to AR System and directs notifications as a result of filters and escalations.

BMC Remedy Flashboards A real-time visual monitoring tool that can show the state of service operations, warn about potential problems, and collect and display trend data.

BMC Remedy Mid Tier Configuration Tool The tool used to configure and manage the mid tier portion of AR System. See also mid tier.

BMC Remedy User The AR System client in which users enter and track requests through the resolution process. Users can also search the database, generate reports, and modify existing requests. (Alternatively, the mid tier enables you to perform these tasks in a browser. See mid tier.)

broadcast operation A distributed operation in which one source server simultaneously transfers data-only copies of requests to two or more target servers.

button field A field on a form that a user can click to execute an active link. A button, image, or hyperlink can represent a button field. See also toolbar button.

chained operation A distributed request operation in which one source server transfers a request to a target server, and the target server in turn transfers the request to another server. This operation is used in environments containing three or more servers.

change flag A status flag set when the contents of a field or form are altered. A change flag can be polled or disabled by workflow.

character data type The data type used for fields that contain alphanumeric text.

character field An AR System data field that holds alphanumeric characters. You can attach a menu or a file system browser to character fields or fill them with default text.

character menu A menu that provides assistance with filling in values for a field. A character menu can be attached to any character field. See also dynamic menu.

Glossary 73


clientSee AR System client.

client tier The architectural level in which AR System clients operate in the multitiered system.

command-line option A parameter used to specify an operation or option to AR System programs and utilities when they are run.

computed group An explicit group whose membership is based on the memberships of other explicit groups. See also explicit group, group.

container The underlying data structure for guides and applications. A component of AR System used to store collections of objects. Used as the basic storage structure for applications, active link guides, filter guides, and packing lists.

control data type The data type for fields that execute active links. These fields do not contain data.

control panel A form used as a centralized entry point from which users choose the business tasks they want to accomplish.

core field One of a set of basic fields common to all AR System regular forms. These fields cannot be removed from a regular form.

currency code The three-letter code that represents a currency type, such as USD for United States dollars.

currency data type The data type used for fields containing currency data. Currency data is stored in four parts: a decimal value, a currency code, a conversion date, and one or more functional (converted) currency values. Each part can be viewed or searched by users or accessed by workflow. See also allowable currency type, functional currency type, currency code.

Customize group One of several special access control groups that AR System provides. This group grants users the right to customize their form layout in BMC Remedy User. See also explicit group.

data field A field that stores data in the database. Data fields include character, date, time, date/time, diary, integer, real, decimal, selection, attachment, and currency.

data-only copy In a distributed environment, a read-only copy of a request that is not part of an active ownership chain and cannot create a new ownership chain. See also independent copy, ownership chain, distributed server.

data tier The architectural level that contains data and communicates with the AR System server. The data can be stored in a text file, spreadsheet, or database that is part of or separate from AR System.

data type The property of a field that determines the characteristics of the field and what type of information (if any) the field can contain.

data visualization fieldA field that provides a way to augment AR System with HTML-based content—such as web pages, flashboards, and other graphics—that can interact with the field’s parent form through workflow.

date data type The data type used for fields containing date values. Date values can range from January 1, 4713 B.C.E., to January 1, 9999 C.E. Date values are stored as the number of days from the beginning of the date field’s range. For example, January 1, 2009, is stored as the number 2454833 because it is 2,454,833 days after the first day in the date range. See also date/time data type.

74 Concepts Guide

Glossary

date/time data type The data type used for fields containing date/time timestamp values. Values can range from January 1, 1970, to January 17, 2038. See also date data type, time data type.

decimal data type The data type used for fields containing fixed-point numbers.

defaultSee administrator default, user default.

default mapping The mapping selected by Distributed Server Option if AR System finds multiple mappings that apply to the specified transfer criteria.

deployable application An application that uses permissions based on roles and that is easily portable to other servers. See also application, local application, role.

Details pane The part of the main window in a browser or in BMC Remedy User that displays fields for entering or viewing data.

Developer StudioSee BMC Remedy Developer Studio.

dialog box A window displayed to users that must be responded to before users can continue filling out a form. To create a dialog box, use an active link action.

diary data type The data type used for a field in which you can capture a history of the actions taken for a request. The field stores character data. It is an append-only field, and each addition is stamped with the time, date, and name of the user who enters it.

display-only field A temporary field for which no space is allocated in the database. See also global field.

display-only form A type of form containing display-only fields. Display-only forms are used to create control panels and dialog boxes.

distributed delete A distributed operation that removes a request from AR System. In a distributed environment, a copy of a request can be deleted on one server if the master copy is deleted on another server. See also Distributed Server Option (DSO).

distributed fields Fields that can be added to an AR System form to manipulate certain mapping controls. The number and type of fields added to a form are determined by the mapping type selected. See also Distributed Server Option (DSO).

distributed mappings Objects on a DSO server that enable users to specify how data from one form is transferred to another. Users specify the forms and fields involved, how frequently updates are processed, the return values, if any, and how conflicts in distributed operations are resolved. Distributed mappings are used with DSO filter and escalation actions. See also Distributed Server Option (DSO).

distributed operation actions Operations that control the action taken when filter or escalation criteria are met in a form. See also distributed delete, distributed return, Distributed Server Option (DSO), distributed transfer.

distributed pools Objects on a server that enable interrelated operations of pending requests to occur in the correct order, especially during periods when the rate of incoming requests exceeds the processing rate. See also Distributed Server Option (DSO).

distributed return A distributed operation that returns the latest copy of a request with ownership to the requesting server. See also Distributed Server Option (DSO).

distributed server An AR System server that exists within a multiserver, distributed environment. See also Distributed Server Option (DSO).

Glossary 75


Distributed Server The name of the user performing all operations for DSO. See also Distributed Server Option (DSO).

Distributed Server Option (DSO) An AR System server component that sends and receives data from forms on physically separate servers. DSO requires a separate usage license. See also distributed server.

distributed transfer A distributed operation that transmits information from one server to another. In a distributed environment, a request can be transferred to one server when it is created or modified on another. The transfer can include the entire request or just specific data. See also Distributed Server Option (DSO).

distributed update A distributed operation that refreshes a copy of a request on one server when the master copy on another server is modified. See also Distributed Server Option (DSO).

duplicate request IDs Matching request IDs that occur in a distributed operation when a request transferred from the source server has the same request ID as a request on the target server. Distributed Server Option provides several ways to handle this issue. See also request ID.

dynamic group One of several special access control groups that developers can create in the Group form by using a group ID from 60000–60999. If a dynamic group field (a field whose field ID is the same as the dynamic group ID) contains a user name, that user is a member of that dynamic group. If the dynamic group field contains a group name, all users in that group are members of the dynamic group. If it contains a role name, all members of the groups mapped to that role are members of the dynamic group. See also Assignee Group group, group, implicit group, role.

dynamic menu A menu populated at run time when users click a search menu icon. The source of the menu items is determined by values in other fields on the form on which the menu appears. See also search menu.

email engine See BMC Remedy Email Engine.

entrySee request.

entry point A link on the home page that users click to start a task (such as creating a request) or to open a console (such as AR System Administration Console). See also entry point guide, form entry point, home page.

entry point guide An entry point that starts a guide so that a user can complete a task. See also entry point, form entry point, home page.

escalation A workflow component that searches at specified times or intervals for requests matching certain criteria and that performs specified operations on the matching requests. Escalations are generally used to find records that have violated business rules or processes and then to take the appropriate action. They run on the AR System server.

event An occurrence in AR System that can trigger other events or workflow. Examples include user interactions with a form (such as opening windows, tabbing from field to field, switching row focus, and so on), state transitions of requests, or any condition that arises while a request is manipulated.

explicit group A group to which users are assigned or that is computed from other groups, such as Administrator and Customize. See also computed group, group, implicit group.

76 Concepts Guide

Glossary

export 1. The BMC Remedy Developer Studio command that writes definitions of objects—such as forms, filters, active links, and mail templates—to a file. 2. To write object definitions to a file by using BMC Remedy Developer Studio or the export command-line interface. 3. To write data entries to a file by using the reporting feature in BMC Remedy User. See also import.

field The main component of an AR System form. AR System field types include data, table, panel, active link control (buttons, menu items, and toolbar buttons), attachment pool, view, and trim.

field ID An integer that identifies a field throughout AR System. Every field in a form must have a field ID that is unique in that form. Field IDs can be assigned manually by AR System developers or automatically by AR System. After a field ID is assigned, it cannot be changed.

field label A name that describes a field’s purpose. Intended to be displayed to users.

field name A unique character identifier assigned to each field. The name can be changed at any time as long as the new name is unique.

file menu A menu with items retrieved from a text file containing a formatted character menu.

filter A workflow component that tests every server transaction for certain conditions and responds to the conditions by taking specific actions. Filters are generally used to check and enforce business rules and processes. They run on the AR System server.

filter API An AR System plug-in API that enables in-line access during filter and escalation processing to extended servers. See also plug-in.

filter guide An ordered sequence of filters that accomplishes a specific operation. Filter guides can be used as a subroutine to accomplish common tasks. See also active link guide, filter.

fixed license A license permanently assigned to a user, enabling the user to access the licensed feature at any time. See also floating license, write license.

floating license A license temporarily allocated to a user who requests a license and who is designated as a floating license user. If no floating license is available at the time of the user request, the user must wait until one becomes available. See also fixed license, write license.

form A collection of fields that represents a request in AR System. AR System developers can define and change the fields and workflow associated with a form. An AR System application can include many forms. In AR System APIs, forms are called schemas. See also request.

form action field One of a set of special fields that perform predefined operations in browsers for Web-based applications. The fields include Submit, Query, Modify, and the Search Bar.

form entry point An entry point that opens a form in a particular mode, such as Search or New, so that a user can complete a task. See also entry point, entry point guide, home page.

form view The screen layout for a form that appears in the Details pane of a browser or BMC Remedy User. AR System developers can create and name multiple form views, which can be further modified by users in the Customize group. Developers can include or hide different fields in various form views, and they can create form views for particular locales or user roles.

Glossary 77


FTSSee full text search (FTS).

full text search (FTS)A search mechanism that is typically much faster than the native database searching functionality for searching in long text fields. It is also the only method available in AR System for searching text within documents attached to requests.

function A named procedure that performs a distinct operation in AR System. The AR System C API has a set of functions used to accomplish AR System tasks. Additionally, AR System contains table functions that you can use in workflow to perform mathematical operations on table data.

functional currency typeAn alternative currency type to which the value in a currency field is converted. Values for functional currencies are calculated according to currency conversion ratios maintained in a form on the server. Functional currency values are stored as part of the data in the currency field. Users can search for and view them. Workflow can access them. See also currency data type, allowable currency type.

global field A display-only field whose value is the same across all forms that contain the field as long as the user is logged in. See also window-scoped global field.

group A category in AR System used to define user access to form fields and functions. AR System defines several special groups: Public, Administrator, Sub Administrator, Customize, Submitter, Assignee, and Assignee Group. You can define additional groups through the Group form. See also access control, explicit group, implicit group, computed group, dynamic group, permission, role, user.

Group form The form in which you can create, modify, and delete explicit groups and assign floating licenses to them. See also explicit group, license.

guest user Unregistered user with a limited set of capabilities (can submit and possibly review requests). An administrator can specify whether unregistered users are allowed at your site.

GUID field A field that is automatically populated with a globally unique identifier (GUID) when a request is saved.

guideSee active link guide and filter guide.

hidden field A field on a form that is not visible to a user.

home page A form that lists entry points. The entry points are displayed in an application list field. In BMC Remedy User, the home page form can be configured to open on user login by default. In browsers, users enter or click a link to a home page URL. See also entry point, application list field, entry point guide, form entry point.

image objectAn image stored in the AR System database along with information defining the image as an AR System object. If you use the same image in more than one location, such as the background for a related set of forms, you store the image once as an image object and then include it by reference in form view and field display properties.

implicit group A group to which users are automatically assigned according to the contents of certain fields in a request, such as Submitter and Assignee. See also dynamic group, explicit group, group.

78 Concepts Guide

Glossary

import 1. The BMC Remedy Developer Studio command that transfers object definitions from an export file to the current server. 2. The BMC Remedy Data Import command that transfers one or more data entries from an archive file to a form. See also export.

independent copy In a distributed environment, a modifiable copy of a request that is not part of the active ownership chain. See also date data type, ownership chain, distributed server.

integer data type The data type used for fields that contain numeric values from –2147483647 to 2147483647. The range for a field can be limited by an AR System developer.

join form A type of form that contains information from two or more AR System forms. Although join forms function similarly to regular forms, they do not store data. A join form references data stored in the forms used to create the join form.

keyword A variable whose value is defined by AR System. For example, $USER$ represents the name of the user currently logged in. Keywords can be used in qualifications for searches, search menus, workflow, and macros or to specify a value in the Set Fields action for active links, filters, and escalations.

license See fixed license, floating license, read license, restricted read license, write license.

local application An application that uses permissions based on groups and that is intended for use on a limited number of servers. See also application, deployable application, role.

macro A set of operations in BMC Remedy User recorded for later execution. Macros are useful for automating frequently used or complex operations.

macro bar The row of buttons below the menu bar in BMC Remedy User that provides easy access to commonly used macro commands. Macro commands are also available from the Tools menu.

mail template A template used to submit a request by email. The export command can be used to generate templates from an existing form.

main form A form that users interact with directly. An application can have more than one main form. Main forms are sometimes called primary forms or consoles.

main window The BMC Remedy User window that displays a form in the Details pane and, optionally, the results of a search in the Results pane and prompt text in the prompt bar. The main window includes a menu bar and optional status bar, toolbar, and macro bar.

mapping The parameters for a particular distributed operation, such as To and From servers and forms, data control issues, and field-to-field mapping definitions. See Distributed Server Option (DSO).

mapping history A history tracking record created when a distributed operation occurs. This record includes the date and time of transfer, source request ID, source form, source server, and the mapping name.

master copy The copy of a distributed request that currently has ownership.

master flag A Yes/No flag indicating whether a distributed request is the master (has ownership).

Glossary 79


mid tier A component of AR System consisting of add-in services that communicate between AR System servers and various clients. BMC Remedy User can communicate directly with AR System servers. Browsers, however, must use the mid tier to communicate with AR System servers.

navigation fieldA field that enables users to navigate through screens in an application quickly and easily.

notification A message to a user from workflow. Notifications can be sent by various mechanisms, including alerts and email. See also alert, email engine.

object modification logA feature of the AR System server that logs all changes made to an object and that can save a copy of an object in a definition (.def) file each time that the object is changed.

object reservationA feature of the AR System server and BMC Remedy Developer Studio used to prevent others from modifying objects that are in use.

ODBCSee AR System ODBC driver.

operator A function that is used to define advanced searches or to build qualifications.

ownershipIn a distributed environment, the ability to update copies of a request that are in the ownership chain. Ownership can be transferred from the original request to a copy, and ownership can be returned. See also distributed server.

ownership chain In a distributed environment, a series of requests representing a history of transfers from a master copy of an original request and updates to the original request. See also date data type, independent copy, distributed server.

packing list A set of associated server objects that can be viewed as a work space in the server window or used in external utilities.

page field See panel field.

panel field A type of field that acts as a container in which related fields can be grouped. A panel field can stand alone or be managed by a panel holder field. In previous releases, called a page field. See also panel holder field.

panel holder field A field that contains one or more panel fields. Panel holders enable groups of fields to be organized and displayed in the same area of a form. They manage various panel layouts, including tabbed, collapsible, splitter, and accordion. See also panel field.

pending operation A distributed operation waiting to be performed. Pending operations typically occur because a specified transfer interval has not yet been met or because network or server-related problems exist in the distributed environment. See also Distributed Server Option (DSO).

permission The property setting that controls who can view and change individual fields on a form and who can access certain types of objects, including active links, active link guides, and applications. See also access control, group, role, user.

plug-in An auxiliary program that works with the AR System server to enhance its capabilities. A plug-in is a dynamically linked library (DLL) on Microsoft platforms, a shared library on UNIX platforms, or a Java archive (JAR) on all platforms. The plug-in server loads plug-ins at run time.

80 Concepts Guide

Glossary

plug-in server A server that loads and executes plug-ins. The plug-in server is a companion to the AR System server. It loads the ARDBC, AREA, or filter API plug-ins at run time.

poolsSee distributed pools.

preference server An AR System server that stores user preferences centrally in the AR System User Preference form.

prompt bar The part of the main window in BMC Remedy User that displays instructions or useful information about the form it is attached to.

Public group One of several special access control groups that AR System provides. Every user is automatically a member of this group.

qualification A filter or search criterion including field references, values, and arithmetical and relational operators used to determine how to process a request or to find a set of data.

query-by-example (QBE) A method for visually describing a database search. An empty form is displayed, and the search conditions are entered in their respective fields. AR System turns the visual query into the command language, such as SQL, required to query the database.

read license A license that allows users to search AR System forms and to submit requests but not to modify requests. See also restricted read license, write license.

real data type The data type used for fields that contain floating-point numbers. The range and precision can be set by AR System developers.

regular form A form used to manipulate and display data. Regular forms and their contents are stored in database tables created, owned, and managed by the AR System server.

request A collection of information that describes something, such as a user, a problem, or a service. When a form is filled in and submitted to AR System, the system creates a request. A request is equivalent to a record in the database. In AR System APIs, requests are called entries. See also form.

request ID A unique identifier generated by AR System for each request. See also Request ID field.

Request ID field A core field on a form that contains the request ID. In join form entries, the Request ID field contains the request ID for each of the underlying forms, separated by a vertical bar.

reserved field A data field that has a predefined special purpose in AR System. If you add a reserved field to a form, the field retains its special behavior and use.

restricted read license A license that allows users to search AR System forms and submit requests but does not allow users to modify requests under any condition. It does, however, allow the same login to access AR System from multiple computers simultaneously. See also read license.

results list A list of requests that match a search. Multiple rows (or requests) in the results list that meet specified criteria can be selected for further processing.

Results pane The part of the form window in a browser or in BMC Remedy User that displays the results of a search.

returnSee distributed return.

return mapping In a distributed environment, the field-to-field mappings used when a request is returned. See also Distributed Server Option (DSO).

Glossary 81


role In a deployable application, a configuration that defines access to form fields and server objects. Roles are defined in the Role Mapping form and then mapped to groups on the server on which the application is installed. Different groups can be mapped to the same role for each development state of the application. See also access control, application state, deployable application, group, permission, Roles form, user.

Roles form The form in which roles are created and mapped to groups for each application state. See also application state, group, role.

schema See form.

search The process by which users display a subset of requests according to search criteria that they define.

search menu A menu whose items are based on data retrieved from a search of an AR System form. See also dynamic menu.

Section 508 A law that requires U.S. federal agencies’ electronic and information technology to be accessible to people with disabilities (visual, motor, and auditory impairments).

selection data type The data type used for fields with a set of mutually exclusive options. Multiple options are displayed as option (radio) buttons or as a list. A single option can be displayed as a check box.

selection list A list that appears when an active link performs a search that returns more than one request.

serverSee AR System server, BMC Remedy Approval Server, distributed server, plug-in server, preference server.

server group A group of AR System servers configured to share the same database. See also AR System server.

server tier The architectural level consisting of the AR System server that controls access to the data and any supporting services called or used by the AR System server.

Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP) The primary transport protocol for messages shared by applications in web services. SOAP is an XML-based packaging format for the transferred information. It contains a set of rules for translating applications and platform-specific data types into XML.

SQL menu A menu whose items are based on data retrieved from a direct SQL command to a SQL database.

status bar The part of a main window in an AR System client that displays instructions or useful information to the user.

Status field The core field in which AR System tracks the various stages of the resolution process for a request.

status history A field that displays information about the progress of a request.

subadministrator A member of the Sub Administrator group.

Sub Administrator group One of several special access control groups that AR System provides. Members of this group have limited administrative access to AR System as defined by an administrator. See also Administrator group, explicit group.

82 Concepts Guide

Glossary

Submitter group One of several special access control groups that AR System provides. The user whose name is in the Submitter field on a request automatically belongs to this implicit group for that request. See also Assignee group, Assignee Group group, implicit group.

supporting form A form that supplies information needed by another form. See also main form.

table field A field that displays data from other requests in the current request. A table field can appear in a list view format (with rows and columns), a tree view format, or a cell-based format.

task A shortcut or link created in BMC Remedy User that enables users to quickly open a specific form, search, application, or active link guide.

time data type The data type used for fields containing time values. Time values are stored as the number of seconds from 12:00:00 a.m. See also date/time data type.

toolbar 1. Standard: In BMC Remedy User, the row of buttons below the menu bar that provides easy access to commonly used menu commands. In a browser, toolbar buttons along the top of the form provide the equivalent functionality of menus and toolbars in BMC Remedy User. 2. Form-specific: A separate toolbar with additional icons that can appear on certain forms.

toolbar button An icon for a menu item that triggers an active link. See also button field.

tooltipA brief informational message displayed when a user interacts with an object—such as a table row, attachment, or field label—on the screen. A tooltip is displayed by hovering the mouse over an area on a form or by clicking an object such as a button.

transfer A distributed operation that sends a copy of a request with or without ownership from one server to another.

transfer mapping In a distributed environment, the field-to-field mappings used when a request is sent from one server to another. See also Distributed Server Option (DSO).

transfer mode In a distributed environment, one of four types of transfer mappings that determines whether the copy of the request is sent with ownership and whether the original is deleted. See also Distributed Server Option (DSO).

trim data type The data type of fields that enhance a form’s usability and appearance. Trim includes lines, boxes, text, and URL links. These fields do not contain data.

updateSee distributed update.

user Any person with permission to access AR System. See also access control, group, permission.

user default A value for a field that a user can predefine. A user default overrides an AR System developer default in BMC Remedy User. See also administrator default.

User form The form in which users are added to AR System and in which each user’s group membership, login, and license information are specified.

variable A data element that changes according to conditions.

Glossary 83


vendor form A form used to connect to external data sources—such as text or spreadsheet data residing on local or remote servers—through an ARDBC plug-in. See also AR System database connectivity (ARDBC).

viewSee form view.

view field A field that provides a browser window in a form. Can be used to display a URL, the contents of an attachment, direct HTML text, or content formatted by a template.

view form A form used to connect to database tables not created by AR System.

view user interface (VUI) A structure that contains information about a single form view.

web client A browser communicating with the AR System server through the mid tier.

web serviceAn object that enables messages to be sent to and received from an application over a network (Internet or intranet), using standard Internet technologies. It uses a combination of protocols such as HTTP and XML that are platform independent.

Web Service Description Language (WSDL) An XML-based language used to define web services and how to access them.

wildcardA character that represents other characters in a search. For example, in search statements in character and diary fields, users can specify wildcards to match single characters, strings, or characters in a range or set.

window-scoped global fieldA display-only field whose value remains the same across requests in the same window as long as the window is open. See also global field.

workflow 1. A set of business processes used to run a company. 2. The automation of business processes through actions performed by active links, filters, and escalations.

write license A license that allows a user to modify and save data in existing requests, subject to field and form permission settings. See also fixed license, floating license, read license, restricted read license.

XML Schema or XML Schema Definition (XSD) A means of defining the structure, content, and semantics of XML documents.

84 Concepts Guide

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

Index

Aaccess control

about 47groups, about 48groups, membership 50groups, types 49hierarchical 51licensing and 53multitiered 51permissions, additive 49role-based 50users and 48

actionsabout workflow 38, 39Change Field 39Close Window 39if/else 38, 43, 44Message 39Notify 39Open Window 40Push Fields 40Run Process 40Service 40Set Fields 40

active linksabout 21API calls and 37execution options 41execution order 42guides 38user-controlled execution options 42

adaptability, AR System 13additive permissions 49Administrator access control group 49administrators, responsibilities 23AIE 16Alert List form 15alert list tables 29alerts 15analytics 57animal tracking example application 59

Apache Tomcat 17API calls, workflow and 37application list fields 30application programming interfaces. See APIapplications

about 20, 33animal tracking example 59components 20deployable 33entry points 30forms and 33local 33localizing 33

AR System database connectivity (ARDBC)database servers and 18

architecture, AR System 14ARDBC. See AR System database connectivityasset management products 57Assigned To field 31Assignee access control group 49Assignee Group access control group 49attachment fields 30

BBMC Analytics for BSM 57BMC Atrium applications 57BMC Atrium CMDB 57BMC Atrium Core 57BMC Atrium Integration Engine 16, 57BMC Atrium Orchestrator 58BMC Dashboards for BSM 57BMC Discovery Solution 57BMC Performance Manager 58BMC Product Catalog 57BMC Remedy Alert 15BMC Remedy Asset Management 57BMC Remedy Change Management 57BMC Remedy Data Import 16BMC Remedy Developer Studio 16BMC Remedy Distributed Server Option 19, 56

Index 85


BMC Remedy Encryption Performance 56BMC Remedy Encryption Premium 56BMC Remedy Encryption products 56BMC Remedy Incident Management 57BMC Remedy IT Service Management Suite 57BMC Remedy Knowledge Management 16, 57BMC Remedy Mid Tier. See mid tierBMC Remedy Migrator 16, 56BMC Remedy Problem Management 57BMC Remedy Service Desk 57BMC Remedy User 15BMC Service Impact Manager 58BMC Service Level Management 57BMC Service Request Management 57BMC Software, contacting 2browsers, AR System user interface 15BSM 12, 57, 58Business Service Management 12, 57, 58button fields 30Button/Menu Field execution option 41

Ccell-based tables 29Change Field action 39change management products 57character menus 32client tier, AR System 14client-based workflow 37clients

AR System 15architectural tier 14BMC Atrium Integration Engine 16BMC Remedy Alert 15BMC Remedy Data Import 16BMC Remedy Developer Studio 16BMC Remedy Knowledge Management 16BMC Remedy Migrator 16BMC Remedy User 15browser-based 15developer 16integration 16user 15Windows-based 15

Close Window action 39CMDB 57components

application 20example of how they work 22workflow 36

computed groups 49configuration management database 57

consoles, applications and 33control fields 30control panels 27core AR System 55core fields 31Create Date field 31custom access control groups 49customer support 3Customize access control group 49

Ddashboards 57data

fields 26importing 16tier, AR System 14working with external 18

data dictionary menus 32data fields 29data forms 27data visualization fields 30database servers 18databases

forms in 27platforms for AR System 18

deployable applications 33developer clients 16Developer Studio 16developers, responsibilities of AR System 23dialog boxes 27discovery products 57display-only fields 29display-only forms 27distributed computing environments 19Distributed Server Option 19, 56documentation, AR System 7DSO. See Distributed Server Optiondynamic groups 49

Eelse actions 38, 43, 44encryption

performance 56premium 56standard 56

enginesJavaServer Pages 17JSP 17servlet 17

entry points 30

86 Concepts Guide


environments, computingdistributed 19heterogeneous 19mixed 19

escalationsabout 21execution options 43

events, triggering workflow with 37examples

animal tracking application 59application components at work 22AR System adaptability 13service desk solution 12

execution optionsabout workflow 36, 38, 41active link 41Button/Menu Field 41escalation 43event-triggered 37filter 41Gain Focus 41Hover 41Lose Focus 41Menu Choice 41Modify 41Service 41Submit 41Table Refresh 41time-triggered 37user-controlled 37, 42Window Open 41

execution orderactive link 42filter 42

explicit access control groups 49extending AR System 55external data, working with 18

FFederal Information Processing Standards (FIPS) 56fields

about 26application list 30attachment 30button 30character 32common characteristics 30control 30core 31data 26, 29data visualization 30

fields (continued)database table columns and 27display-only 29label styles 31menu items 30navigation 30panel 30table 29toolbar buttons 30trim 30types 29view 30

file menus 32filters

about 21API calls and 37execution options 41execution order 42guides 38

FIPS 56Fixed licenses 53Floating licenses 53forms

about 20, 26Alert List 15applications and 33consoles 33data 27database tables and 27display-only 27fields 26home pages 30join 27main 33menus 21primary 33regular 27supporting 33types 27vendor 27view 18, 27views 20, 29

foundation products, AR System 56FTS 56Full Text Search 56

Index 87


GGain Focus execution option 41groups

access control 48computed 49dynamic 49explicit 49implicit 49local applications and 33membership in access control 50regular 49server 17

guidesactive link 38filter 38

Hhelp desk products 57heterogeneous computing environments 19hierarchical access control 51home pages 30horizontal navigation fields 30Hover execution options 41

Iif actions 38, 43, 44implicit access control groups 49importing data 16incident management products 57Information Technology Infrastructure Library 12integrating with other products 16, 55ITIL 12ITSM 57

JJavaServer Pages engines 17join forms 27JSP engines 17

Kkeywords 45knowledge management products 16, 57

Llabel styles, field 31Last Modified By field 31licenses

access control and 53Fixed 53Floating 53pools 53Read 53Restricted Read 53

list view tables 29local applications 33locale 33localizing applications 33Lose Focus execution option 41

Mmain forms 33membership, access control group 50Menu Choice execution option 41menu item fields 30menus

about 21, 32character 32data dictionary 32file 32search 32SQL 32

Message action 39mid tier

about 17AR System architecture and 14

Migrator 16mixed computing environments 19Modified Date field 31Modify execution option 41multitiered access control 51

Nnavigation fields 30navigation, consoles and 33Notify action 39

OOpen Window action 40OpenSSL Project 56operating systems, AR System server 17

88 Concepts Guide


Ppanel fields 30performance encryption 56permissions. See access controlpools, license 53predefined access control groups 49premium encryption 56primary forms 33problem management products 57Product Catalog 57product support 3Public access control group 49Push Fields action 40

Qqualifications 44query-by-example (QBE) searches 18

RRead licenses 53records 20, 26regular forms 27regular groups 49Request ID field 31requests

about 20creating 26database table rows and 27

Restricted Read licenses 53results list tables 29roles

access control and 50deployable applications and 33

Run Process action 40

Ssearch menus 32searches

about 18FTS 56query-by-example (QBE) 18

server tier 14server-based workflow 37servers

AR System 17database 18database platforms 18

servers (continued)groups 17operating systems for AR System 17

Service action 40service desks

example solution 12products 57

Service execution option 41service level management products 57service request management products 57servlet engines 17Set Fields action 40Short Description field 31SLM 57solutions 57SQL menus 32SRM 57Standard BMC Remedy Encryption 56Status field 31Status History field 31Sub Administrator access control group 49Submit execution option 41Submitter access control group 49Submitter field 31support, customer 3supporting forms 33

Ttable fields 29Table Refresh execution option 41tables, database 27technical support 3third-party products and AR System 58tiers, AR System architecture 14time, triggering workflow by 37toolbar button fields 30tree view tables 29trim fields 30

Uuser clients 15user interfaces, AR System

browser 15Windows 15

userscontrolling execution options 42

users, access control and 48

Index 89


Vvariables, keyword 45vendor forms 27vertical navigation fields 30view fields 30view forms 18, 27views, form 20, 29

WWindow Open execution option 41Windows, AR System user interface 15workflow

See also actions, execution optionsabout 21, 35actions 38, 39AR System and 36client-based 37components compared 21, 36event-triggered 37execution options 36, 38, 41guides 38server-based 37time-triggered 37

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Documents

BMC Remedy Action Request System 7.5.00 Concepts Guide