WFTK PDM: update: Actually changing procdef versions!

update: Actually changing procdef versions!

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And hey! Here's the code that makes this whole thing an editor! You knew it had to come along some time, right? Like the editor presentation code, the update code looks at a switch parameter to see what it's supposed to be doing. It does what it's supposed to do, then it has to figure out where to send the user in order to support a usable interface. (This is the hardest part of Web app design; the coordination of frames and when to reload things.)

The best mechanism I know of for having one frame reload another in the same frameset is to include a piece of Javascript in the first frame's HTML. This can serve rather well to keep frames in synch while working on complex data structures -- but it only works if you have Javascript available and enabled. But I don't see a more usable way of doing things, so you'll see a lot of little Javascript snippets here and there in this code.

The first thing we're going to do is to check that the current user has the authority to update.

sprintf (sbuf, "%s_%s", xml_attrval (query, "item"), xml_attrval (query, "ver"));
if (!user_perm (current_user, "wftkpdm", sbuf, "edit")) {
   printf ("<h2>No edit authorization</h2><hr>");
   printf ("Sorry, your current user id (%s) doesn't have permission to edit this item version.",
           xml_attrval (current_user, "name"));
   printf ("  You might want to check with the version owner or with an administrator if you think that this is in error.");
   exit (0);
}

So OK, we're authorized to make changes to the version if we've gotten this far. Let's go ahead and load the version file and mark it as dirty so that it'll be saved after we make our changes.

sprintf (version_file, "%s%s_%s.xml", PROCESS_DEFINITION_REPOSITORY, xml_attrval (query, "item"), xml_attrval (query, "ver"));
file = fopen (version_file, "r");
if (!file) {
   sprintf (sbuf, "Unable to open procdef version file %s.\n", sbuf);
   complain();
}
version = xml_read (file);
fclose (file);
version_dirty = 1;

Now let's go ahead and display a heading in case this is being viewed outside a frame or something weird like that, and switch off to the various action handling code.

printf ("Content-type: text/html\n\n");
printf ("<html><head><title>wftk update - %s</title><LINK href=\"pdm.css\" rel=\"stylesheet\" type=\"text/css\"></head>\n", xml_attrval (version, "name"));
printf ("<body bgcolor=\"ffffff\">\n");

if (!strcmp ("updatedescription", xml_attrval (query, "action"))) {
   See Updating descriptions
} else if (!strcmp ("moveup", xml_attrval (query, "action"))) {
   See Moving things up in lists
} else if (!strcmp ("movedn", xml_attrval (query, "action"))) {
   See Moving things down in lists
} else if (!strcmp ("role", xml_attrval (query, "action"))) {
   See Adding and modifying roles
} else if (!strcmp ("data", xml_attrval (query, "action"))) {
   See Adding and modifying data items
} else if (!strcmp ("task", xml_attrval (query, "action"))) {
   See Adding and modifying tasks
} else if (!strcmp ("if", xml_attrval (query, "action"))) {
   See Adding and modifying decisions
} else if (!strcmp ("alert", xml_attrval (query, "action"))) {
   See Adding and modifying alerts
} else if (!strcmp ("handle", xml_attrval (query, "action"))) {
   See Adding and modifying situation handlers
} else if (!strcmp ("sequence", xml_attrval (query, "action"))) {
   See Adding and modifying sequences
} else if (!strcmp ("parallel", xml_attrval (query, "action"))) {
   See Adding and modifying parallels
} else if (!strcmp ("delete", xml_attrval (query, "action"))) {
   See Deleting pieces
}
printf ("</body></html>\n\n");

Updating descriptions
As described above in the editor presentation, there are four places where description info is stashed in a workflow item. The first is the name of the item, so I'm going to handle that quickly. We've got "title", "description", "instancetitle", and "instancedescription" coming in.

updated_flag = 0;
if (strcmp (xml_attrval (version, "name"), xml_attrval (query, "title"))) {
   xml_set (version, "name", xml_attrval (query, "title"));
   if (!updated_flag) {
      printf ("<h2>Description updated</h2><hr><ul>\n");
   }
   printf ("<li> Title was changed to '%s'\n", xml_attrval (query, "title"));
   updated_flag = 1;
}

After the update has been made, we need to reload the overview form; otherwise I guess displaying an acknowledgement will suffice.

if (!updated_flag) {
   printf ("<h2>Description not updated</h2><hr>\n");
   printf ("No update was necessary.\n");
} else {
   printf ("</ul>\n");
   printf ("<script>parent.frames[0].location = parent.frames[0].location.href;</script>\n");
}

Moving things up in lists

Moving things down in lists

Adding and modifying roles
Roles are only found at the top level, so they have special handling. Actually, I think that each separate type of element will end up with special handling. We'll see. At any rate, I don't simply want to append roles onto the end of the workflow list; I want to have all the roles right up at the top. The easy way out is just to prepend new roles, and I suppose that's what I'll do for now.

See Finding pieces of the item to update
if (add_flag) xml = xml_create ("role");

xml_set (xml, "name", xml_attrval (query, "name"));
xml_set (xml, "local", xml_attrval (query, "local"));
if (!add_flag) {
   while (holder = xml_first (xml)) xml_delete (holder);
}
xml_append (xml, xml_createtext (xml_attrval (query, "content")));

if (add_flag) xml_prepend (version, xml);

printf ("<h2>Role %s %s</h2><hr>\n", xml_attrval (xml, "name"), add_flag ? "added" : "modified");
printf ("The version has been updated.\n");
printf ("<script>parent.frames[0].location = parent.frames[0].location.href;</script>\n");

Adding and modifying data items
Data items (and data manipulation actions, which are also data elements) may appear basically anywhere in the workflow. I fear that my data item editor is too simple, but until I have the prototype finished I don't want to sit down and really think it through.

The attribute initial="yes" denotes a required startup data item.

See Finding pieces of the item to update
if (add_flag) xml = xml_create ("data");

xml_set (xml, "name", xml_attrval (query, "name"));
xml_set (xml, "type", xml_attrval (query, "type"));
if (strcmp ("", xml_attrval (query, "initial"))) {
   xml_set (xml, "initial", xml_attrval (query, "initial"));
}
if (!strcmp ("", xml_attrval (query, "mode"))) {
   xml_set (xml, "mode", xml_attrval (query, "mode"));
}

if (!add_flag) {
   while (holder = xml_first (xml)) xml_delete (holder);
}
if (strcmp ("", xml_attrval (query, "content")))
   xml_append (xml, xml_createtext (xml_attrval (query, "content")));

if (add_flag) xml_append (parent, xml);

If we just added a non-local data item to a subelement of the workflow (i.e. not top-level) then we need to ensure that the same-named top-level data item does indeed exist.

if (add_flag && strcmp (parent->name, "workflow") && strcmp (xml_attrval (xml, "mode"), "local")) {
   sprintf (sbuf, "workflow.data[%s]", xml_attrval (query, "name"));
   holder = xml_loc (version, sbuf);
   if (!holder) {
      xml = xml_create ("data");
      xml_set (xml, "name", xml_attrval (query, "name"));
      xml_set (xml, "type", xml_attrval (query, "type"));
      if (strcmp ("", xml_attrval (query, "content"))) 
         xml_append (xml, xml_createtext (xml_attrval (query, "content")));
      xml_append (version, xml);
   }
}

And of course, finally we have to notify the user that the change succeeded.

printf ("<h2>Data item %s %s</h2><hr>\n", xml_attrval (xml, "name"), add_flag ? "added" : "modified");
printf ("The version has been updated.\n");
printf ("<script>parent.frames[0].location = parent.frames[0].location.href;</script>\n");

Adding and modifying tasks
Tasks consist of two parts: there is a form editor for the name and role of the task, but there is also a list of data items gathered during the task. The list is handled separately; this segment of the update is only concerned with the task attributes themselves.

See Finding pieces of the item to update
if (add_flag) xml = xml_create ("task");

xml_set (xml, "label", xml_attrval (query, "label"));
xml_set (xml, "role", xml_attrval (query, "role"));

if (add_flag) xml_append (parent, xml);

printf ("<h2>Task %s %s</h2><hr>\n", xml_attrval (xml, "label"), add_flag ? "added" : "modified");
printf ("The version has been updated.\n");
printf ("<script>parent.frames[0].location = parent.frames[0].location.href;</script>\n");

Adding and modifying decisions
Like tasks, decisions are two-part items. Like the task updater, the decision updater only fields changes from the form (i.e. the expression to be evaluated.)

See Finding pieces of the item to update
if (add_flag) xml = xml_create ("if");

xml_set (xml, "if", xml_attrval (query, "if"));

if (add_flag) xml_append (parent, xml);

printf ("<h2>Decision %s</h2><hr>\n", add_flag ? "added" : "modified");
printf ("The version has been updated.\n");
printf ("<script>parent.frames[0].location = parent.frames[0].location.href;</script>\n");

Adding and modifying alerts
Alerts are just like data items: some attributes and then the content is just handled as text.

See Finding pieces of the item to update
if (add_flag) xml = xml_create ("alert");

xml_set (xml, "type", xml_attrval (query, "type"));
xml_set (xml, "to", xml_attrval (query, "to"));
if (!add_flag) {
   while (holder = xml_first (xml)) xml_delete (holder);
}
xml_append (xml, xml_createtext (xml_attrval (query, "content")));

if (add_flag) xml_append (parent, xml);

printf ("<h2>Alert %s</h2><hr>\n", add_flag ? "added" : "modified");
printf ("The version has been updated.\n");
printf ("<script>parent.frames[0].location = parent.frames[0].location.href;</script>\n");

Adding and modifying situation handlers
Situation handlers have a form editor for the name of the situation they handle.

See Finding pieces of the item to update
if (add_flag) xml = xml_create ("handle");

xml_set (xml, "situation", xml_attrval (query, "situation"));

if (add_flag) xml_append (parent, xml);

printf ("<h2>Handler for %s %s</h2><hr>\n", xml_attrval (xml, "situation"), add_flag ? "added" : "modified");
printf ("The version has been updated.\n");
printf ("<script>parent.frames[0].location = parent.frames[0].location.href;</script>\n");

Adding and modifying sequences
The basic sequence is undecorated, but a loop is marked by having repeat="yes" and an optional index variable which will contain the number of times the loop has already been executed. Remember that loops are terminated by situations, and you can't go wrong.

Actually, it's rather fortunate that there is some attribute for sequences and parallels, otherwise the UI for adding them would have been ugly. (And actually, I was going to cut a corner on the UI for adding them until I realized that that would have been even uglier...)

See Finding pieces of the item to update
if (add_flag) xml = xml_create ("sequence");

xml_set (xml, "repeat", xml_attrval (query, "repeat"));
xml_set (xml, "index", xml_attrval (query, "index"));

if (add_flag) xml_append (parent, xml);

printf ("<h2>Sequence %s</h2><hr>\n", add_flag ? "added" : "modified");
printf ("The version has been updated.\n");
printf ("<script>parent.frames[0].location = parent.frames[0].location.href;</script>\n");

Adding and modifying parallels
And of course the parallel block, as in all other respects, is handled identically to sequences.

See Finding pieces of the item to update
if (add_flag) xml = xml_create ("parallel");

xml_set (xml, "repeat", xml_attrval (query, "repeat"));
xml_set (xml, "index", xml_attrval (query, "index"));

if (add_flag) xml_append (parent, xml);

printf ("<h2>Parallel %s</h2><hr>\n", add_flag ? "added" : "modified");
printf ("The version has been updated.\n");
printf ("<script>parent.frames[0].location = parent.frames[0].location.href;</script>\n");

Deleting pieces
Actually, deletions are pretty simple.

See Finding pieces of the item to update
if (add_flag) {
   printf ("<h2>Huh?</h2><hr>Trying to delete without a location doesn't even make sense.\n");
   exit(0);
}

xml_delete (xml);

printf ("<h2>Delete complete</h2><hr>\n");
printf ("The version has been updated.\n");
printf ("<script>parent.frames[0].location = parent.frames[0].location.href;</script>\n");

Finding pieces of the item to update
This differs slightly from its edit presentation counterpart. The location, if given (for modification) ends up in xml, just as with editing, but if the parent location is given instead, then it is preserved, and is passed in parent. No dummy XML is needed to fool the form builder, so it's not created.

if (strcmp ("", xml_attrval (query, "loc"))) {
   xml = xml_loc (version, xml_attrval (query, "loc"));
   if (!xml || xml == version) {
      sprintf (sbuf, "The location %s doesn't exist in this item.", xml_attrval (query, "loc"));
      complain ();
   }
   add_flag = 0;
} else {
   parent = xml_loc (version, xml_attrval (query, "parentloc"));
   if (!parent) {
      sprintf (sbuf, "The parent location %s doesn't exist in this item.", xml_attrval (query, "parentloc"));
      complain();
   }
   add_flag = 1;
}

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This code and documentation are released under the terms of the GNU license. They are additionally copyright (c) 2000, Vivtek. All rights reserved except those explicitly granted under the terms of the GNU license.