Thank you for your response!

> >
> > I see. Does it mean I can plug in the admin interface provided by
> ruote-kit
> > in my web application?
>
> Yes.
>
> You can, for example, add this to your config/routes.rb:
>
> ---8<---
>  # routes to RuoteKit
>  match '/_ruote' => RuoteKit::Application
>  match '/_ruote/*path' => RuoteKit::Application
> --->8--
>

Got it. And since RouteKit is a Rack application, it can take it from
there. Makes sense.

>
> > Can I configure views so that there is a consistency
> > across the app?
>
> Yes, it's doable, it's Haml + CSS (and Ruby).
>

OK.

>
> Generally people use ruote-kit's interface as a special admin only zone.
> When
> they want to integrate in their core webapp, they look at ruote-kit for
> inspiration and build their own views and controllers.
>
> I guess I will need to do something similar.

>
> > Yeah, trying to understand the choices that I should make. I do need to
> > give (some of) my users an ability to modify process definitions, so an
> > admin interface is required, I believe.
>
> Do you mean "modify process instances"? If you need to modify process
> definitions, only a text editor is required.
>

Well, I meant process definitions. And that is the confusion I have. My
understanding with dynamic workflow was that it is a process that is not
fully determined at the time of initial creation and instead is defined (at
least partially) at run-time. For instance, the user who created the
process determines next steps after a checkpointing step has been reached.
And it is this user who I termed as process administrator. I guess my
terminology is wrong. Does such an interpretation of "workflow" make sense?
Or does the process definition have to be usually determined a priori?


> The admin interface is handy for administering the system, not really to
> design process definitions.
>

I see. But since some of my users need to be given a web interface to
create/modify the processes, it is important for me to do more than text
editor?


>
> Maybe you meant modifying process instances and in that case, yes, the
> admin
> interface offered by ruote-kit is handy (for process administrators).
>

Process instances are modified by the actions taken by participants is what
I thought I read, e.g. in the "getting started" example (which I ran), the
state of process instance was modified when :alpha got a message and then
passed it on to :bravo via the workitem. The process definition itself was
fully determined -- a sequence of two participants, :alpha and :bravo.

Am I not understanding it right?

>
>
> > But then, I am assuming that I will
> > do that using ruote abstractions. Additionally, Kenneth's blogpost gave
> me
> > an impression that making a commitment to implementing workflows in your
> > application is a fairly heavy-weight decision and I was not sure if I
> > should do that, given that at least initially, most of the decisions are
> > going to be made by other users logging in to my application (there are
> no
> > multiple applications/services involved). Looks like I have deliberated
> > enough and am leaning toward using ruote.
>
> It's still OK for you to go with simpler abstractions, business objects and
> plain controllers that modify their states, simple business rules and no
> workflow engine problems.
>
> It's true that ruote is heavy-weight. You shouldn't dive directly into
> building something with it. Take the time to do a prototype, then you can
> make the right decision.
>
> I'm not selling anything to you. As a fellow developer, it's my duty to
> tell
> you not to use ruote if it leads to too convoluted a sytem.
>
> That's what I am trying to assess. And though the complexity seems to
increase with the use of ruote, what I am doing seems to be modeled
corrected as a "process" or "business process". And going back and forth
between ruote and state_machine confuses me even further.

To make it somewhat more concrete, what I am trying to do is model a hiring
process. Every company seems to have a process for it (e.g. phone screen(s)
followed by technical interviews followed by HR interview, followed by
background check and a negotiation phase ... and some of these are
optional). Any applicant applying for a job at such a company would need to
pass through this process. The process creator needs to assign actual users
to certain roles (e.g. interviewer), schedule the interviews etc. And this
is a typical process or it may needs to be modified from company to company
(and that's why I need a proper user interface for the users who do that).
My gut tells me that using workflow to model such a situation is the right
way to go.

Would you disagree? Is a state_machine (or a few of them) in a better
position to capture the essence of this?

Regards,
Kedar


> Best regards,
>
> --
> John Mettraux - http://lambda.io/processi
>
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