This topic applies only to the IBM Business Automation Workflow Advanced
configuration.

Substitution for absentees

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This topic only applies to BAW, and is located in the BAW repository. Last updated on 2025-03-13 12:15

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The substitution feature allows you to specify absence settings either for yourself, or for members of the group that you administer. A substitution policy defines how to deal with tasks and escalations that are assigned to absent users.

A substitution policy defines how to deal with tasks and escalations that are assigned to absent users and is defined when the task template is modeled. The same policy is applied for all of the task roles that are associated with a task template. After the task template is deployed, you cannot change the policy.

If a user is absent, the substitution policy is applied to the results of the people resolution to determine who receives the work items instead of the absent user. It is applied only to task roles that have people assignment criteria. This means that task originators, starters, or owners are not subject to substitution. Similarly, substitution is refreshed if the people assignment criteria get refreshed.

To limit the substitution in time, you can specify a start and end point. If only a start point is specified, then the user will be considered to be absent from the specified starting point.

Depending on the specific substitution policy, the following actions are applied:

No substitution (default)

The set of users remains unchanged

Replace absent users with their substitutes

For every user that is present, the user itself is used.
For every user that is absent, the first substitute that is present is used.
If none of the users and none of their substitutes are present, then the default people assignment rules apply.

Prefer present users

For every user that is present, the user is used.
Substitutes are not taken into account.
If none of the users is present, then the original set of users is used, that is, the fact that they are absent is disregarded.

The substitution feature can be used in conjunction with the virtual member manager (VMM) people directory provider. If an attempt is made to deploy a task template with a non-default substitution policy, while specifying a people directory provider other than VMM, the deployment attempt will be rejected.

Note: VMM is the repository implementation provided by the WebSphere® Application Server for its security realm 'Federated Repositories'. This security realm has to be configured in WebSphere Application Server in order to make VMM available for the substitution feature.

As substitution is a processing step after people resolution, it exhibits the same lifecycle as people resolution itself. For a given task role (for example, Potential Owners), it is carried out, if a People Assignment Criterion is associated with that role. Similarly, it is refreshed if the People Assignment Criteria itself gets refreshed.