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Create process variables

In this lesson, you create the process variables to implement the gateway logic.

About this task

To implement the two gateways in the Standard HR Open New Position business process definition (BPD), you need two private variables:
  • requisition
  • currentPosition

You select private variables because these variables are used only by this BPD and possibly passed to linked BPDs. Then you assign a variable type called placeholder to each of them. The placeholder is a temporary variable type. When you implement the process, you associate the variables requisition and currentPosition with business objects that you will create.

When you create variables, follow these guidelines:
  • Create variable names that begin with a lowercase letter.
  • Capitalize the first letter of a variable type.
  • If the variable name is only one word, spell that word in all lowercase letters.
  • If the variable name consists of more than one word, capitalize the first letter of each subsequent word.
  • Remember that variable names are case sensitive.
This lesson uses the following concepts:
Concept Description
variables Data that provides the business context to a running process. Using variables, the business process passes data from one step to another. Private, input, and output are kinds of variables.
private variables Values that the current BPD or service requires.
input variables Values that pass into the current BPD or service.
output variables Values that are passed from a BPD to a parent BPD or service.

Procedure

Create the variables:

  1. Click the Variables tab in the main canvas of the Standard HR Open New Position process.
    This image shows the Variables page.
  2. In the Variables section, click Add Private and type currentPosition for the name.
  3. In the Details section, click New and type Placeholder for the business object.
    This image shows the placeholder business object window.
  4. Click the back arrow to return to the Standard HR Open New Position process.
  5. Click Add Private and type requisition for the name.
  6. In the Details section, click Select to select the Placeholder for the variable type. Your private variables match the following image:
    This image shows the Variables page with the requisition variable selected showing the Placeholder variable type.
  7. Save your work.
  8. Click the Diagram tab in the main canvas of the Standard HR Open New Position process to return to the model.

Lesson checkpoint

You added process variables to the Standard HR Open New Position BPD.

In this lesson, you learned
  • How to add private variables to a BPD
  • How to create a simple placeholder variable type

In the next lesson, you conduct Playback Zero.

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