Developing a Java Step Processor

Here are the main prerequisites for developing a Java step processor:

A basic understanding of Process applications (see Introduction to Process Applications)
Familiarity with the Process Java™ APIs (see Process API Class Calling Sequences).
Completed your Content Cortex Platform installation.
Configured your Process development environment.
Set the web application services.
Created and initialized an isolated region for development. For more information, see Initializing an isolated region.
Created a workflow definition (by using the Process Designer) that contains the step for which this Step Processor application is intended.

Planning and Design Checkpoints

Decide upon the following items for the step processor:
- Your approach to the user interface
- The related business processes
- How it fits into the workflow definition
- The operations to be performed for this step
See Developing Step Processors and Fundamental Step Processor Operations.
Determine whether to deploy the Step Processor as a Java application or applet.
Decide whether to modify the supplied sample Java Step Processor, or build your own custom Step Processor. See Building a Java Step Processor with the Java Step Processor UI Toolkit.

To modify and deploy the supplied sample Java Step Processor:

To verify that the supplied samples work correctly in your development environment, compile and run MainSample and the sample classes that are called. These classes include the sample Java Step Processor, the Launch Step Processor, or both. See MainSample.
Customize the sample Java Step Processor.
Complete the Java Step Processor.

To build your own Java Step Processor:

Use standard Swing or AWT, or the Java Step Processor UI Toolkit. If you use the Java Step Processor UI Toolkit, add the vwpanel.jar file (supplied with the Process development environment) to your IDE pane container.
When a workflow user opens a step assignment that references a Step Processor, a window that contains the Step Processor user interface is displayed. For information about the algorithm that is used to determine which application to select for this step, see Opening Step Processors.
Create the Step Processor class. Use the Process Java API to:
- Log in to the Content Platform Engine server and establish a workflow system session.
- Query User and Work queues for work items (such as Step Elements).
- Lock retrieved objects.
- Update workflow data.
- Complete the step.

Use the Process Java API to integrate with the Content Platform Engine. Your options depend on whether you use an IDE:

IDE	You can use the VWTabbedPanel control and the VWAttachmentPanel beans (included with vwpanel.jar) to access attachments stored in object or file stores.
Otherwise	You can use the VWAttachmentPanel bean in a manner similar to that bean used with the Java Step Processor UI Toolkit to access attachments. For more information, see Working with the VWAttachmentPanel.

Completing your Java Step Processor development is the same regardless or whether you modify the sample or build your own: