Processing windows and extending the business day
Processing windows allow a user to control the delivery times for incoming transactions based on the time that they are received. The user can also extend or shorten a business day for either an entire processing window or for a specific participant.
Processing windows are created and modified using the processing windows page. As transactions arrive, Business Rules assigns processing windows to the incoming transactions. Distribution then uses the cut-off times that are configured for the processing window to decide when to release an outbound transmission that contains the transactions that are assigned to the processing window. An outbound transmission for a processing window is released when all of the checks indicate the window can close.
The expected transmissions are configured by using the expected transmissions participant directory preference page for the specific participant. See Participant directory preference tree for more information about the participant preference pages.
Extending or shortening the business day
After a business day has been activated, it can be extended or shortened by updating its active processing windows. Use the processing window activities page to update the cut-off times for an active processing window. Updating the cut-off times allows a user to either extend or reduce the amount of time that is allowed for incoming work to be assigned to a particular processing window.
The changes to the cut-off times can either apply to all work for a given processing window or be limited to work that originates from a specific participant. To limit the change to a specific participant for the active processing window, create a participant window override for that participant. For more information, see Processing Window Activities page or Processing Window Activities details page.
Implementation
When a business day is activated, the processing windows that have business day categories that match the business day are used to create processing window activity records. The values from the processing window definitions are used to create the new processing window activities. In addition, for each processing window activity record that has not been extended indefinitely, a separate delivery window cutoff task is created and scheduled.
When a business day record is removed from the database, the processing window activity records that have the same business day identifier as the business day record are also removed. If the Transaction Server scheduler has a purge event configured for Distribution, the delivery window cutoff tasks are halted when the business day that they are associated with is purged.
The following topics provide more information about how Distribution builds and releases outbound transmissions for the active processing windows.