Enabling email for Process Portal notifications

Process Portal users can set their preferences to receive an email notification when a new task is assigned to them. The configuration works for all types of email. To use this capability, you must enable the email environment to send notifications.

Before you begin

Important: The following information applies to both Heritage Process Portal (deprecated) and Process Portal.

Verify that the following components are stopped:

Process Center server
Process Server

If Process Portal users are using email with an IBM® Lotus Domino V9 server, they can complete Process Portal tasks directly from their email notifications. To make sure that the integration is set up correctly, complete the following prerequisite tasks:

Configure single sign-on (SSO) with an LTPA token on IBM WebSphere Application Server and IBM Lotus Domino. See the IBM Lotus Domino documentation at Configuring single sign-on with an LTPA token on IBM WebSphere and IBM Lotus Domino platforms.

Make sure that the IBM Lotus Domino server is set up properly by following the steps in the IBM Lotus Domino documentation:

Create an XML file that you import into IBM Lotus Domino as described in Using widgets in iNotes.

Customize the following example:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<webcontextConfiguration version="1.1">
  <palleteItem contributeTabOnStartup="false" contributeToSideshelfOnStartup="false" description="Embedded Experience OpenSocial gadget used to display Coach" hideThumbnail="false" id="1074909581" imageUrl="" providerId="com.ibm.rcp.toolbox.opensocial.provider.internal.OpenSocialPalleteProvider" singletonSidebar="false" title="BPM Coach EE" url="http://bpm80.swg.usma.ibm.com:9080/ProcessPortal/gadgets/OpenSocial/BPMOpenSocialGadget.xml" viewImageUrl="">
<preferences/>    
<data>
      <object-capabilities url="http://[hostname]:[WC_defaulthost port]/ProcessPortal/gadgets/OpenSocial/BPMOpenSocialGadget.xml">
        <grant-feature id="opensocial-data"/>
        <grant-feature id="opensocial-templates"/>
        <grant-feature id="opensocial-1.0"/>
        <grant-feature id="dynamic-height"/>
        <grant-feature id="embedded-experiences"/>
        <grant-feature id="open-views"/>
        <grant-feature id="settitle"/>
        <grant-feature id="osapi"/>
        <grant-feature id="content-rewrite"/>
        <grant-feature id="embedded-experiences-render"/>
        <grant-feature id="core"/>
      </object-capabilities>
    </data>
  </palleteItem>
</webcontextConfiguration>

Set up Domino Web SSO authentication between the iNotes server and IM server as described in Setting up iNotes with Sametime.
Configure the component as described in Configuring Domino Social Edition Open Social component for iNotes clients.
Complete the configuration as described in Widgets created from an OpenSocial gadget.
Set up SSO in IBM Lotus Notes.
1. Create an account as described in Creating and editing accounts from Notes preferences.
2. Publish the account for all users as described in the Using administrative accounts to manage client plug-ins document in the IBM Domino 9.0 Social Edition Administrator Help.

Perform the actions described in Configuring SSL communication.
Tip: Using the same security protocol for both the IBM BPM server and the email server prevents an issue where Process Portal users see a blank task completion view in email.
Adding the email server to the trusted servers list prevents problems with sizing in Process Portal. See Adding servers to the trusted server list.
The email facility (used for task notification, task assignment, and so on) must be configured to use a local SMTP server that is listening on the default port (25) and does not require authentication. This local SMTP server can then be used to forward emails to any other external SMTP that requires authentication.

About this task

The entries in the email properties section in the 99Local.xml configuration file define the properties for your email environment. Make all required modifications to the 100Custom.xml file.

Important: Do not edit the 99Local.xml file.

Procedure

Open the 99Local.xml file and locate the email properties section.
Open the 100Custom.xml file and copy and paste the email properties section into the 100Custom.xml file.
In the <email> element, insert the values that are appropriate for your environment.
<smtp-server> element

Ensure that the value of this element is a valid SMTP server.

<use-gadget> element

The gadget renders the task completion URL within an email. Ensure that the value of this element is set to true.

<default-from-address> element

Ensure that the value of this element is a valid email address.

<send-external-email> element

If you want notification email to be sent to external email addresses, change the value to true.

<send-email-notifications-to-list> element

By default, separate email is sent to each user that is assigned to the task and is registered for email notifications. To avoid lock time-outs when there are many users registered for notifications, change the value to true so that users receive notification email grouped by locale.

<send-email-notifications-async> element

By default, notification email is sent synchronously with the navigation transaction of the business process definition (BPD). To avoid lock time-outs when there are many users registered for notifications, change the value to true so that notification email is sent asynchronously in a separate thread.

The following example shows the values that you set for the <email> element in the 100Custom.xml file.
```
<server merge="mergeChildren">
	<email merge="mergeChildren">
		
		<smtp-server merge="replace">smtp.example.com</smtp-server>
     <mail-template>
        <use-gadget>true<use-gadget>        
     </mail-template> 
		<valid-from-required merge="replace">true</valid-from-required>
		<default-from-address merge="replace">username@example.com</default-from-address>
		<send-external-email merge="replace">true</send-external-email>
		<send-email-notifications-to-list merge="replace">false</send-email-notifications-to-list>
		<send-email-notifications-async merge="replace">false</send-email-notifications-async>
	</email>
</server>
```
Save your changes.
Optional: If you want to force URLs that are included in emails to go through a network router, see the following scenario keys in Configuring endpoints to match your topology.
- SERVER_EMAIL_GADGET_LINK
- SERVER_EMAIL_PORTAL_LINK
- SERVER_EMAIL_PORTAL_PROCESS_INFO_LINK
- SERVER_EMAIL_PORTAL_RUN_TASK_LINK
- SERVER_EMAIL_TEMPLATE_CLIENT_LINK
Start the Process Center server and Process Server.

What to do next

So that process participants receive email notifications, ask them to update their user preferences.