Configure business process flows

 

Applies To: Dynamics CRM 2013

Business process flows use the same technology as other types of processes. The process to create them is similar, but configuring them is very different.

Create business process flows

Like other processes, business process flows have the following properties in the Create Process dialog:

• Process name
  The name of the process does not need to be unique, but it should be meaningful for people who need to choose a process. You can change this later.

• Category
  This property establishes that this is a business process flow process. You can’t change this after you save the process.

• Entity
  Choose one of the entities from the list of business process–enabled entities. If you don’t find the entity you expect, make sure the entity has the Business process flows (fields will be created) option set in the entity definition. You can’t change this after you save the process.

Note

Business process flows have a simplified way to reuse existing business process flows as an advanced starting point for new business process flows. When you select Business Process Flow as the Category, there is no option available to set the Type value as you can for other types of processes. Instead, when you open an existing business process flow, you will find a Save As button on the command bar. This will create a new business process flow that is the same as the existing one, except that the text (Copy) will be appended to the name.

After you create a new business process flow, the Create Process dialog box will close and you must find the new process in the list and open it.

Edit business process flows

Once you open a business process flow to edit it, you will see the following page:

If you want to rename the process or add a description, you must click or tap the Expand toggle to view these properties.

When you define the logic for a business process flow, you will edit stages and steps, and add additional entities.

• Edit Stages
  Business process flows can have up to 30 stages. To add a stage, click or tap the (+) icon near the Stages column. To remove a stage, select it and click or tap the X icon on the right edge of the stage.

  Stages have a label that you can set. The text of the label is always in upper case.

  Stages also have a Stage Category. This is optional. Stage category is useful for reports that will group records by the stage they are in. The options for the stage category come from the Stage Category global option set. You can add additional options to this global option set and change the labels of existing options if you want. You can also delete these options if you wish, but we recommend that you keep the existing options. You won’t be able to add the exact same option back if you delete it. If you don’t want them to be used, change the label to ”Do not use”.

• Edit Steps
  When you have selected a stage, click or tap the (+) icon near the Steps column to create a new step. To remove a step, select it and click or tap the X icon on the right edge of the step.

  Each step has a label set to New Step when you create it. When you set the field for the step, if you haven’t edited the label, the label for the step will change to match the label for the field. Generally, you want the label for the step to match the label for the field. Once you edit the label, it will not change when you change the field.

• Add Additional entities
  In the Included Entities area, you can select Options to see available options to Add Entity or Close Process Cycle 

  You can add any of the entities that have one-to-many relationships with the entity selected for the process. After you add an entity, you can select any of the entities that have a one-to-many relationship with that entity. You can add up to five entities, but each entity you add can only proceed to one of the entities that have a one-to-many relationship with the previous entity. If an entity doesn’t have any one-to-many relationships, your only option is to close the process cycle.

  Closing the process cycle is always the last stage of the flow. You can close the cycle by using any of the entities in the cycle. This is frequently a step to change the state of the original entity, but you may choose a different entity.

• Remove additional entities
  After you have added an additional entity in Options, you will see a new Deleted Last Entity option. Because each entity you add depends on the previous entity, when there are multiple entities, you need to remove them in the reverse order in which they were added.

To make a business process flow available for people to use, you must order the process flow, enable security roles, and activate it.

• Set Order
  When you have more than one business process flow for an entity, you need to rank the order in which they should be evaluated to be used by default. To open a dialog where you can move business process flows up or down, in the command bar, select Order Process Flow. For new records or records that do not already have a process flow associated with them, the first business process flow that a user has access to is the one that will be used.

• Enable Security Roles
  People will only be able to use business process flows that are associated to security roles that are associated with someone’s user account. By default, only the System Administrator and System Customizer security roles can view a new business process flow. To set these roles, in the command bar, select Enable Security Roles. You can choose either the Enable for Everyone or Enable only for the selected security roles options. If you choose Enable only for the selected security roles, you can select which security roles will allow access to the business process flow.

• Activate
  Before anyone can use the business process flow, you must activate it. In the command bar, select Activate to open the Process Activate Confirmation dialog box. After you confirm the activation, the business process flow is ready to use. If a business process flow has errors, you will not be able to activate it until the errors are corrected.

See Also

Business process flows
Monitor and manage processes

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