Jarvis Pizzeria: Creating a Custom Tasklist

So within Process Cloud Service (PCS) we have already shown the tasklist a couple of times. This is the default tasklist that comes with the product. You can use the left hand side filters and handle the actions in the tasks within the task screens.

However, as with all of the ‘one-size-fits-all’ solutions, the tasklist might not be exactly what you need for your organisation or use-case. In this case it is good to know, that you can create your own custom tasklist.

This compares to what we see at customers using BPM Suite on premises. We use a lot of features from BPM, but usually not the Worklist/Workspace that comes out of the box with BPM. Since there is an SOAP API to call your tasks, it is quite easy to talk to this API and create your custom tasklist in the on-premises world.

For PCS, we do not have SOAP APIs, but we do have REST APIs, if there is any need to create a custom tasklist, you can use these APIs to; Start an application, query for tasks, query for task details, handle the payload or outcome and much more.

To find the APIs, all you need to do is add ‘/bpm/components’ at the end of your baseurl. This brings up the PCS ‘Embeddable Process UI Components’ page. On the first page, you can enter your credentials and it will help you get the authentication token for the service url. After that, you can use the cookbook to start working with the components.

For those who are familiar with Oracle JET, this works exactly the same as the Oracle JET Cookbook.

Once in the Cookbook tab, you can select the component on the left hand side. In the above screenshot, this is the task list component. You can open the demo code to see the JavaScript, HTML or CSS snippets. This makes it easy to help you get your custom application up and running. You can even change the look and feel by using the ‘Component Setup’ and edit the properties of the component you see and get the demo code for it.

Some of the APIs, like the demo page for the task details, actually need you to provide some of the component setup before they work. Here you will need to enter a task number to make the demo component work. Below the component is shown which task numbers are available. For the demo purpose I have also switched on the hide Attachment, Comments, History & Conversation toggle. If we press apply we will see the result of the Task Detail in the ‘Embeddable Process UI Components’ page.

Now that you know where to find the APIs and how to use them, you can pick any framework or technology you prefer and create your own tasklist. From an Oracle perspective, the best choice for this task is Oracle JET. However, if you have experience Angular developers within your organisation, you can decide to build it in Angular just as easy (or React, or Vue, etc.).

Although, now that you are using PCS as your choice of Cloud Tools, there is another good option within the Oracle Low Code Cloud Platforms. As part of the Oracle Integration Cloud you also have access to the Visual Builder Cloud Service (VBCS). This is a Low Code Cloud tool for rapid UI development.

VBCS works with JET under the hood and has an OOTB integration with PCS. You create a task screen or tasklist in a drag & drop style.