Running Oracle BPM 11g PS5 Worklist Task Flow and Human Task Form on Non-SOA Domain

With standard setup, both BPM worklist application and Human task form runs on the same SOA domain, where BPM process is running. While this work fine, this is not what we want in development, test and production environment. Mainly because BPM worklist and Human task form are ADF artificats, its easier to develop and run in production from different server. I will describe in this post how to run both BPM worklist application and Human task form on different non-SOA domain. There are two main advantages for such architecture:

1. BPM Worklist TF will be integrated into custom ADF application, no need to run standard BPM Worklist application from SOA domain (read more from previous post - ADF 11g PS5 Application with Customized BPM Worklist Task Flow (MDS Seeded Customization))

2. Human Task form will run on the same non-SOA server, where custom application is deployed (it integrates BPM Worklist TF)

All this makes ADF part less dependent on SOA specifics, as well allows to minimize workload on SOA domain.

Main goal of this post is to aggregate all available information from Oracle documentation into one single sample application. There are several things not working as described in the documentation, I will point below. In order to prepare sample applications for BPM worklist TF and Human task form to be deployed on non-SOA domain, I was using following chapters from Oracle SOA/BPM 11g PS5 developer guides:

1. A Creating Custom ADF Applications with Oracle Business Process Management Workspace Task Flows

2. 30.8.4 How To Deploy a Task Form to a non-SOA Oracle WebLogic Server

Download sample applications:

1. Sample BPM process and Human Task Form - Lab02_v2.zip

2. Custom ADF application with integrated BPM worklist TF - IntegratedBPMWorklistApp_v2.zip

Both applications are deployed on the same non-SOA domain (except for BPM process), I'm using JDev Integrated WLS server 7101 port for this - CreateOrderTaskForm (Human task form) and IntegratedBPMWorklistApp (BPM Worklist TF):

I was deploying CreateOrderTaskForm application first. Follow this section from Oracle SOA/BPM developer guide: 30.8.4 How To Deploy a Task Form to a non-SOA Oracle WebLogic Server. While provided documentation info is very useful, still you can't follow it completely.

Decide first, how you would like to run BPM Worklist TF. There are two options - federated and normal modes. Federated mode provides less functionality, is designed for remote servers. My sample app is configured (as by default) to run in normal mode, this means there is no need to create wf_client_config.xml file.

Create Foreign JNDI with links pointing to SOA server - this will allow to connect from non-SOA domain to SOA server:

Links:

Assign BPM security grants in system-jazn-data.xml from non-SOA domain. You still will see security error, when starting non-SOA domain, it will try to register Human task form with BPM process and will fail - you can ignore this.

One thing you should point your attention is oracle.soa.workflow library installation on non-SOA domain. If non-SOA domain already have WebCenter extensions installed, most likely there already exists another library - oracle.soa.workflow.wc. Developer guide says you can use either one or another. What I experienced - when I had both libraries installed, I was getting class path conflicts when starting BPM Worklist TF. If you will get similar error, double check may be both libraries are installed. I have only one:

Once configuration is completed - you can deploy Human task form. Deployment is done on JDev integrated server:

BPM process is deployed on SOA enabled domain:

Define Human task form URI for BPM process. Go to BPM process in Enterprise Manager and select Human Workflow component:

Specify address for Human task form associated with selected BPM process (server port should point to non-SOA domain in this case):

First part is completed - now we move to BPM Worklist TF (IntegratedBPMWorklistApp_v2 application). We are not using out of the box shell application - BPM Worklist. Instead we are using only Task List TF from that application, inside our own custom environment. Read more from Oracle BPM developer guide - A Creating Custom ADF Applications with Oracle Business Process Management Workspace Task Flows.

There is one thing that developer guide doesn't say. If you will configure BPM libraries for your project as developer guide says - you will get errors when running application directly from JDeveloper (libraries are not copied into deployment folder). It works well, if you will deploy on the server, but not when you run from JDeveloper. This happens, because standard BPM Worklist Components library available in JDeveloper is not marked to be deployed (and this option is disabled to change):

Same for BPM Services library, this library is mandatory on class path when deploying on non-SOA domain:

Libraries are not copied into deployment folder when running from JDeveloper, even there is a check:

Workaround it to create your own library group (for example - Custom BPM Worklist), add all 3 required libraries and set to be deployed by default (important if you want to run BPM Worklist TF application from JDeveloper directly):

Custom library is added to the project:

JAR files included through the custom library are targeted for deployment:

BPM Worklist TF - TaskList is included using Worklist mode (Workspace also possible, but will require additional libraries to be added):

Make sure security is granted to each resource:

Deploy custom ADF application with BPM Worklist TF to integrated WLS server:

BPM Worklist TF and Human task form is running from custom ADF application, deployed on JDeveloper integrated WLS server port 7101:

To summarize content of this post:

1. Enable JDev integrated WLS domain to run SOA

- Install Oracle SOA Workflow library, if required. Configure foreign JNDI. Set security grants for BPM

- Deploy

- Change Human task form URI

- Test from BPM Worklist application

2. Run BPM Worklist TF on non-SOA JDev integrated WLS domain

- Set domain trust password

- Define custom library for BPM components

- Make sure no conflicts between oracle.soa.workflow and oracle.soa.workflow.wc