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Procedure documentationConfiguring Mail, Notification Messages, and Forms Services Locate this document in the navigation structure

 

Business Process Management (BPM) enables you to send notification messages via e-mail to potential and actual owners of tasks about new and assigned tasks in their inbox. The e-mail message has as its subject the task title and is a static body text which is automatically translated. It includes a direct link to the task execution UI and a link to the universal worklist (UWL).

For more information, see Completing Tasks.

BPM also sends specific notification messages as a result of a notification activity that you model at design time. The e-mail subject and body text can be customized at design time, including dynamically created texts based on the process context.

For more information, see Modeling Notifications.

Caution Caution

You can configure only one mail server for sending the notification e-mails. If this server is down or not reachable, notifications will be lost. This can result in the deadline for a task not being met, and therefore cause a delay in the execution of the business process. If you rely on e-mail notifications you need to ensure the provision of a reliable e-mail infrastructure.

End of the caution.

BPM also enables you to assign Adobe offline forms to tasks. Forms are sent as PDF attachments in an e-mail messages sent to potential owners of a task. At runtime, the actual owner of the task submits the form as a PDF attachment by e-mail back to the BPM framework.

For more information, see:

Assigning an Offline Form to a Task.

Using Adobe Offline Forms

To enable these services, you have to configure the mail server connectivity.

Alternatively, you can save time and configure the notification messages service using the configuration wizard. You can run the configuration wizard directly after installation.

For more information, see Wizard-Based Configuration for Business Process Management.

Procedure

Configuring the JavaMail Client Service

The configuration of this service is global for AS Java and is necessary for using notifications, modeled notifications and forms services. If the properties are configured beforehand by a system administrator, you need to make sure they are accurate, for example whether the correct sender e-mail address is entered.

  1. Open the SAP NetWeaver Administrator in a browser using the path http://<host>:<httpport>/nwa, and log on with administrator rights.

  2. Choose   Configuration Management   Infrastructure   Java System Properties  .

  3. Choose the Services tab, and select Java Mail Client.

  4. Set the following properties:

    • mail.smtp.host: Enter the host of the smtp server

    • mail.smtp.port: Enter the port of the smtp mail server such as <25>.

    • sslCertificate: Specifies the SSL certificate to be used for authentication if the connection is secure.

  5. Set the values for the properties of the account from which all mails and notification messages are sent:

    • mail.smtp.user: Enter the user name of the sender.

    • mail.smtp.password: Enter the password of the sender.

    • mail.from: Enter the E-mail address of the sender.

  6. Save the JavaMail Client Service properties.

Configuring the Mail, Notification Messages, and Forms Services

  1. Open the SAP NetWeaver Administrator in a browser using the path http://<host>:<httpport>/nwa, and log on with administrator rights.

  2. Choose   Configuration Management   Infrastructure   Java System Properties  .

  3. Choose the Applications tab and select tc~bpem~base~ear..

Basic BPM Configuration

  1. Enter defaults for the localization of the process context parameters of data type Date and Time:

    • Default.locale: Enter a locale, such as en.

    • Default.timezone: Enter a time zone in the standard notation, such as CET or Europe/Berlin.

  2. Save the application properties.

Notifications Configuration

  1. Set the following properties for the notification messages service:

    • Notification.assigned: To send a notification message to users who become actual owners of a task set this property to true. Otherwise set it to false.

    • Notification.newtasks: To send a notification message to all potential owners for a new task in their inbox set this property to true. Otherwise set it to false.

    • http.baseurl: Enter the URL, including protocol, host name and port number which is used to generate the links to the UWL and the task execution UI in the notification e-mail, such as http://<host>:<httpport>.

  2. Save the application properties.

Modeled Notifications Configuration

Apart from configuring the JavaMail Client Service and completing the basic BPM configuration, no other configuration is necessary.

Forms Service Configuration

  1. Set the following properties for the forms service:

    • mail.mailbox.protocol: Enter the type of protocol (such as pop3) that the mail server uses for incoming (submitted) forms.

      Caution Caution

      Make sure that the host and port of the protocol you define here are accurately configured in the JavaMail Service client properties. For example, if you set pop3 as your protocol, you need to configure the mail.pop3.host and mail.pop3.port properties in JavaMail Client.

      End of the caution.

    • Mail.mailbox.username: Enter the name of the user who receives the submitted mails.

    • Mail.mailbox.password: Enter the password of the user who receives the submitted forms.

    • mail.mailbox.address: Enter the e-mail address to which submitted forms are sent.

    • mail.mailbox.folder: Enter the name of the dedicated mailbox for retrieving mails with attached offline forms.

      Caution Caution

      Ensure that you dedicate separate folders for each J2EE system on the mail server if you configure the mail server using only one mail user for multiple J2EE systems that are running the same BPM process. This ensures that a BPM process instance does not retrieve mails dedicated for processing by another BPM process instance of a different J2EE system.

      End of the caution.

    • Mail.mailbox.reader.timeout: Define at what time interval the dedicated mailbox for forms is checked.

    • Mail.sent.attachment.logging: Set the value to true if you want to save all your sent mails in the business log together with their attachments and form attachments.

    • Mail.received.attachment.logging: Set the value to true if you want to save all your received mails in the business log together with their attachments and form attachments.

  2. Save the application properties.

Result

You have configured the services needed to send and receive notification messages, modeled notifications and forms. For the changes to take effect, you need to restart your engine.