Mark Craig Group Manager Oracle Workflow

Oracle Workflow System Management Hints and Tips

Important Patches OWF H Patchset OWF G Rollup 7: 3868138 Metalink Note 258312.1 Released November 4 OWF G Rollup 7: 3868138 Simplified prereqs Released November 17

Agenda Is everything up and running? Are the Agent Listeners falling behind? Why did the Mailer go down? Why didn’t I receive my email? When can I drop and recreate workflow queues? When can I “skip” errored workflow activities? What’s the latest on the Workflow Directory Service? Any news on cloning?

#1 Is everything up and running?

Oracle Workflow Manager Dashboard for System Administrators and DBAs Component of Oracle Applications Manager Accessible from Workflow Administrator resp Track Workflow System Status Manage Workflow Background Processes Manage Notification Mailer Drill Down Capability

Oracle Workflow Manager Unified Logging Diagnostics Notification User Preferences GSM Setup Mailer Component Test Mailer Component Parameter Test Mailer Diagnostic Test

Oracle Workflow Manager

Workflow Service Instances There are two workflow service containers which must be running:

Workflow Service Components

Workflow Manager: Metrics Access metrics either via graph or Related Links: Throughput:Work Items(View)

Drill Down on an Item Type Error Count per activity per item type

Drill Down per Activity Stage Launch Monitor, Abort (All), Retry (All)

View Errored Work Items

#2 Are the Agent Listeners falling behind?

Workflow Agent Listeners Business Event System requires agent listeners to be run to process event messages An agent listener monitors incoming messages and dequeues messages When an event message is dequeued, the Event Manager begins subscription processing for the event. Oracle Workflow provides 3 seeded agent listener service components to process messages: Workflow Deferred Agent Listener (WF_DEFERRED) Workflow Error Agent Listener (WF_ERROR) Workflow Inbound Notifications Agent Listener (WF_NOTIFICATION_IN) Event – A business event is an occurrence in a internet or intranet application or program that might be significant to other objects in a system or to external agent. For instance, the create of a purchase order is an example of a business event in a purchasing application. Subscription – An event subscription is a registration indicating that a particular event is significant to a particular system and specifying the processing to perform when the triggering event occurs.

Workflow Agent Listeners Workflow Deferred /Java DeferredAgent Listener for deferred subscription processing (Local subscription) Can run multiple Workflow Agent Listeners on WF_DEFERRED MUST BE RUNNING Workflow Error/Java Error Agent Listener for error handling (Error subscription) Workflow Inbound Notifications Agent Listener inbound agent for e–mail notification responses (External subscription) can run multiple Workflow Agent Listeners on WF_NOTIFICATION_IN Local – The subscription applies only to events raised on the subscribing system. External – The subscription applies only to events received by an inbound agent on the subscribing system. All event messages received by an inbound agent on the subscribing system are considered to have an External source. Error – The subscription applies only to errored events dequeued from the WF_ERROR queue.

Workflow Manager: Agent Activity

Search on Messages/ View XML

Tip: Custom SQL Example SQL to check status of messages (example only) select count(*) from applsys.aq$wf_deferred where msg_state = ‘READY’ select count(*) from applsys.aq$wf_notification_out where msg_state = ‘READY’ (example only) Queue message states also available from wfver.sql

Tip: Custom SQL Simple custom SQL to check status of service components select 'Service component ' || COMPONENT_NAME || decode (COMPONENT_STATUS, 'RUNNING', ' is running', ' is not running') from fnd_svc_components where concurrent_queue_id = (select concurrent_queue_id from fnd_concurrent_queues where concurrent_queue_name = 'WFALSNRSVC') order by COMPONENT_TYPE, COMPONENT_ID (example only) Also available from wfver.sql

#3 Why did the Mailer go down?

Oracle Workflow Java Mailer Based on standard Java Mail APIs SMTP for outbound Optional IMAP for inbound OR users respond via hyperlink included in email One Workflow Mailer for detail and summary emails Leverages Generic Service Management feature to manage JVM Leverages Generic Service Components feature to monitor java threads

What type of errors? Not configured correctly See Workflow Manager Online Help Not configured when system was started Complete configuration Run (for owf g, run wfntfqup.sql after contacting support) Invalid Email Addresses mark.craig instead or mark.craig@oracle.com

What type of errors? SMTP Server uncontactable UNIX SA doesn’t talk to Apps DBA Content Generation errors Uncompiled Packages Oracle/Java Errors IMAP Server uncontactable Mail Admin doesn’t talk to Apps DBA Unexpected Errors: Oracle/Java Unsolicited Emails

Mailer Status says System Deactivated Maximum error count for Mailer is 10 (default) Service Component Level MAX_ERROR_COUNT=10 10 consecutive fatal errors = Stopped with Error Maximum restart count is 5 (default) Service Instance Level SVC_COMP_MAX_ERROR_COUNT=5 5 sets of 10 consecutive errors = System Deactivated

Workflow Service Components Workflow Notification Mailer service components use for inbound and outbound mail processing can run multiple outbound thread for scalability. can only run one inbound thread Workflow Agent Listener service components to perform deferred subscription processing error handling for the Business Event System inbound e–mail processing for notification mailers

#4 Why didn’t I receive my email?

Possible Causes Email traffic – be patient Check Notification Preference “Do not send mail” “Summary” Email Address Not set Wrong Invalid

Find Notification Screen

Troubleshooting Send a Test Email to that Role using Workflow Manager, note down the NID. wfmlrdbg.sql: for a given NID: Notification Status and Mail Status Role Details: preference and email address Existence/Status of Messages on Queues Depends on Queue Retention Time (processed messages may have already been purged), default retention is zero WF_DEFERRED WF_ERROR WF_NOTIFICATION_OUT WF_NOTIFICATION_IN

Troubleshooting – wfmlrdbg.sql Notification Item Information Notification Recipient Role Members Notification Recipient Role Information Notification Recipient Routing Rules Notification More Info Role Information Notification Message Attribute Values Notification Attribute Values Notification User Comments Deferred Queue Status Error Queue Status Notification OUT Queue Status Notification IN Queue Status Message Templates Generate Notification Message GSC Mailer Component Parameters Mailer Tags

Troubleshooting Metalink Note 242941.1 How to Troubleshoot Java-based Workflow Notification Mailer in 11.5.9 and OWF G

#5 The Agent Listeners are running slowly, should I drop and recreate the queues?

Dropping Queues No!!! Not supported unless you are using a SQL script provided by Oracle Workflow Development Not all Queues can be recreated without loss of data WF_ERROR WF_JAVA_ERROR WF_DEFERRED WF_JAVA_DEFERRED WF_NOTIFICATION_IN

Investigate Performance Issues Number of messages on queue (wfver.sql) Run more Agent Listeners OK to run in parallel Review STATSPACK Reports Review DB File I/O Temporary Tablespace used heavily for LOB Operations

#6 My Order Management workflow has errored… #6 My Order Management workflow has errored…. can I just skip that activity?

Skipping Activities Not Supported Workflows are business processes For a product to function properly, all activities within the workflow process need to be executed, for example: Activity 1 – creates business document Activity 2 – inserts record into table Activity 3-6 update other tables Activity 7 – updates record created by activity 2 If Activity 2 errors and you “skip” it, Activity 7 will error, but activity 3-6 have already been executed……data is corrupted!!!

Status Monitor

Status Diagram

Status Diagram

#7 What’ the latest Workflow Directory Service Rollup??

Workflow Directory Service v4 Patch 3942438 Additional Bug Fixes Enhancements to support Role Based Access Control Role Hierarchies Included in OWF H and AOL Data Security Rollups And any product which prereqs those patches Bulk Synchronization disabled for partitions which are hierarchy enabled

#8 Any news on Cloning?

OWF H + OAM H Automated Cloning No manual steps required Global Preferences, Instance specific runtime data updated to be correct for target instance More details Oracle Applications Manager Online Help Oracle Applications System Administrator Guide

Future Directions Basic vs Advanced Keeping the Mailer Up in unfriendly environments SMTP Server not contactable IMAP Server not contactable Many Email Addresses wrong or invalid Integration with System Alerts feature of OAM Official hooks to get status of service components for 3rd party management tools eg. Database view Enterprise Manager Integration Raise alerts based on queue backlog Override Address vs Test Mail address

Q & Q U E S T I O N S A N S W E R S A

Workflow Administrator Web Applications