2019-05-10 Meeting notes

Date

Attendees

Discussion items

ItemWhoNotes
Minute TakerPeter McCracken

Updates on FOLIO Community Meeting

See schedule and attendee list, links from left. Last updated 5/9; may be updated further. Fuller descriptions for each session on appropriate tab. 

Outside knowledgebase vendors have been invited to present on Wednesday. They don't need to register for conference; they'll just attend the Weds session. Please book hotel rooms asap - definitely by May 17. 

Workflow update and discussion

  • Presentation from Mike Gorrell
  • How important is workflow for Resource Management activities?
  • How well will the staged approach work for us?
  • What questions do we have to bring back to the PC/TC?

Mike Gorrell (Index Data) has been working on proof of concept re workflows in past spring; now that we've moved through gap analysis, we should look at workflow. Kristin Martin is presenting Mike's slides on the subject. Mike put together thoguths on how one could create automated workflow idea, but was easier to mock up in UX than to actually create. Librarians created some ideas on how to use this, in a workflow sub-group (Martina Tumulla , Kristin Martin , Virginia Martin , Eric Hartnett ) 

Index Data tried to build a workflow engine from scratch, then decided to investigate other open source product, which led to Camunda. Mike has proposal for going forward from here. 

Workflow engine is thing that executes workflow; workflow editor is what helps create them. Also need a tool to test, debug, review each workflow. To-do app lets people participate in workflow. Also, how will system work with multiple apps?

Integration approach: use a Message Queue to share information, and tasks, via a "bus". Mike's slide show, presented by Kristin, describes how all of this would work. 

While Workflow is not project critical (ie, we do this today without such a service, so it's not required), it is a valuable tool that could provide a great improvement to FOLIO. Would help us get away from a lot of duplicative day-to-day work. Particularly start with manual activities, then expand to automated work, later. 

To get to an effective working solution soon, Mike proposes using Camunda editor, rather than creating a FOLIO editor. The FOLIO-based editor would wait until later. 

Slide show described several potential workflow paths developed by Mike. 

Workflow is still being considered; while not one of the features being actively developed, it is being reviewed and discussed by PC and TC. 

The group discussed the role of Workflow in overall FOLIO - how much benefit do we get if we aren't able to have workflow at go-live; given the benefit that workflow would provide to the overall product, how long can we last without it, or what do we risk by not incorporating it early? How much would implementing workflow slow down development of the basic FOLIO functionality?

Other?
Brief discussion of Chalmers' implementation process. No other issues.  Meeting concluded at 9:20am ET.

Action items

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