V1.2.0
Data Objects, Messages and Services
Note: there are some minor breaking changes in this release, please see "Minor Breaking Changes and their Fixes" below for how to fix them.
This Version of SpiffWorkflow adds support for Data Objects, Messages, and Service Tasks. These are powerful new tools for managing workflows as they grow in complexity. Details below.
This is also our first step towards a larger ecosystem. One that includes a customized Diagram Editor that is still under development, but available on GitHub and perfectly serviceable. You will need the editor to take full advantage of the new features mentioned above. A new project, code named SpiffArena is also under heavy development. SpiffArena will connect this SpiffWorkflow library to the new BPMN Editor and provide a complete Workflow Engine with a backend and frontend that can be configured to manage and execute a collection of your own BPMN diagrams. Keep an eye out for an initial release before the end of the year.
In addition to major new features, we've improved some existing core features. The Python Expression Engine is now easier to extend and modify for custom deployments, and SubProcesses have a far stronger and more consistent internal representation and are easier to control. We've also added the ability to unit test your script tasks - to make it much easier to write small python scripts to re-structure your data.
Finally, we undertook hours of effort to clean up the code base, so that imports are consistent, circular dependencies are removed, and code smells are eliminated. It is by no means perfect, but we are arcing in the right direction.
Major Changes
Data Objects, Inputs and Outputs
We now support Data Objects, providing powerful tools for controlling the scope and access of variables within a workflow.
For an overview of how Data Objects work, please check out our article "Understanding BPMN Data Objects". Detailed information is also available in our ReadTheDocs page.
- explicitly add data associations on serializing MI tasks by @danfunk in PR
- add messages to data object exceptions by @essweine in PR
Messages
Communication between running workflow instances is a powerful tool as workflows become more complex. For a detailed overview of this topic, please check out our article "Understanding BPMN Messages"
Service Tasks
Service Tasks are now supported, and offer an easy way for BPMN Developers to make calls to external APIs. Examples for
working with this critical new tool will be documented in our ReadTheDocs page.
- First pass of ServiceTask handling by @jbirddog in PR
- Service task connector delegate by @jbirddog in PR
- Store service task response in task data by @jbirddog in PR
- get description aka name when parsing service tasks by @burnettk in PR
- Follow up on service task bug fix, quote string literals by @jbirddog in PR
- Pass task data to service task delegate by @jbirddog in PR
Custom BPMN Editor Support
Still in heavy development is a custom BPMN Editor, which you can find on GitHub
This new editor provides the tools that will make creating valid Service Tasks, Data Objects, and Messages possible.
Many thanks to the BPMN.js community for this highly extensible diagramming library!
- Support for Spiff pre/postscript extensions by @essweine in PR
z* parses out spiffworklow:property tags in bpmn extensions and makes th… by @danfunk in PR
Improved Script Engine
A Script Engine that is overall easier to understand and extend.
- Feature/improved script engine by @essweine in PR
- make globals an argument in the script engine by @essweine in PR
Script Task Unit Testing
Added the ability to create, store, and execute assertions against Script Tasks. Allows you to define a Json data
structure as input, and an expected Json data structure as output. So you can assert your script is producing exactly
the right data.
New spec_type attribute
Given the ability to overload classes, and mix-in properties, it could be difficult to look at a Task Spec's class
to determine if it was a User Task or Script Task, etc... All Task Specs now have a spec_type attribute, containing a descriptive string of the type, expect to see "User Task", "Script Task", "Start Event" etc...
Improved Subprocess Handling
- Allows recursive calls to subprocesses, and improves serialization and execution by @essweine in PR
- add bpmn spec mixin functionality to subworkflow tasks by @essweine in PR
- handle all data copying in bpmn subworkflow task by @essweine in PR
Vastly Faster Tests!
- Profile and improve run time of the test suite by @jbirddog in PR
- Improve test suite run time, part 2 by @jbirddog in PR
- ParallelTest.py split by @jbirddog in PR
- Up some sleep times in tests for CI stability by @jbirddog in PR
Bug Fixes
- fix loop reset task to handle multiple subprocess properly by @essweine in PR
- Bugfix/separate subprocess dict for serializer by @danfunk in PR
- Update make tests to run tests per the README, remove unused test runners by @jbirddog in PR
- Bug/service task variable by @jbirddog in PR
- Fix for failures with Python 3.7 by @jbirddog in PR
Code Cleanup and Documentation Changes
- Support custom JSON encoder/decoder in BpmnWorkflowSerializer by @soby in PR
- Add Python 3.10 to CI by @jbirddog in PR
- list dependencies by @danfunk in PR
- Feature/centralized logging by @essweine in PR
- [FIX] Use self.spec_class instead of direct use of base object by @Giulios74 in PR
- add more documentation about serializer migration by @essweine in PR
- docs: Fix a few typos by @timgates42 in PR
- Fix a few docstring typos in the tests by @jbirddog in PR
- Remove unused imports by @jbirddog in PR
- Reorganized parser PR
- fix for a serialization bug by @danfunk in PR
- fix serialization bug by @essweine in PR
- Don't use bpmn exception from core spec by @jbirddog in PR
- added task name to the spiff logs by @burnettk in PR
- Remove navigation.py, tests and related bpmn files by @jbirddog in PR
- Remove bpmn imports from task.py by @jbirddog in PR
- Remove bpmn references from dict.py and json.py by @jbirddog in PR
- Remove some lingering bpmn imports by @jbirddog in PR
- Empty SpiffWorkflow/init.py by @jbirddog in PR
- Various fixes as I attempted to get our CR-Connect application working against the lastest SpiffWorkflow build by @danfunk in PR
Minor Breaking Changes and their Fixes
This Minor Release includes a few minor breaking changes that should be easy
to correct. Please apply these fixes as appropriate
- Top Level Imports moved to appropriate modules
REPLACE 'from SpiffWorkflow import WorkflowException'
WITH 'from SpiffWorkflow.exceptions import WorkflowException'
REPLACE 'from SpiffWorkflow import TaskState'
WITH: 'from SpiffWorkflow.task import TaskState'
REPLACE: 'from SpiffWorkflow import Task'
WITH 'from SpiffWorkflow.task import Task'
- Navigation code was removed
- Proved to be of little use to folks, was super complex and difficult to maintain.
- If you depended on this code, you can take the original code and embed it in your project.
- remove all references of timeit (no longer in SpiffWorkflow)
- timing is now available for all tasks in the spiff.metrics log without having to edit the code
- Same as above, this standalone code can be added to your code if needed.
- pythonScriptEngine._evaluate no longer accepts a task argument.
If you were overriding this method for some reason, please change your method signature - If you were previously using the workflow.signal() or workflow.message() functions, these should be replaced with
workflow.catch(). - Task States are JUST integers and TaskSpecNames is now a public dictionary, and can be used to covert a state to human readable string
REPLACE: user_task.state.name
WITH: TaskStateNames[user_task.state]
Other Notes
- When inserting custom functions into the PythonExecutionEngine - be aware that the task data will act as the full context for execution, and will contain global functions and methods during the exec call.
New Contributors
- @Giulios74 made their first contribution in PR
- @jbirddog made their first contribution in PR
- @burnettk made their first contribution in PR
Full Changelog: PR
