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Introduction
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JOC Cockpit offers a graphical Workflow Editor for designing workflows, jobs and dependencies.
- Workflows can be designed by drag & drop in a graphical view.
- Workflows can be edited in a JSON source code view.
- Job scripts within a workflow can be edited using a special editor that allows working on longer scripts.
The Workflow Editor supports keyboard shortcuts and mouse operations for moving objects and copying, cutting and pasting objects.
Graphical Workflow Editor
The Workflow Editor is available from the Configuration->Inventory View. This view has the following panels:
- Left panel: The tree panel allows navigation to design workflows, jobs and dependenciesfolders and objects. Workflows can be available in any folder from the sub-folder Workflows.
- Middle panel: The design panel allows JS7 - Workflow Instructions to be copied from the tool panel to a workflow by drag & drop.
- Right panel: The property editor allows management of instruction properties such as the jobs that are available with a workflow.
Drag and Drop
The middle panel holds a vertical toolbar with icons for the relevant JS7 - Workflow Instructions.
The first instruction icon indicates a JS7 - Job Instruction and can be dragged from the toolbar and dropped in the indicated area:
- The
icon is used to add a Job Instruction from the toolbar. - The dropping area has to be touched by the cursor, not by the Job Instruction icon.
To add further instructions to a workflow, for example a second job, the Job Instruction is dropped on the connector lines before or after the existing job.
- The connector line has to be touched by the cursor, not by the Job Instruction icon.
Example for Adding Fork/Join Instruction Branches
Users can add branches for jobs that run in parallel by dragging and dropping a JS7 - Fork-Join Instruction.
- The toolbar
icon is used to add a Fork/Join Instruction. - In a first step an empty block for Fork and Join is created.
To add a branch to the Fork/Join Instruction, for example the Job Instruction icon is dragged and dropped directly onto the Fork Instruction icon.
- The
Fork Instruction icon has to be touched by the cursor, not by the icon for the Job Instruction that is being added.
When dragging and dropping of a Job Instruction onto the Fork Instruction icon is repeated, then an additional branch will be created each time as shown below:
Users can add jobs to an existing branch by dragging and dropping the Job Instruction icon onto the connector lines before or after an instruction like this:
Example for Adding If Instruction Branches
Adding a JS7 - If Instruction to a workflow allows conditional execution of jobs and further instructions to be performed.
- The
If Instruction icon is used to add an If Instruction from the toolbar. - In a first step an empty block for If and If-End is created.
- The property editor is then used to specify the predicate of the If Instruction, i.e. the condition.
To add a branch to an If Instruction, for example, for a job, the Job Instruction icon is dragged and dropped directly onto the 
If Instruction icon.
If a further Job Instruction is dragged and dropped directly onto the If Instruction icon, a second branch will be created for the If Instruction as shown in the diagram below.
- The left hand branch will be processed if the condition evaluates to true, the right hand branch will be processed if it evaluates to false.
- The icon has to be touched by the cursor, not by the Job Instruction icon.
Visible Section Operations
Moving the Lens
The visible section in the design panel can be moved using the mouse and keyboard shortcuts:
- Left, right, up and down arrows move the lens to focus on different sections of the design panel.
- Alternatively users can move the lens by clicking and moving the blue frame with their mouse.
When hitting an arrow key the focus is moved in the corresponding direction.
Zooming
When clicking in the design panel a horizontal toolbar is made available:
The toolbar offers
- the
zoom-in button to enlarge objects in the visible section of the design panel. - the
zoom-out button to reduce the size of objects in the visible section of the design panel. - the
zoom-default button resets the zoom to its default value. - the
zoom-fit button zooms the visible section to the size required to make all objects visible.
Object Operations
Selecting Objects
The following operations are supported for selecting objects:
- Hitting the Ctrl+A key selects all objects in the design panel.
- Pressing the Ctrl key and clicking individual objects in the design panel allows multiple objects to be selected.
- Alternatively, users can highlight an area with the mouse to mark objects that should be selected:
Copy, Cut & Paste Objects
The following keyboard operations are supported:
- Ctrl+C: copies the selected object(s) to the clipboard.
- Ctrl+X: cuts the selected object(s) to the clipboard.
- Ctrl+V: pastes the selected object(s) from the clipboard.
When hitting the Ctrl+C key a popup message appears that indicates: Copied!.
Similarly when using the Ctrl+X key a popup message indicates: Ready for paste!.
In order to select the position to which objects should be pasted users can click a connector line that will be highlighted in green like this:
When hitting the Ctrl+V key the object(s) are pasted to the indicated location:
Removing Objects
The DEL key can be used to remove selected objects.
Alternatively, when moving the mouse over an individual object its 
action menu becomes visible:
Clicking the action menu brings forward the menu item to remove the respective object.
Removal of objects can be undone, see next section.
Undo/Redo Operations
The Workflow Editor offers a stack of up to 20 levels to undo and redo previous operations for both graphical instructions and text input to the Property Editor.
When clicking in the design panel a horizontal toolbar is made available:
The toolbar offers:
- the
undo operation that allows the most recent graphical instruction or text input to be undone. - the
redo operation that allows redoing the most recent undone operation.
Repeatedly hitting the undo / redo buttons applies these operations to previous operations further in the stack.
Download / Upload Operations
The Workflow Editor allows objects in JSON format to be downloaded and uploaded.
When clicking in the design panel a horizontal toolbar is made available:
The toolbar allows:
- an object to be downloaded using the
icon. Users should locate the downloaded object in the directory that is offered for downloads from their browser. - an object to be uploaded using the
icon. For further information on uploads see the JS7 - How to upload .json examples article.
Export Operations
The Workflow Editor allows the graphical export of objects in PNG format.
When clicking in the design panel a horizontal toolbar is made available:
The toolbar allows objects to be exported using the 
icon.
An exported .png file can look like this:
JSON Object Editor
JS7 stores scheduling objects in JSON format. Users can display and modify the JSON representation of objects such as workflows from the object's action menu:
The action menu items Show JSON and Edit JSON bring forward popup windows for displaying and modifying JSON code.
- The JSON code is generated and validated with JSON Schemas that are available for each object type, see JS7 - Inventory Storage Format.
- The JSON Editor is explained from the JS7 - Inventory Object Editor article.
Job Script Editor
The JOC Cockpit Configuration->Inventory Viewopens the Script Editor for the modification of job scripts:
- Job scripts can be directly edited from the multi-line input field in the lower right hand corner of the property editor.
- The
pencil icon will be displayed when the mouse is moved into the job script input field. Clicking this icon invokes the Script Editor.
The Job Script Editor is explained in more detail in the JS7 - Job Script Editor article.
Overview
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