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1. To create a message attribute that does not reference an existing item type attribute, select a message in the navigator tree and choose New Attribute from the Edit menu.

An Attribute property page appears.

2. Provide an Internal Name in all uppercase with no spaces. All Oracle Workflow APIs, SQL scripts, and PL/SQL procedures refer to the internal name when identifying an attribute.

Attention: You cannot update the internal name for an attribute once it is defined.

Caution: Do not include colons ":" or spaces in your internal name.

3. Enter a Display Name. This is the name that appears in the navigator tree. If this message attribute is going to have a source of 'Respond', then this display name is also used as the prompt for a response value.

4. Enter an optional description. If this message attribute is going to have a source of 'Respond', then use this field to elaborate on response instructions.

5. Select the data type of the attribute.

6. Depending on the Type of your attribute, provide the following information:

• parameterN="&item_type_attribute"

• parameterN="Value &item_type_attribute" where &item_type_attribute represents the rest of the value.

Document

Enter the name of the document management system and a document reference. In the future, you can specify any one of the following document types in the default value field:

• PL/SQL--a document representing data from the database, generated from a PL/SQL procedure. Specify as <procedure>/<document_identifier>. The PL/SQL procedure must follow a standard API format. See:Standard API for a "PL/SQL" Document.

• Http--a standard URL. Specify as http://<host>/<document_path>.

• File--a file accessible from the Oracle Workflow server filesystem. Specify as <file_path>.

• External document management system--a document managed by an external document management system. Specify as <doc_management_system>:<document_reference>.

Attention: Currently, only the PL/SQL document type is supported.

Role	Specify a role name. You must initially load the roles from the database to display a list of roles to choose from. See: Roles.
Attribute	Specify the name of an item type attribute that you want to maintain references to in a process by choosing from the list of existing item type attributes.

Attention: Do not specify a message attribute's data type as Attribute, as it serves no purpose in a notification message and is also not supported by the Workflow Notification System.

7. Specify 'Send' or 'Respond' in the Source field to indicate whether this attribute should supply information or prompt a notification message recipient for a response, respectively.

For 'Send' message attributes, the Display Name of the attribute appears in the notification only if the attribute is of type URL to describe what the URL drills down to.

For 'Respond' message attributes, the Display Name and Description of the attribute make up the Response section of the notification message. Use the Description field to describe the response expected, and the Display Name field to specify the response prompt.

'Respond' message attributes of type Date, Number, Text, Document or Role prompt the notification recipient to respond with a date, number, text value, role (internal or display name), or document, respectively.

'Respond' message attributes of type Lookup prompt the notification recipient to select a response from a list of values.

'Send' and 'Respond' message attributes of type URL appear only when a notification is viewed using the Notification Web page. A 'Respond' message attribute of type URL prompts the notification recipient to link to another HTML page to complete the notification response. The HTML document that the URL links to takes over the entire browser page, and must include a call to the Workflow Engine CompleteActivity( ) API to inform the workflow engine when the notification response is complete.

'Send' and 'Respond' message attributes of type Form appear only when a notification is viewed using the Notification Viewer form in Oracle Applications. The Reference button on the Notification Viewer form is enabled if a notification message includes a 'Send' message attribute of type Form. The notification recipient can choose the Reference button to drill down to the form defined by the message attribute.

If a message includes a 'Respond' message attribute of type Form, the Respond button in the Notification Viewer form drills down directly to the designated form. This form must be coded with a call to the Workflow Engine CompleteActivity( ) API to inform the Workflow Engine that the notification response is complete. See: Workflow Engine APIs.

8. For message attributes, the default value may be a constant or an item type attribute. If the default references a value from an item type attribute, choose Item Attribute, then use the poplist field to choose an item type attribute. The item type attribute you select must be associated with the same item type that the message itself is associated with. The item type attribute you select must also be of the same data type as the message attribute.

Note: A message attribute type of 'Text' is compatible with any item attribute type, but all other message attribute types must match the item attribute type exactly.

9. Choose Apply to save your changes, OK to save your changes and close the property page or Cancel to cancel your changes and close the property page.

Message attributes assume the access/protection level of their parent message.

10. Any message attribute you define appears beneath the respective message you defined it for in the navigator tree. You can review or edit the properties of an attribute at any time by double-clicking on the attribute in the navigator tree or by selecting the attribute and choosing Properties from the Edit menu. Respond message attribute icons in the Navigator tree have a red question mark overlay to help you distinguish them from Send message attribute icons.

Attention: The order that you list 'Respond' message attributes in the navigator tree correlate to the order in which they appear in the response section of the notification message. You can use the drag and drop feature of the navigator tree to reorder a set of attributes, or select an attribute and choose Move Attribute Up or Move Attribute Down from the Edit menu.

11. Following is an example of how the Notification System uses a template to generate the Response section of an E-mail notification using a sample set of 'Respond' message attributes.

Enter the <Display Name> on line <Sequence>. <Description> <Type_Hint>

<Display Name> is replaced with the Display Name of the message attribute. <Sequence> is replaced with the relative sequence number of the 'Respond' message attribute as it appears in the Navigator tree among all 'Respond' message attributes (that is, the presence of 'Send' message attributes is ignored when determining the sequence). <Description> is replaced with the Description of the message attribute. In addition, <Type_Hint> is replaced with one of the following statements, if the message attribute matches one of these data types:

Type		Type_Hint

Lookup	Value must be one of the following:
			<list of lookup codes>
Date		Value must be a date [in the form "<format>"].
Number	Value must be a number [in the form "<format>"].
Text		Value must be <format> bytes or less.

Resulting Response Section in an E-mail Notification

Enter the Action on line 1. Do you approve? Value must be one of the following:

Approve

Reject

Enter the Review Comments on line 2. Value must be 2000 bytes or less.

Enter the Required Date on line 3. If there is no required date, leave this blank. Value must be a date in the form "DD-MON-YYYY".

Enter the Maximum Amount on line 4. This is the maximum approved amount. Value must be a number.

Table 1 - 5. (Page 1 of 1)

See Also

To Copy an Attribute

To Respond to a Notification by E-mail