Using MONGODB Database to manage document forms and information in Office system--General process application approval list design ideas (two, Cont.)

1. Definition of documents in Office system

A document in an Office system is a business that is insensitive to data, such as approval orders, information columns, data escalations, information records, etc. in a process. And the management of these information, especially the more timeliness of management records, still use a relational database for management.

(1) Approval form in the process

The approval list in the process is composed of functional button area, special function area, business form area, attachment area, approval opinion area, and so on, in which the Business form area contains the attachments and opinions, but because of the business particularity of the attachments and opinions, it needs to be managed separately, and the remaining business forms can be regarded as documents.

In some process approval business, there are some business information in Excel or Word files, such as special delivery, this is very concise, the disadvantage is not intuitive.

Figure 1

Typical business Form sample

Business form content, mainly used for approving subject objects, as shown in the visual display, can facilitate the approval of work (as opposed to attachments), improve the efficiency of approval.

Figure 2

(2) General information

Comprehensive information refers to the news, materials, learning Garden, laws and regulations, department functions, such as the introduction of information display business, such business is based on text, pictures, information storage structure is simple, not fixed. But the reply to the information, the comment, all is the attachment information existence, deletes the information, then its corresponding comment, the reply also does not exist.

Among them, information column is the entry of information according to the predetermined classification, column structure is not fixed, change more frequently.

(3) Data escalation

Data reporting refers to the reporting of data to the competent authorities, the need to fill out the data of random relatively large, change is the norm.

The above approval list, the comprehensive information, the data report and so on business main body, all have the data structure is not fixed, the change is frequent, the data sensitivity low characteristic; the above business high-end applications are implemented using the Lotus Notes/domino (document database) system. Therefore, this paper proposes to use NOSQL database to achieve the above business.

2. Approval Form/form "save" and business integrity

The process business is usually the case, the staff fill out the Business application form (fill out the form), and prepare the relevant information (add the attachment), the Business application form and information packaging (save), sent to the process of the next step of the approver.

Complete the above business, as shown in 3, at least need to fill out the form, add attachments, save, send out four operation actions, and its operating objects are documentation and follow-up process, that is, the process is a transport, documentation is required to carry the goods.

Based on the above definition, the process and documentation can be managed separately, and each process instance associates the process with the document.

Figure 3

(1) Sequence of business operations

When approving a single business in the processing process, the sequence of user actions is as follows:

The first step: fill in the form content (including upload attachments) or approval comments;

The second step: Select Next and next to accept people;

Step three: Save the form (waiting for the feedback to succeed);

Fourth step: Send out the form (approval by workflow rules sent to the next link);

Fifth step: Close the current page and complete the business process.

(2) Business integrity processing

In the process of processing the process approval order business, it is required to save the success form (saved to MongoDB), return the form document ID, and then send the action, at which point the workflow and business critical data are saved in the relational database, where the ID of the form document returned earlier is recorded.

3. Database design

(1) Document database design

Based on the MONGODB database design model, a one-to-many relationship (model One-to-many relationships with Embedded Documents) models.

In the approval form, 2 of the approval of the main table and the asset details are a one-to-many relationship, the approval opinion is a pair of many relationships, the relational database into a NoSQL document database, that is, from table to collection, such as 4 as an embedded document, asset details stored in the document as many.

Figure 4

Because the approval opinion is related to the process, the flow through the process link and the approval opinion correspondence, therefore, the examination and approval opinion should take out from collection, put in the relational database to use.

(2) The use of document-based database and relational database

Figure 5

From the overall perspective of management, and from the technical framework as a whole, the database design is still based on the relationship, the introduction of NoSQL database only solves the data storage flexibility and data structure variable and changeable requirements of document type. This alone will save a fraction of the design and development effort.

In addition, the definition around the document, such as the configuration data item for the form, corresponds to the collection schema in MongoDB. Because of the horizontal scalability of the columns of the MongoDB database, different documents (row in relational data) in a collection (relational database table) can be arbitrarily extended to support the flexible and dynamic configuration of the form.

Reference:

(1) General process application Approval list design ideas (i) December 2014, Sho Yongwei

(2) The feasibility analysis of using nosql technology in the BPM dynamic configurable form--the design idea of general process application approval List (ii) December 2014, Sho Yongwei

(3) Cloud computing Unified Office Operation Platform service capability Design Scheme November 2014, Sho Yongwei

Using MONGODB Database to manage document forms and information in Office system--General process application approval list design ideas (two, Cont.)