Workflows Management

A workflow implements a process model — the sequence of states an object moves through, and the rules for moving between them. Starhive's workflow capability is flexible enough to model very different processes: an order fulfillment pipeline, a quarterly security review, or a simple task board.

Terminology

• State (workflow state) — where an object sits at rest, like a state machine's state.
  • End state — a state flagged as "done," filterable in StarQL (see Workflow attribute type).
  • Any state — a placeholder representing every state, so you can define one transition that applies from anywhere instead of one per state.
• Transition — the action of moving an object from one state to another.
• Workflow — the full set of states and transitions.

Modeling a workflow

Workflows are created at the space level, by adding a Workflow-type attribute to an object type and assigning a workflow to it — either an existing unassigned workflow, or a new one the system creates automatically.

Conditions

A transition can have conditions — all of them must pass for the transition to be available:

Condition	What it checks
User	The transition is enabled only for specific users, or users found in a User attribute (directly, or on a referenced object).
Email	Same idea, matched against an Email attribute (directly, or on a referenced object).
Boolean True	A specified boolean attribute must be true.
Attribute Value	An attribute's value must meet given criteria.
Attribute Mandatory	A specified attribute must not be empty.
Compare Another Date	A date attribute is compared to another date attribute, or an expression like now, using d/w/m/y offsets — e.g. "later than now," "earlier than or same as 1d," "later than -6m."
Always False	Never passes — used to disable a single transition without disabling the whole workflow.

Transition screens

A screen is a small form shown when a transition runs, to capture or confirm information before the state actually changes. Configure it from a transition's chevron menu — an optional description, and which attributes to show. Without a configured screen, the transition applies immediately.

Workflow graph

Every workflow can be viewed as a graph of its states and transitions — hover a workflow value on an object, or open workflow configuration directly.

Using workflows on objects

Once a type has a Workflow attribute, only the states reachable from an object's current state (with all conditions satisfied) are offered as valid transitions — unlike a normal attribute, you can't set it to an arbitrary value.

For CSV imports, the value must be a state name reachable by a valid transition from the object's current state (or its initial state, for new objects); rows that don't satisfy any valid transition are rejected and reported in the import's error file.

Permissions

Action	Workspace member	Space member	Space admin	Space owner
Create workflow	✓	✓	✓	✓
View workflow	—	✓	✓	✓
Edit workflow	—	—	✓	✓
Delete workflow	—	—	✓	✓