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h1. Actions Concept



The actions mean the activation of actions when a JCR document is added, removed or read. There exists several types of action and it is quite simple to plug your own ones.

By default eXo comes with two supported action types:

Business Process (Bonita & JBPM)

    * Content Validation Process
    * Content Backup Process

Groovy Scripts

    * Transform script: Microsoft Office and PDF documents to text


These actions allow organizations to manage their content flexibly. Many organizational processes can leverage that functionality to model and implement use cases.


The sample bundled with the eXo default distribution is an article publication use case:


!actions.png!

* An article writer creates the content from its home directory using the ECM explorer portlet and the dialog template. He can also attach some documents like PDF or Word ones (for example by using WebDAV to drop the files).

* After doing all the necessary modifications and versions on the document, he can copy and paste that article into the dedicated publication directory (in our sample, it is the /cms/publications directory of the draft workspace). As an "add" action is bound to that directory, the content validation business process will be launched.

* Once one of the content validator accepts it and sets up some publication dates and backup, then the document will be moved from the draft workspace to the production one. There it can be seen by the Content Browser portlet in the Reference or normal modes.

* When the node is moved to the production workspace (under the /cms/publications directory), a new business process is launched as that location also has an "add" action mapped to it. That action launches the 'back-up" business process which is responsible for moving the content from the production workpsace to the backup one when the publication period ends.

Adding an action to a node is a very simple process. By default, only the admin-view allows the user to access the "Manage Actions" icon. In the next screenshot, you can choose one the the four preconfigured actions, including the validation workflow and backup one. Note that each action has its own template (underneath an action is a Node which has an exo:action NodeType). Each template can provide custom variables such as in the case of the send mail action (that one is a script action) the email address to use.


