Here are some example reasons to want to use Workflows:

 

•Email the Lab Manager or PI when the end date of a grant is nearing so they have the opportunity to enter a new one before the monthly report is emailed to finance.

•Every week, automatically expire the accounts of any user that hasn't logged in for 6 months. It could also be configured to email such users a week before to let them know they have a week to log in before their account will be expired.

•Keep track of the number of bookings and amount of time booked for each project, storing those numbers on the project so they're always available for reporting and booking rules to use.

•An alternative version of the previous item. The facility has a notion of core time and non-core time. For each booking, it is required to calculate the amount of time that is within core time, and the amount that is within non-core time, and update the booking's project, so that it keeps a running tally of its total use of core and non-core time.

•Calculate properties that you store on a booking. For example, a price or something that will be used as part of calculating a price.

•Somebody updates a project, and it indicates that it is funded by a grant, but some of the grant information is missing. If the project status is also set to Approved, which means it could be used for bookings, then either reject the change to the project (with a custom error message) or modify the project's status to reduce it to Requested.

•Provide grant code on a project, but allow a user to override that by selecting a different grant code when creating a booking.

•Consistency checks when entering project information with good, customised error messages when some requirement is broken

oExample: if a project indicates it's using an MR scanner, then the user must provide information about ethics and safety information regarding what's going to taken into the scanner room.

•The facility has a significant number of users using it for a short period, they go away for a while, and come back again. It is required to know who is active, and to limit the number of active users to stay within the licence requirements. So a Workflow is configured to automatically expire users when they've been inactive for a while, but another Workflow can automatically un-expires users when they try to log in after a long period (perhaps provided they meet some other criteria)

•For a particular bookable resource, it is required that at least one week before the booking date, a health and safety file is attached to the booking. A Workflow is created that will email the person who made the booking one week before it is due if the attachment is not there yet. The email gives them a reminder. Then two days before the booking is due, if the attachment is still not there, the booking is automatically cancelled and everybody who has used the resource over the past three months is sent an email telling them the slot has just opened up.

•Create a check-in and check-out system that enables an instrument for a duration, while recording the fact that this person is using it. This could be done by having a card reader that scans a university card, or by having a computer or tablet next to the instrument displaying a suitably configured page.