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Serena Business Manager 10.1.2 Readme
This readme file contains known issues and other important information for Serena® Business Manager. This file also contains information that might not be available in other SBM documentation. Last updated on 2013-02-05.

Contents

About this Release

SBM 10.1.2 is the version that immediately follows SBM 10.1.1.4. All of the features, changes, and fixes that were made in SBM 10.1.1.4 can be found in SBM 10.1.2.

SBM 10.1.2 is available in U.S. English only.

Terminology Changes

The following terminology and component name changes have been made since the release of SBM 2009 R4.

Old Term New Term

SBM Application Administrator

SBM Application Repository

Web Administrator

SBM Application Administrator

Manage Data

Auxiliary Data (in SBM Application Administrator)

Supported Configurations

The sections below discuss changes in supported software configurations. Detailed information about supported platforms and software configuration is available in the Supported Platform Matrix.

  • Client Operating Systems

    Now supported:

    • Microsoft Windows 8 Professional/Enterprise
  • Web Browsers

    Now supported:

    • Internet Explorer 10

    No longer supported:

    • Internet Explorer 7.0
  • Web Services

    The latest application Web service calls can be found in the sbmappservices72 WSDL. The latest administrative Web service calls can be found in the sbmadminservices72 WSDL. All TeamTrack Web services and earlier SBM Web services (including ttwebservices, aewebservices70, and aewebservices71) are still compatible with this release. However, these WSDLs have been deprecated and will not contain any of the new calls or parameters found in SBM Web services version 7.2. For new Web service implementations, use SBM Web services version 7.2.

Build Numbers

The following component build numbers apply to this version:

  • SBM User Workspace: Build 165
  • SBM Composer : Build 050
  • SBM Application Administrator: Build 165
  • Application Repository: Build 107

Third-Party Tools

For third-party software information, refer to:

Third Party Copyrights

Third Party Client Licenses

Third Party Suite Licenses

What's New

The following features have been added in this release.

Hybrid SSO

Single Sign-On (SSO) now has extended capabilities that enable it to integrate with third-party authentication systems via the SSO server. This enables users to log in to SBM On-Demand automatically without having to supply login IDs or passwords. For details, see solution S139337.

Time Capture

Users can now record the amount of time they spend working on primary items. Time can be captured on State and Transition forms. A time summary shows the total time captured for a particular item for all users. Time Capture changes are also noted in the Change History section.

This feature is disabled by default, but can be enabled at the Base Workflow level in SBM Application Administrator. Once enabled, Time Capture options are available on all quick and custom forms. You can add the Time Capture widget to custom forms in SBM Composer to explicitly place Time Capture options.

Social View

A "social" view has been added to all primary items. This alternative view of item details that enables users to easily collaborate on items. The view includes an item feed and journal log, along with the ability to "follow" an item and see a list of experts.

The Social view is enabled by default, but can be disabled for your system. For details, refer to the SBM Application Administrator Guide.

Improved Create Report Page

The Create Report page in SBM User Workspace has been improved. Users can now view available reports by category, including brief descriptions and sample images for each report type. Users can also search for a report type by name and select the desired report template after previewing a sample image, all from the new launch page.

Scheduled Reports

Users can now schedule reports to run at a particular day and time and have the results e-mailed to them. Users can easily schedule reports to execute and send on a recurring basis by simply selecting a report to run, the frequency it should run, and the exact time it should be executed. Users can add, delete, and manage their own scheduled reports from the User Profile section of SBM User Workspace.

In addition:

  • You can limit the number of items that appear in a scheduled report by changing the Scheduled Report Items setting in the Display options tab in SBM System Administrator.
  • Administrators can allow users to CC scheduled report e-mails to other users and groups with Regular User or Managed Administrator product access by granting the new System privilege CC Scheduled Reports to Other Users.
  • A new scheduled report notification is created for each report that your users schedule. In Application Administrator, you can edit the e-mail template for each scheduled report notification that is created. This means that all users can use the same e-mail template, or you can customize the e-mail template for each scheduled report that your users create.
  • New template tags that are only applicable to scheduled reports e-mail templates have been added. For details on working with scheduled report e-mail templates, see the SBM Application Administrator Guide.

Summary Reports

Summary Reports have been updated to improve usability and functionality. Some of the enhancements include:

  • Ability to expand and collapse the rollup levels to easily control the display of different summary levels.
  • Ability to dynamically modify which summary columns are displayed by using a slider to determine the summary levels to display.
  • Links to display a Listing report of the items at that particular summary level.
  • Ability to display the actual items included under each summary level.
  • Ability to create a Summary Report at the root project level.
  • Ability to report on Time Capture entries.

Custom End-user Help

Solution designers can now provide custom application-specific help to end users. Information added in SBM Composer for workflows, states, transitions, fields, and custom forms appears in the SBM User Workspace as hover help (transitions and fields) or as a help window (workflows, fields, forms, states, and transitions).

The following changes were made to support custom help:
  • Description fields for applications, workflows, states, transitions, forms, and fields are now labeled End-user help text in SBM Composer.
  • Information in the End-user help text setting for each element is visible to end-users. Privileges control users' access to field content, however.
  • The number of allowed characters in End-user help text fields for workflows, states, transitions, and fields has increased from 255 characters to 900.
  • HTML tags included in the End-user help text are rendered in the custom help.
  • Information provided in the Description field for applications now appears as hover text for the Application tab in the SBM User Workspace.
Upgrade Considerations:
  • If you provided descriptions for applications, workflows, states, transitions, and custom forms in SBM Composer before SBM 10.1.2, you should review the information before you upgrade. After the upgrade, it is visible to users.

    You can use the End-user Help icon located on the Home ribbon bar in SBM Composer to search for content in the End-user help text setting.

  • For existing process apps, solution help for custom forms uses the same mechanism as quick forms until you deploy the process apps from SBM Composer.

User Replacement

You can use the new References feature in SBM Application Administrator to view and transfer certain application settings from one user to another. For example, if a user leaves your organization, you can use this feature to transfer User field default values, role assignments, notification subscriptions, and other settings to a different user.

Delegation of Primary Items

The new out-of-office feature allows users to delegate active primary items they own to another user for a specific time period. Administrators can also create out-of-office entries on behalf of users.

Delegation applies to fields defining primary ownership of items. For example, an IT Technician field may be set as the owner in an "Assigned" state. Once the out-of-office entry expires, all delegated items are returned to their original owner, except for those that have moved to another state or to a different owner.

Delegations are recorded in the State Change History and Change History sections for each item.

Notification Channels

Notification Channels enable you to send SBM notifications to your users through different messaging services in addition to standard e-mail. This means you can notify users not only through e-mail, but also through other means such as instant message (IM) like Google Talk, social networks like Twitter, or short message service (SMS).

New Actions for Notifications

Two new actions have been added to notifications: Run Transition and Run ALF Event.

The new Run Transition action performs a transition as a specific user against the item that triggered the notification. For example, when an item reaches a certain state, you can have the system perform a transition against the item when a notification rule becomes true. The change history will show that the transition was executed by the user that you specified.

The new Run ALF Event action executes an event as a specific user in connection with the item that triggered the notification. For example, you can have the system send an event to the Orchestration Engine, which can then execute an orchestration workflow when a notification rule becomes true. The change history will show that the changes were invoked by the user that you specified.

New Transition Operator for Notification Rules

You can now use the new "Transition" operator in notification rules. The "Transition" operator enables you to send notifications when a certain transition occurs. For example, to send a notification when the Close transition occurs, select the "Transition" operator, the "Is" comparison, and the "Close" transition from the value drop-down list in the notification rule editor.

Additional Changes

The following sections describe additional features that have been changed or added to SBM 10.1.2.

SBM User Workspace Changes

E-mail Changes

  • Navigation and search options have been improved for the Send E-mail dialog box.
  • The E-mail icon is now available next to Multi-User fields in primary and auxiliary items.

Date/Time Widget

Improvements have been made to the calendar pop-up used to populate Date/Time fields on submit, transition, and update forms and search filters for most report types.

Report Changes

New Operator Conditions in Reports Field Specification

Two new operators have been added to the reports Field Specification section in SBM User Workspace: is empty and is not empty. You can use these operators to return items that do not have field values or return items that do. This simplifies report creation because you no longer need to use Advanced SQL to query for empty values.

Elapsed Time and Calculated Fields Changed for Export to Excel

Elapsed time values that are exported to Microsoft Excel appear in hours:minutes:seconds format that excludes calculated days regardless of the display settings in SBM Composer. This is due to a limitation in Excel in which the format does not calculate days. In addition, all calculated field values that are exported to Excel are now represented as date/time values, except for elapsed time values that are negative. These values are represented in text format because Excel does not support negative time values. This means that an exported report might display a combination of date/time and text values in the same column.

Graphical Reports Available for Duration and Trend Reports

Additional graphical report options are now available for the following Duration and Trend reports:

  • Duration reports – Time in State, Average Time to State, Elapsed Time
  • Trend reports – Backlog, Entering a State, Open and Completed, State Activity
Note: The pie chart graphical report type is not supported by the Entering a State report.

Drill-Down Display Options Added to Tabular Trend Report Results

You can now configure drill-down display options for tabular and graphical Trend reports.

Miscellaneous Changes

The Notifications tab in the User Profile has changed. Users can now search for notifications and select the notification channels in which the message should arrive.

Administrator Changes

SBM Application Administrator Improvements

Navigation Improvements
  • SBM Application Administrator users can now create bookmarks to commonly used features, such as projects, users, and groups. These bookmarks are available in SBM Application Administrator and in the Administration Links folder in the SBM User Workspace. You can now expand and collapse the process app and project trees. When you expand the project tree, all projects assigned to the selected parent project are returned, along with the hierarchy placement and assigned workflow. The hierarchy placement and assigned workflow are also shown in project search results.
  • The name of the page you are currently viewing now appears at the end of the main navigation link.
  • Process apps can now be sorted by name, and project can be sorted by name, project hierarchy, or assigned workflow. This sorting is for viewing purposes in Application Administrator only.
  • The new Items Per Page setting enables you to control the number of items that display on pages that contain long data lists, such as projects, fields, users, groups, and notifications.
  • Project selection is now saved when you grant user and group privileges on the Item, Field, Attach, Note, and Report privileges tabs and when you grant managed administration privileges on the Projects and Fields tabs. This prevents you from having to navigate to a project repeatedly to assign privileges on each tab.
  • Changes to project-based privileges and role assignments for users and groups are now listed in a Changes pane for each editing session. This enables you to save your changes for multiple projects at one time rather than incrementally for each project.
  • The parent project name is now listed after the double periods at the top of the project hierarchy. For example, a root application project may appear as .. (Project Name). In previous releases, only the double periods were shown.
Workflow Migration
  • Certain application workflow settings have been added to SBM Application Administrator. Click the Workflows icon on the Administrator portal to open the Workflows view and access workflows you have privileges to manage.
  • You can now add user and group selections for User, Multi-User, and Multi-Group fields to workflows in SBM Application Administrator. This ensures that user and group selections are available to all projects assigned to the workflow and to sub-workflows. You can enable and disable selections for specific projects and sub-workflows as needed.
  • You can now set default values for User, Multi-User, and Multi-Group fields to workflows in SBM Application Administrator. You can then override these values for these field types in projects and transitions in projects.
  • Transition restrictions have been migrated from projects to workflows. You can now set group restrictions for transitions at the workflow level, making them available to all projects assigned to the workflow and to sub-workflow. You can also view item and role restrictions set in SBM Composer.

Improvements for Notifications

  • The following improvements have been made to the $CHANGES() tag:
    • You can now configure the number of change history entries that appear in an e-mail notification by editing the e-mail template and specifying the desired number of entries in the $CHANGES() tag.
    • If an attachment is added or updated as part of the change, a link to the file attachment now appears in the associated change action as part of the $CHANGES() output.
    • Additionally, you can now apply a CSS style to the $CHANGES() tag to enhance the appearance of the table that is displayed in the e-mail message.
  • You can now display a comma-separated list of users that are subscribed to a notification by adding the $ALLRECIPIENTS() template tag to your notification e-mail templates.
  • You can now display the number of repeated notifications by adding the $REPEATCOUNTER() template tag to your notification e-mail templates.
  • Note: The following option only appears in Application Administrator if Serena Orchestrated Ops is installed.
    In the Add/Edit Notification view, you can now designate the URL extension for item links in notifications. This allows you to include links that direct users to either the traditional User Workspace, Serena Demand Center, or Serena Request Center. For example, if you are using Serena Orchestrated Ops and you want the user to view the item in Serena Demand Center, select the Demand Center link type. Similarly, if you are using Serena Orchestrated Ops and you want the user to view the item in Serena Request Center, select Request Center.
User/Data Import Improvements
  • You can now choose whether newly imported users should receive a confirmation e-mail message that includes initial log-in information. Users must change the temporary password included in the message on their first login attempt.
  • You can now save field mapping settings for data imports from spreadsheets. This enables you to quickly import or update data for specific tables.
  • You can now copy the import log to your clipboard so you can paste it into a separate document. This applies to data and user imports from a spreadsheet in SBM Application Administrator.
Resource Management Improvements
  • Several options have been added for easing the process of adding skills and job functions:
    • When you are adding or editing a resource, you can now add skills and job functions and associate them with the user.
    • A Save and Add Another option has been added to the Skills and Job Functions general pages, enabling you to quickly add multiple skills and job functions at the same time.
    • Levels previously with skills and job functions are now saved and available in the drop-down list. This prevents users from creating multiple or inconsistent levels.
  • You can now view the team assignments for each resource on the Resources view.
  • You can now collapse and expand the team hierarchy on the Teams view.
  • When administrators rename or delete resource teams, they now receive a warning indicating that the team may be assigned to plans in Serena Demand Center and that team allocations should be removed from plans before the team is deleted.
Miscellaneous Improvements
  • The new global Mailboxes view enables you to view and manage mailboxes for all projects in your system.
  • You can now search for application variables in a project.
  • Selected values in multi-selection lists, such as values for Multi-User fields, are now indicated by a check mark.

SBM Application Repository Improvements

  • Auxiliary table data can now be excluded from a new snapshot. This can save a considerable amount of time if auxiliary tables are large.

SBM Composer Changes

Visual Compare and Merge

  • Differences you do not want to merge can now be dismissed, so you do not have to process them again in subsequent SBM Composer sessions. This is especially useful when you need to perform large or complex comparisons and need to finish the comparison in a later session. You can also easily restore dismissed differences if you change your mind.
  • Differences in the editors for the following additional design elements can now be copied to the open process app:
    • Form
    • Image
    • Application
    • Orchestration
    • Orchestration Workflow
    • Process App
    • AppScript
    • JavaScript
  • You can now move and resize each comparison window and store the arrangement as a custom layout. This is useful when you have multiple monitors, because you can maximize use of the available screen space. For example, you could move the compared process app window to its own screen. The next time you enter comparison mode, you can quickly restore this custom layout. You can also have it automatically applied each time you enter comparison mode, or reset the default layout.

User Interface Changes

  • The Common Views area on the Home tab of the Ribbon has been redesigned to split messages into their respective categories. Two new selections replace the Message List: Validation Results and Activity Log. The Validation Results displays information generated when the process app is validated. The Activity Log displays other information generated when major operations, such as deployment and other repository tasks are performed in SBM Composer.
  • There are new startup behavior options. You can specify whether the Start Page or the most recent process app (or neither) opens when SBM Composer starts. If you do not have Internet access, the startup can be faster if you do not specify the Start Page.

Validation Results

  • You can now dismiss a warning or a class of warnings in the Validation Results after deciding that the warnings can be ignored. The messages remain dismissed in subsequent validations and SBM Composer sessions with the same process app. You can remove these messages from the Validation Results. If you do not remove them, they are crossed out and in a lighter shade so you can ignore them.
  • You can now show only messages that apply to the current editor in the Validation Results.
  • Unnecessary validation warnings have been removed from the Validation Results.

Embedded Application Reports

  • Reports defined in SBM Composer can now be used in the Embedded Report widget. These report definitions can be either application reports run against a primary or auxiliary table, or reports of related items based on specific relational fields. Because the report is embedded, a user can view relevant information without having to navigate away from the form. For example, when the Embedded Report widget is based on a relational field, fields in a related item can be displayed in the widget. In a problem management application, if the widget is based on a "Workaround" Multi-Relational field, the widget will display a list of workaround items, including the category, steps, score, and so on for each workaround. The problem specialist can select the appropriate workaround based on the information in the report without having to open the workaround in another window.

    If the report definition is based on a primary table, you can specify the project to query. You can also choose to have fields that are configured with the Query at Runtime search feature to be automatically bound on the Query tab of the widget Property Editor.

Form Design

  • You can now customize the tool bar on custom forms for primary and auxiliary tables. For example, you can remove the Add Item Link item from the Actions drop-down list and instead map that action to a clickable image on the form. You can also make individual actions only available on certain forms, or remove the button bar or action bar entirely.
  • You can now globally specify whether JavaScripts that are included in forms are executed or suppressed during form preview. This option is on the Form tab of the Composer Options dialog box. By default, JavaScripts are enabled, but this setting can be overridden for individual forms in the Form Preview dialog box.
  • For field controls, you can now specify input masks to make it easier for users to enter data in the correct format. For example, with the date input mask, when users click in the text box in the SBM User Workspace, two forward slashes appear. You can select from four preformatted input masks, or define your own using a provided syntax.
  • A new form action can be defined to dynamically prevent a form from being submitted without the need for JavaScript programming.
  • Form action conditions can now be evaluated with OR logical operators. All conditions within a single section will use the logical operator you select; you cannot combine AND and OR logical operators within a single section.
  • The new Grid Style is applied to the REST Grid widget and the relational grid type of Embedded Report widget. You can customize settings, such as the colors users see for selected, highlighted, and alternate rows in the grid in the SBM User Workspace.
  • You can now edit the display text for a field on a form. This allows you to make the label on the form differ from the database table name. This can be useful when you have multiple fields that store the same kind of information (for example, a first name), but that are placed in different sections on a form. The database fields are unique, but their labels can be identical, simplifying the form design.
  • You can now export an image or icon from SBM Composer to the file system of your computer. You can also choose whether the image or icon is displayed in the Form Editor at 100% of its size so you can view details better, or adjusted to fit in the available space.
  • When you use the RESTServiceWrapper JavaScript object to query REST service results without the need to display the REST Grid widget on custom forms, both JSON data and XML (POX) data can now be accepted. For details and descriptions of new parameters, see the SBM JavaScript Library Guide or SBM Composer online Help.
  • In the REST Service Configuration dialog box, the first available array in the data set is selected by default, but you can now select another array if more than one is present. If no arrays are detected, the list includes all potential elements, and at runtime, the user must select the element that will contain repeating data.

Common Log Viewer

  • The maximum length of a Common Log message is now 1,048,576 (1 MB of data). You can specify the maximum length for your system on the Common Log Viewer tab of the Composer Options dialog box.
  • You can now specify whether Common Log messages in the Message Detail dialog box are displayed in plain text, XML, or formatted XML.
  • On the Details tab of the Common Log Viewer, there is a new option that automatically selects the latest run of the process app. The runs are now sorted in descending order, so the newest run is at the top of the Run list, and the run information is more detailed.

Concurrent Development

  • New options ensure that when multiple designers deploy to a shared environment, they are aware of the system behavior, and have the option to get the latest versions of design elements before proceeding. By default, you are now prompted before you publish if there are newer versions of design elements in the SBM Application Repository than in your Local Cache. In the message, you can specify whether the newer versions are published or ignored. These options can be set globally on the Local Cache and Repository Options tab of the Composer Options dialog box.
  • The Process App Version History command on the Composer menu |Repository submenu has been replaced by the Refresh Status All command. This command refreshes the repository status of selected design elements.

Miscellaneous

  • In application reports, a column can now be narrower than the display text, so the text will wrap in the SBM User Workspace.
  • In App Explorer, you can now view the entire tree of design elements in referenced applications, without opening the process apps containing the applications. The design elements are read-only, but you can click the yellow alert bar at the top of the applicable editor pane to open the related process app and make changes.
  • System fields, which cannot be deleted, now have an indicator to distinguish them from custom fields. There is an optional System column in the table editor, and in the field Property Editor, [System] is appended to the field type.
  • A role name is now limited to 64 characters, to prevent additional characters from being truncated in SBM Application Administrator.
  • In the roles editor, you can now sort privileges alphabetically within a group by clicking the Privileges column header before you click the other column header, or by pressing the Shift key while clicking the group column header. The sorting is remembered in the next SBM Composer session.
  • A red bookmark is now overlaid on the icons for design elements that are locked by design and cannot be modified or deleted. The bookmark appears on such icons in App Explorer, editor panes, lists, and tables.

Orchestration Changes

  • The detection, characterization, and reporting of event handling and orchestration workflow processing is more robust. In SBM Application Repository, the Event Manager Log tab and Event Summary now include additional information about events and workflows, such as their status and last processing time. The status information pertains to the various phases of event and workflow processing, and accurately depicts the correlation of events and workflows. For example, when the event status is EVENT_COMPLETE, the event is mapped to one or more orchestration workflows that all completed successfully.
  • In the purge utility, most parameters are now already supplied with default values, and do not need to be passed at the command line. In addition, the purge.bat file was moved to installationDirectory\Serena\SBM\Common\jboss405\bin.
  • In areas such as the Action Wizard for orchestration actions, the orchestration workflow Property Editor, and App Explorer, icons were added to distinguish asynchronous and synchronous orchestration workflows. In addition, on the General tab of the orchestration workflow Property Editor, "Asynchronous" or "Synchronous" is shown as the orchestration workflow type. If an orchestration workflow is not mapped to an action, a validation warning is generated.
  • When you copy and paste a step in an orchestration workflow, data mappings and other values are now copied with the step.
  • When you copy and paste a working data element on the Data Mapping tab of the Property Editor for an orchestration workflow, the values in the Source elements and Default value columns are now copied with the data element.

Web Services Changes

  • New role management calls have been added. You can now check users and groups for a specific role, return all roles for specified users or groups, and set roles for users and groups. RoleIdentifier, RoleInfo, and RoleHolder types have been added for working with roles.
  • New privilege management calls have been added. You can now check users and groups for a specific privilege, return all privileges for specified users or groups, and set privileges for users and groups. Additionally, new calls have been added that return all privilege types and return privileges by a specified type. PrivilegeKind, GrantState, PrivilegeIdentifier, PrivilegeInfo, and PrivilegeHolder types have been added for working with privileges.
  • A new RunReportXml call has been added. This call enables you to run more reports than the existing RunReport call, which only enables you to run Listing reports. The RunReportXML call enables you to specify a stylesheet in the options parameter to transform the XML result into a report that is similar to what is displayed in SBM User Workspace.

Miscellaneous Changes

  • The Java Development Kit (JDK) version provided with SBM is now JDK 1.6. Its location is installationDirectory\Serena\SBM\Common\jdk 1.6.

Documentation Changes

  • A new help splash screen has been added to the SBM Application Administrator help system, enabling easier navigation to documentation for major features.
  • The "Purging Orchestration Workflow Data" information was moved from the SBM Application Repository Guide and online Help to the SBM Orchestration Guide and the SBM Composer online Help.
  • In SBM 10.1, the SBM Application Administrator Guide stated that group restrictions for transitions will be deprecated in a future release. This feature will not be deprecated, and the statement has been removed from the document.

Fixed Issues

A list of defects fixed in this version can be found in the Knowledge Base. You must have a Serena.com user account to view items in the Knowledge Base. Register for a free account if you do not have already have one.

Known Issues

For a complete list of known issues and potential workarounds, refer to the Knowledge Base.

Administrator Issues

  • When you import users from a spreadsheet in SBM Application Administrator, you can choose to send newly imported users an e-mail message that contains their login information, including an initial password. If you choose not to send this e-mail message, you must manually change passwords and provide them to users before they can log in.

SBM User Workspace Issues

  • Users who send e-mail messages from transition forms cannot search for recipients. To work around this problem, send e-mail messages from state forms.
  • Time Capture entries are not visible on print forms.
  • Summary reports incorrectly show 0.00 hours as values for numeric fields used in calculations. This problem only occurs when the Show Items check box is selected in the report, and only for items rows. Roll-up calculations display correctly.

SBM Composer Issues

  • The WidgetBox widget has been deprecated and removed from the Form Palette. Existing WidgetBox widgets will continue to work. If a new WidgetBox widget is needed on a form, you can paste the JavaScript code into an HTML/Javascript widget.

Orchestration Issues

  • If a Service step in an orchestration workflow maps to a dynamic endpoint (that is, the URL for the endpoint is defined in the step properties), the workflow can fail because it cannot find the Web service. To work around this problem, copy the orchestration workflow and in the new "dummy" workflow, remove the dynamic mapping. The presence of this dummy workflow will allow the lookup service to find the Web service in the problematic workflow.