Need a Workflow Editor Alternative
Good morning,
My team has been unable to successfully install the Eclipse plugin, so I am looking for an alternative to the Flowable Eclipse plugin.
I’ve opened several trouble tickets with Collibra–but after much troubleshooting, we still do not have a solution.
I have tried the Flowable all-in-one Docker image, but the Flowable Modeler that comes in the docker isn’t fully compatible. Many capabilities from the Eclipse Plugin version are missing on Modeler, including the ability to edit the BPMN code.
I am currently using Visual Studio Code to make BPMN changes, but it treats bpmn files as xml–no groovy auto-complete for example.
Has anyone else had problems installing Flowable Plugin for Eclipse? Are there alternatives that my team and I might be able to try?
Thank you!
Roger
castonstack1
·3 years ago · EditedHey all,
Was going through this exact same scenario. I was able to figure out what link needs to be followed to install the plugin into Eclipse.
Note that the location is not the https://flowable.org/designer/update/ location that the Collibra documentation notes, the location is: https://activiti.org/designer/update/. Flowable is a fork off of the Activiti project. Activiti kept their URL up (as of now) for the 5.22 version that was forked off. As far as I’ve seen, there is not any functional changes between the Flowable and the Activiti forks. The “Flowable Explorer” references in documentation can be replaced with the “Activiti Explorer.”
The only “issues” with installation occur if Groovy is not already installed. It will show an error that Groovy cannot be installed from this repository. Going through the normal Eclipse plugin, you can get Groovy working.
rogermanga1
OP3 years ago · EditedCastor,
Thank you for the suggestion.
Unfortunately, this solution did not work for me still.
I’m not sure if this has to do with installing groovy or not, but I cannot access the Eclipse store to download a Groovy plugin if that is a requirement.
But thanks for the info!
castonstack1
·3 years ago · EditedIt doesn’t appear to be an issue with Groovy. It’s looking like that there is an issue with missing certs within your version of the JRE, or if your security policies are prohibiting the download. In an old Eclipse forum, the exact same issue is cited can be found here: https://www.eclipse.org/forums/index.php/t/1102068/.
I don’t think it will make a difference, but utilizing https:// in your URL for Activiti may get the cert resolved if it’s on the Activiti side rather than your domain security policies.
rogermanga1
OP3 years ago · EditedThanks, Tony and Arthur, great suggestions!
Unfortunately, our team is not able to use Collibra Workflow Designer because it isn’t FedRAMP compliant. In theory this sounds like a great solution though, if only our team could use it–although Arthur also makes a good point about it being beta and possibly lacking features.
Arthur your issue installing Flowable sounds quite similar to the problem that we are having as well.
I had asked our IT Help Desk for help installing Flowable, but they couldn’t figure it out either…
I had also come across that article but unfortunately it didn’t help my case.
We tried using a “known good” Flowable (package provided by a teammate), another one that was provided to me by the Collibra Support tech, as well as the packages listed on their GitHub like the one link listed in the article. None made a difference for me.
I had also tried different versions of Eclipse (Mars 2,Mars 3, Neon2, Neon3, Latest Release, x64 version, and x32 versions. We tried to install it in different directories, I even tried uninstalling my Java and re-installing it to make sure that my JDK wasn’t malformed–no luck.
After much troubleshooting, we decided to look for an alternative solution.
I was able to set up Docker Modeler on my machine, via the Flowable Docker all-in-one image. However it is pretty limited in features… so we’re still looking for an alternative still.
arthurburkhardt
·3 years ago · EditedWow…
That sounds like a typical corporate adventure
Last suggestion: have you thought about setting up eclipse on a totally different machine, outside of all corporate networks (e.g. personal laptop, server machine, etc.) then zipping the project folder and reimporting into your corporate machine?
The workspace contains all the plugins and configurations, you just have to zip it, copy to the other machine, unzip, import the project into eclipse.
rogermanga1
OP3 years ago · EditedHaha, spot on!
Great suggestion–although my team was hoping for a long-term alternative solution, this could be a quick fix for the time being. I’m not allowed to use a personal USB drive on my work computer, but perhaps I could try emailing the files to myself.
Thanks for the suggestion, and the laugh!
arthurburkhardt
·3 years ago · EditedAnother random thought: if your company is replacing ssl certificates, have you made sure your company root CA has been loaded to the JRE used to run eclipse?
You need key tool to add it to your JRE trust store (usually in a file called cacerts)
rogermanga1
OP3 years ago · EditedAh, a very good question!
I do not recall ever doing so, although I think that it should’ve been fine without loading the Certs–since I was trying to install the Flowable plugin using a local package (as opposed to the online web address).
However, I’m intrigued to see if that could make a difference, so I will give this a try and report back.
Thanks again, Arthur!
arthurburkhardt
·3 years ago · EditedGood idea to use workflow designer, but it’s still in beta and lacking features compared to the traditional workflow development.
My team had issues installing the flowable plugin because of corporate networking policies.
Granted all attempts to solve it have failed, I would recommend to try the following:
tonyhoang
·3 years ago · EditedHi Roger,
Did you try Collibra Workflow Designer ?
https://developer.collibra.com/workflows/workflow-documentation
It is the web version of Collibra to replace Eclipse (in beta), many customers are already using it.
If it is not activated by default on your instance, it must be activated in the Collibra console in the configuration page
Best Regards,
Tony