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About FlowsA flow defines a business process or part of a business process. A flow governs how work items are created, progress through your application, and become resolved (completed). A flow consists of a network of shapes and connectors (lines), each with associated parameters and values.
Flows are the fundamental rules that represent business processes. They determine who works on a work item in what sequence, what decisions and processing occur automatically, and other aspects of the business process.
After you complete and save the Flow form, click the Run toolbar button (
) to create a new work item with the flow. (The Run toolbar button is visible only for starter flows — flows with Creates a new work object? selected on the Process tab.)
Use the Process tab to constrain which users can execute this flow. Use the Parameters tab to identify flow parameters to be supplied when a flow execution starts. Use the Diagram tab to explore a flow interactively and preview the rules it references, including the runtime appearance of user forms.
Use the Diagram tab to edit the flow. On the Diagram tab, choose one of the three diagram modes in which to edit the flow: Process Modeler, Microsoft Visio, and Discovery Map. Your choice of editor does not affect the functional operation of the flow at runtime.
You can edit a process using the Discovery Map view only if the process was not previously edited using either the Process Modeler or Visio. If the process was previously edited using one of the other editing modes, the Discovery Map view is in read-only mode. In read-only mode, while you can review the information associated with each step in the process, you cannot edit the associated information or the process itself in that view. When the Discovery Map view is in read-only mode, a lock icon is displayed next to the name of the process at the top of the Discovery Map view (for example 
). This condition applies to any editing performed on the process at any point in its history. For example, if the process was previously edited in Visio, and you save a copy of the flow using another name, the Discovery Map view is read-only because the process itself had been edited in Visio previously.
Note: The Microsoft Visio diagram mode is available on the Diagram tab only if the flow was originally created and saved using a Visio-based template, and not later converted to use the Process Modeler mode. See Flows — Completing the New or Save As form for how to create a Visio-based flow.
Flows containing too many shapes can introduce complex, difficult-to-understand processing into your application. As a best practice, limit a flow to contain 15 or fewer shapes. If your flow grows to contain more than 15 shapes, revise the flow to call or branch to subprocesses to handle continuations, special cases, or non-mainstream processing.
Editing with the Discovery Map view
Beginning in V6.2 SP2, you can edit a flow using the Discovery Map view, a graphical design tool used to provide a high-level presentation of steps in the flow, including the subprocesses and alternate paths. See Basics of editing with the Discovery Map view for descriptions of the shapes and how to work with the process in this view.
Processes in flows that are created using Visio-based templates (such as the VisioFlow and VisioScreenFlow templates) are presented in read-only mode in the Discovery Map view. For such processes, in the Discovery Map view, while you can review the specification information (if any) associated with the shapes, you cannot directly edit the process in that view.
Editing with the Process Modeler
Introduced in V6.2, Process Modeler allows you to create and edit flows without Microsoft Visio. You can convert flows that use Visio, both those created in V6.2+ and flows created in earlier versions, to use Process Modeler. See Process Modeler basics.
As a best practice for new development, use Process Modeler rather than Visio to create and edit flows.
Click a link for details on these flow shapes and features.
You may edit any flow using Microsoft Visio, excluding flows that were initially created using Process Modeler and flows created with Visio but later converted to Process Modeler.
Click the Flow Editor toolbar button (
) to start Microsoft Visio and edit the flow. If Visio presents a warning about macros, select the choice to trust the publisher (source). (See How to set up Visio.)
Click the Return button (
) when you complete Visio editing.
To change the shape properties of an existing shape, but not alter the structure and relationships among shapes, access the Design tab, right-click a shape, and select the Edit tab.
As a best practice, ensure that everyone in your development team is using a common version of Visio. PRPC operates identically for Visio versions 2003 and higher. However, when you save a flow edited with one version of Visio, that rule cannot later be edited using a lower version.
These topics describe aspects of flow editing:
After you complete initial development and testing, you can delegate selected flows to line business managers. The Diagram tab of the Flow form provides managers with access to the fields most often updated.
For each flow in your application, consider which business changes might require rule updates, and whether to delegate the rule to non-developers who then can make such updates directly. See How to build for change.
Select 
> Process & Rules > Processes > Process Explorer to display the flows in the current application. See Process & Rules category — Processes landing page.
Use the Rules Explorer to list all the flows available to use.
Flows are part of the Process category. A flow is an instance of the Rule-Obj-Flow rule type.
Flows are normally stored in the PegaRULES database as rows of the pr4_rule_flow table.
Process category
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