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OVERVIEW

Actionabl.ai is a platform that automates your business processes and alerts users whenever human intervention is needed. 

This guide covers the Controller Dashboard, which is central to managing the flow of automated processes through the system and enables monitoring and reporting on the workflows being managed in Actionabl.

Related Documents:

• Task Management covers all aspects of the Task Manager dashboard, which includes:
  • Process and Task concepts, organization, and management
  • Process View basics
  • Automation management, including processes, tasks, connectors, and rules 
• User Management includes asset and access control for users through Groups and Departments
• Automation, Task, & Rule Administration covers the core of setting up and managing the tasks, automations, connectors, and rules that make up the process flows.

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CONTROLLER DASHBOARD OVERVIEW

Two modules are unique to the Controller dashboard: Control Center and Process Analytics. 

For convenience, you can also access the Search tools, Process View, and Error Tasks queue directly from the Controller menu. 

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Control Center

The Control Center can be thought of as air traffic control at a busy airport. This is where you: 

• Manage the flow of data and items through the system via automations and tasks
• Schedule routine and repetitive operations through cron jobs
• Manage the AI Spaces that automate machine-learning tasks by checking their status, pausing them, or starting them.

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Process Analytics

The Process Analytics dashboard gives you a visual overview of how items are moving through your automation based on reports and charts that your system administrator builds to monitor your metrics.

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AUTOMATION MANAGER

The Automation Manager module shows you all automations and tasks configured in the system, with an at-a-glance view of their status (running, paused, failed, etc.).

It contains 2 tabs:  

• Automations is the overview of all tasks and processes running in the system. 
• Schedules lists all of the schedules that can be used to manage a task or process listed on the Automations tab.

Each automation or task shows:

• The process in which it’s running
• The task associated with it
• How it is executing (Standalone, Call, External, or Polling)
• Its current status and last run time

In the Process Name or Task Name fields, an asterisk (*) indicates that the automation is a “Common Process Automation.” This means that it runs across all processes or tasks, so any change in its status will affect all items flowing through the system. Examples include data or report archives, which run across the entire system.

To see all of the automations and tasks relating to a specific process, select the process from the dropdown at the top right. This activates the process filter; when this filter is on, you will not see any Common Process Automations listed.

Pausing An Automation

This should be done whenever you make changes to an automation or task configuration, ensuring that items queued for processing follow the new configuration. 

To pause an automation, click the green indicator on its right.

When it has been fully paused, the indicator will turn red.

To restart a paused automation, click its red indicator. Once it has restarted, the indicator turns green.

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Refreshing Automation Status

To refresh any automation, click the yellow “refresh” icon on the far right of the line. This will pause the current job and restart it. This can be useful in troubleshooting if a process or item appears “stuck.”

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AUTOMATION SCHEDULER

The Automation Scheduler is where you build or edit the schedules that manage the automations and tasks listed in the Automation Manager.

The list shows all of the existing schedules. There are both standalone and process-specific schedules in the list.

• Standalone schedules are applied to any matching item flowing through the system, regardless of the process or task it is in.

  In the example, the Standalone schedule “Read Support Emails” runs each time a new email is received that matches the definition within the schedule.

• Process-specific schedules only examine items while they are flowing through the specified process or task. If they match during that time, the schedule applies to them.  

  In the example, the Process schedule “Task Notification Email” will be run only against items currently in the send_notification process and the send_email task.

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Viewing and Editing Automation Schedule Details

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Configuring Disable Rules for Automations

There are cases where you will want an automation rule to be selective about when and how it runs within a process. Some examples include:

• You want to notify customers about proofing only if an invoice exceeds a threshold amount.
• Certain vendors have asked not to receive emails about individual order invoice payments because they prefer an end-of-month summary statement.
• You want a conditional case that alerts a user and shows new fields if a field has a specific value. For example, in processing a loan application, if a user has input “Owns” for home ownership, pause the automation and display new fields asking about mortgage balances, real estate taxes, etc.

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Using An Existing Rule

1. In the Automation Scheduler list, click the expander icon to the right of the automation you want to apply the rule to.

2. Click the blue Edit button to enter Edit mode.
   

3. Click the selection icon in the Disable Rule field.

4. The existing rules are displayed in the list. To view their details, click on the expand icon to the right of any rule.
   

   If you need to adjust a rule’s definition, remember that changes you make here will take effect in ALL automations that use this rule.

5. Click the green Duplicate button to create a new copy of the rule if the changes apply only to this automation. The copy appears immediately below the existing one. Make changes in this NEW copy, then save and select the new rule.
   

After saving your change to the rule, reactivate the automation so it restarts with the new rule definitions.

1. Go to Automation Manager in the Control Center.
2. Find the automation on the list.
3. If you deactivated it before making changes, all you need to do is click the red play button to restart it.
4. If you did not deactivate it first, you need to refresh it so the changes take effect. This will stop the automation and restart it. Click the orange refresh button on the right of the rule, then click Yes in the popup. You will see the automation’s status change to “Restarting” for a few seconds and then back to “Running” once the refresh is complete

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Creating a New Disable Rule

If none of the rules match what you need, you can create a new disable rule. There are two ways to do this:

• Duplicate an existing rule as a starting point. This is recommended where possible as it will save you time and promote better consistency.
• Create a rule from scratch. Best used when no existing rules are close to your desired result.

1. In the Automation Scheduler list, click the expand icon to the right of the automation you want to apply the rule to.
2. Click the blue Edit button to enter Edit mode.
3. Click the selection icon in the Disable Rule field and view the existing rules in the list.
   
4. Click the expand icon to the right of any of the rules to see its details.
   
5. If one is fairly close to the rule you want to create, click the green Duplicate button while viewing the rule. This makes a copy that will open just underneath the original rule.
   
   Edit the rule as needed, then save it to activate it in the Automation.
   

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Creating a Rule from Scratch

If no rules in the list are close to the one you need, create a new rule from scratch by clicking the green plus sign at the top right of the popup.

1. Select a Category for the new rule.
   

2. Select the rule’s Type. This determines the fields you have available to build the logic for the rule. Details of the logic available for each type are covered in the next section, Building Rule Logic.
   

3. Enter a unique ID. This ID is restricted to letters, numbers, and underscores. No spaces or special characters are allowed.

4. Enter the rule’s Name. This is what appears on the popups when you select a rule or when you view an automation’s configuration, so it should be unique and clearly describe the rule’s scope. For example, “Amount LT 1000” or “Opted out of daily invoices”

   NOTE: Names must contain no special characters other than underscore (_), dash (-), and period (.). They can contain spaces and alphanumeric characters.

5. Click the “Active” box (if it is not already selected) to indicate that the rule should apply when it is saved and the automation is restarted.

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Building Rule Logic

Actionabl looks at the values and criteria defined here in the logic section and bypasses the automation for any record that evaluates “YES” against these criteria. The logic section, where you build this logic, changes depending on the Type selected in the top line.

Regardless of the rule type, click the green plus sign to the right of the criteria header to get started adding the logic:

Default Rule

This defines a condition that, when matched, causes the item to be bypassed when the automation runs. 

In this example, attached to the “AutoPay” automation, any invoice with a total amount greater than or equal to $1000 will disable the AutoPay automation.

You can “stack” additional conditions onto this rule. At the top of the condition list, select whether the conditions should be boolean AND or OR, and click the green plus sign to add a new row.

The green “grouping” icon next to the green plus lets you add a condition group. A condition group is treated as a single condition in evaluating the boolean AND/OR above it. Let’s look at some examples to clarify this.

This example disables autopay for any invoice greater than or equal to $1000.

This example disables autopay for invoices greater than $1000 plus ANY invoice from supplier “VendX” for any amount. Using boolean OR matches against either one of these conditions.

The following example uses grouping. It disables autopay for invoices greater than or equal to $1000 but ONLY if they are Manually Completed OR from supplier VendX.

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Defining Additional Actions

You may also define additional actions that happen when these conditions are met. These actions are taken after the automation is disabled and can be: 

• Setting a field value that is saved on the record
• Setting an error message that generates an error task and stops further execution
• Calculating a value that can be used within this process (for example, in a Javascript expression)

Click the green plus sign on the right of the Action field to define more actions.

In the following example, Error Message is the action type, which generates an error task for the user to resolve and stops the task’s execution.

Click Save to finish, and then select the rule you just created to apply it to the task.

This rule will now also be available in the Disable Automation list for all other tasks and can be selected for reuse there.

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Expression Rule

Expression rules are built using the same techniques as the default rule, but instead of selecting fields and values to match, you define those conditions using Javascript expressions.

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Javascript Rule

This rule type uses Javascript (either in an attached file or a function entered directly here) to determine the eligibility of a record to run this automation.

Either click the [ ] icon in the Script File field to select an existing script file or enter the javascript code directly in the Script field.

Once you’ve selected a file or entered a script, you can set parameters that govern how that script should behave. Click the green plus sign to the right of Rule Parameters to open that section.

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AI SPACE MANAGER

AI spaces are components that are part of the machine-learning tasks within a process. The computing needs of an AI space are usually intense, so they are set up as separate-but-trusted environments that work as components within Actionabl.

AI spaces are typically used for classification or language detection models. These trained models sit separately from the core of Actionabl but are used by Actionabl within a process. In many ways, they run like an external component, but they are trusted items.

When the Actionabl team sets up your system, the AI spaces are also set up as part of that process, so client users cannot edit these spaces. 

AI Space Manager is used simply to check the status, pause, or start one of the AI spaces, as needed.

Details of an AI space include whether it is running, the mode(s) enabled, and a count of the current workers running in the space.

• Status: Not started or Running. A running space is available for use within a process. If a required space is not running, any process that depends on it will fail.
• API Mode: The space is set up to be accessible via an API connection.
• Worker Mode: The space allows multiple threads to run simultaneously for parallel processing.
• Worker Count: This shows how many worker threads are actively running in the space.

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CRON JOB SCHEDULER

The Cron Job Scheduler in Actionabl is where you set up a task to run and match it with a schedule you’ve defined under Cron Schedules. This process creates a cron job.

Cron jobs are tasks that are managed by a time-based scheduler that is built into all Unix-based operating systems. You use a cron schedule to specify precisely when and with what frequency the task or script should execute, such as “every 15 minutes” or “every other Thursday at 2 PM”.

The Cron Job Scheduler shows all cron jobs currently set up:

To set up a new cron job schedule, click the green plus icon at the top right of the screen.

The Type is either Report, Batch Job, or Task Event. When you pick one, the appropriate additional fields appear to set it up.

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Report Cron Setup

1. Specify a unique Name for the cron. This should be informative when browsing the list of all crons. For example, bank_invoice_process_run_daily_2am
2. Click the browse bracket in the Cron Schedule field, then select which of the available schedules you wish for this job. You can add a new schedule by clicking the green plus icon at the top right of the screen.
   
3. Click on the browse brackets in the Report Definition field to select the report script to schedule. 
4. The email template can be left blank to use the system’s default. Alternatively, click the browse brackets to select a different template.
   

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Batch Job Cron Setup

1. Specify a unique Name for the cron. This should be informative when browsing the list of all crons. For example, bank_invoice_process_run_daily_2am
2. Click the browse brackets [ ] in the Cron Schedule field, then select which of the available schedules you wish for this job. You can add a new schedule by clicking the green plus icon at the top right of the screen.
   
3. Click on the browse brackets in the Batch Job Script field to select the script to schedule. 
   

• In the list of locations, browse to select the script file you want to schedule. If an item shows as a Folder type, click it to see the files inside it. Click the double dots .. to go up a level in browsing. When you find the script file you want, click it to select it.
  
• Click the green Save button. If the script is marked Active it will run on the next scheduled cron time.

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Task Event Cron Setup

1. Specify a unique Name for the cron. This should be informative when browsing the list of all crons. For example, send_docusign_daily_9am
2. Select the Event Type. Events are predefined in the system by your system administrator.
   
3. Click the browse brackets in the Cron Schedule field, then select which of the available schedules you wish for this job. You can add a new schedule by clicking the green plus icon at the top right of the screen.
   

Cron Schedules

The Cron Schedules module defines all of the possible schedules that a task could use for its run schedule. It is prepopulated with some common schedules.

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Add A New Cron Schedule

1. Click the green plus sign at the top right of the screen.
2. Enter a unique ID for the schedule. The ID must contain only letters, numbers, underscores, and dashes, and it cannot contain spaces.
   
3. Type a Name for this schedule. The name will appear to users on the list of schedules.
4. Ensure that Active is checked.
5. Click the plus sign on the right of the cron schedules to start setting up the parameters.
   

• You can specify an optional Effective Start Date and Effective End Date for the schedule, which is helpful if you create a temporary cron job.

• Likewise, you can specify an Effective Start Time and Effective End Time. If you leave these fields blank and specify a start and end date, the job will start at midnight on the start date and end at 11:59 PM on the end date.

• Click the browse brackets to specify Disable Rule(s) that disqualify items from being included in this cron job. For details about defining rules, see Configuring Disable Rules for Automations.

• Click the browse brackets next to Cron Expression to set up the schedule for jobs to run.
  

• Check each appropriate box to build the schedule you want. You can select single or multiple options in each section or select “No Restriction” for sections that do not apply.
  
  The following example sets the schedule to run daily at 9 PM:
  

  HINT: If you are used to setting up cron jobs using crontab code, the code generated by the schedule is shown at the bottom for ease of verification.

• Click Save at the top right to save this parameter.
  

• You can continue adding parameters to this cron schedule if you need.

• When the schedule contains all of the necessary parameters, click the green Save button to save it. If the “Active” box at the top is checked, this also activates the schedule.