Process instance attributes are required to calculate instance-related measures and to create dimensions. When importing data in PPM event format, attributes of the process instance fragments cannot be imported directly because the instance fragment is created dynamically from a fragment definition. Object attributes of the instanced process fragment are therefore copied to the process instance.
The rules for copying object attributes to the process instance are made up of the following sections:
If the attribute type is not specified for any of the objects indicated or for the process instance, the attribute type is created with the default value specified in the #PCDATA section of the attributspec XML element.
The following example copies the AT_ID attribute for the FCT_Create_order function to the process instance. If the attribute cannot be accessed as it is not specified or the function does not exist, the attribute for the next object indicated, FCT_Create_invoice is copied.
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?>
<!DOCTYPE copyattributerules SYSTEM "copyattributerules.dtd">
<copyattributerules>
...
<copyattributerule>
<attributespec srcattrname="AT_ID"/>
...
<sourceobjectspec nodetype="OT_FUNC">
<objectname name="FCT_Create_order"/>
<objectname name="FCT_Create_invoice"/>
...
</sourceobjectspec>
</copyattributerule>
...
</copyattributerules>
The DTD CopyAttributeRules.dtd describes the structure of the XML file for the attribute copy rules:
All of the source object names specified in the configuration file reference the AT_OBJNAME_INTERN attribute.
The copying of object attributes also allows you to transfer process type information directly from the source system when using PPM event format. The attributes corresponding to the process type and the process type group are written to the process instance objects that occur in each process instance by mapping as the AT_PROCTYPE and AT_PROCTYPEGROUP attributes and are copied to the process instance using the attribute copy rules.