Governance & Best Practices

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Yoana_904337
Yoana_904337 Posts: 1
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Hi all,

I am relatively new to Catalytic (have been mostly using automation anywhere so far), and I am interested in getting some advice regarding best practices for automating workflows and what can be considered good governance. I am currently trying to build a framework that will be common for our users of Catalytic in the department to avoid scaling without any guidelines that might cause trouble in the future.

Just to clarify, an example of governance & best practice for me would be:
Governance: following a certain task/variable convention, using conditional blocks, use a workflow template etc.
Best practice: implement in email footer . --> to retrieve the email ID, implement notes and headlines etc.

I would really appreciate any inputs you have, I know practical experience dictates what are best practices and governance you can use when implementing a new tool.

Lastly, does anyone have experience with implementing some sort of error handling in Catalytic workflows?

Thanks a lot in advance!

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Best Answer

  • Chuck_146211
    Chuck_146211 Posts: 36 admin
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    Hi @Yoana_209021,

    Here's a handful of general best practices for building workflows in Catalytic, written by one of our internal builders, @Kevin_129457.

    This list is not all-encompassing, so please ask us any specific questions you may have.

    Catalytic Building - General Best Practices

    Be Aware of System Limits

    Build your workflow to operate within the current system limits

    Iteration and Version Control

    Make Use of Version Control

    • See our help site documentation for version control
    • The published version should ALWAYS be free of any defects. Never publish an untested draft
    • Make small changes. In other words, publish early and publish often
    • Consider adding a changelog to the workflow description before publishing a draft
    • Consider having a review process before publishing a draft

    Monitoring and Error Handling

    Add Logical Breakpoints with Manual Review Tasks

    After a set of automated steps executes, consider manually verifying the data with a human task like Assign Task to a Person. This is meant to catch processing errors before passing data to downstream steps.

    Common scenarios include:

    • Pauses to review a table or spreadsheet before starting a batch
    • Pause to review a PDF before and after processing in OCR steps
    • Pause to review the contents of an email before approval email steps

    💡 Consider removing the manual review task in a future iteration of the process after testing thoroughly with sufficient data

    Naming Conventions General Guidelines

    Use whatever naming convention that works for you, but be consistent

    Use Pronounceable Names


    vs

    Make Meaningful Distinctions

    How do you differentiate between these tasks at a glance?

    Use Intention Revealing Name

    A name should tell you why it exists, what it does, and how it is used. If a name requires an explanation, then the name does not reveal its intent.

    Naming a field "d"

    vs

    Naming a field "elapsedTimeInDays"

    Make Workflows/Instances/Fields Easily Searchable and Traceable

    Pick One Word per Concept

    Use the same concept across the entire workflow

    Fetch Value vs Get Value vs Retrieve Value

    If you named a module that returns data as Fetch Value, use the same concept throughout the process. Using Get Value or Retrieve Value will confuse the reader.

    General Things to Avoid

    • Don't use initials, abbreviations and codes that are not commonly understood
    • Avoid unnecessary repetition and redundancy
    • Don’t add gratuitous context. Short names are generally better than longer ones, so long as it is clear, don’t add context to a name that does not need it

    Build Testability Into the Process

    Have a Boolean "Testing" Flag for Specific Workflow Steps

    Have control over which steps you'd like to skip in your workflow for testing purposes.

    • Create a True or False type field in your workflow's Instance Fields.
    • Add conditions to any actions you may want to include/exclude in your testing.
    • Configure your workflow's action conditions to evaluate whether this testing field == true or false.

    Use case examples:
    When your Testing field == true

    • Skip or execute specific actions within your Workflow to help with debugging
    • Use test data instead of "live" data (e.g. a data table with values for testing purposes)
    • Skip API actions or actions that rely on external systems
    • Output data is sent to a specific recipient/location (add all testing data to a "Test Results" data table, Email results table to the tester)

    When your Testing field == false

    • Workflow operates normally, actions built specifically for testing purposes are skipped

    Plan How to Clean Up Test Data

    If your workflow is going generate large amounts of test data, consider automating this with a separate workflow

    • Build in a way to "reset" your input data

      • Example: If your workflow is editing a data table with new values, build in a way to reset that table

    • Remove test instances from Master Tables

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