The following flowchart shows the steps in which an Automation workflow can be defined and then linked to a skill.
Step 1: Create new or identify an out-of-the-box Automation Workflow
First, you need to validate if there is an existing out-of-the-box (OOTB) Automation Workflow already available. If available, you can directly use or modify it.
To create your own custom workflow, you can create a new workflow and just set the basic properties of the workflow. Designing the workflow is the next step.
Step 2: Design an Automation Workflow by adding Operations
The next step is to modify an existing OOTB workflow if required or design your own workflow created in Step 1. The workflow designer allows you to add different Operations to create a sequence of tasks that can be executed as per the defined path.
All Operations that can be added into a workflow are out-of-the-box. For a complete list, refer to the section on Out-of-the-box Automation Operations and Workflows below.
Step 3: Update Service Configurations
The Automation Workflow will require certain Service Configurations in order to execute successfully. For example, details and login credentials of a Server are required when trying to start a service on a Server.
You need to identify the appropriate Service Configurations for the workflow you are creating and update them here.
Step 4: Publish Automation workflow as a Service
In order to consume the Automation workflow, you will need to publish it as a Service. This is required when you want to link your Ticket Workflow to the Automation workflow.
Here you create a new Service, attach your Automation workflow to it and define the input parameters. Input parameters are those data elements that will be provided by the user.
The user will save these input parameters in ticket fields and when the Automation workflow is executed, the system will take the input data elements from the ticket fields.
Step 5: Add the Automation Workflow into Skill Fulfillment
Once you create an automation related skill, add the automation workflow as part of skill fulfillment. Select the required workflow service from the list and add the required mapping field details.
Step 6: Create Conversation Parameters
After selecting the automation workflow service as part of skill fulfillment, the next step is to add the input mapping fields for the workflow as attributes in the skill. This is done in the Conversation Parameters section of the skill by associating all the required mapping fields as inputs from the user. After the skill is saved successfully and executed, Luma prompts user to enter values for the attributes in order to execute the automation task.
Automation Terminology
| Term | Definition | Create New Allowed | Update Allowed |
|---|---|---|---|
| Operation | These are out-of-the-box operations you can use to automate typical IT tasks in your organization. | No | No |
| Workflow | Workflow is a sequence of operations which perform a definitive set of tasks. For example, you can create a workflow where you have the first operation to add a new user to your Active Directory and after this a second operation to update the worklog of your ITSM ticket. This sequence of operations is called a workflow. | Yes | Yes |
| Service Configurations | In order to execute a workflow, the system will need some configurations such as how to connect to the system where the automated task will be executed. For example, when trying to add a user to Active Directory (AD), the Automation system may need parameters such as AD server details, username, password, and more. You can store these configurations under the Service Configurations, which are used during the execution of a workflow. | No | Yes |
| Input Parameters | These are primarily used when integrating either ISM or Luma with Automation. When you want to initiate an Automation Workflow from an ISM ticket or Luma conversation, you might want to pass a few inputs into the workflow from the ticket or conversation. For example, when adding a new user to Active Directory, you might store the Login ID of the new user in the ticket, and this value is then passed from ticket to Automation Workflow. These are known as input parameters. | Yes | Yes |
| Service | When a workflow is published along with a set of Service Configurations and Input Parameters, it is exposed as a Service. An administrator can invoke a service into a ticket workflow. | Yes | Yes |
Out-of-the-box Operations and Workflows
For ease of use, we have provided some out-of-the-box operations as well as Workflows that you can start using as is.
For a complete list refer to Out-of-the-box Automation Operations and Workflows.
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