Defining Signature Accumulator rules

A Signature Accumulator rule gathers data across the set of current signature records, for use by a Statistical Override rule. You use Signature Accumulator rules when the standard signature statistics gathered by the  are not sufficient.

The  automatically populates the hidden Total fields in the join forms with the number of signature records in Pending, Approved, Rejected, Hold, More Information, Cancelled, Error, and Closed states. These values are often sufficient to construct a Statistical Override rule. If not, you can define Signature Accumulator rules to gather other data.

If a Signature Accumulator rule exists, it runs when a signature record is Approved, Rejected, or Cancelled. The  collects a set of current signature records and applies the Signature Accumulator rules for the approval process to each record (provided the Run If qualification passes). After all rules have been applied for the current signature, the  moves to the next signature and applies the rules.

A Signature Accumulator rule uses the Set Fields operation to collect and store the signature data. Typically, the Set Fields operation in a Signature Accumulator rule performs an addition to accumulate information, as in the following example:

The assignment of the Set Fields operation is always to the Detail record that the  is processing. After all rules have been applied for one signature, the  moves to the next signature and applies the rules.

To define Signature Accumulator rules

1. Follow the procedure in Creating-a-rule to complete the basic information about the rule.
   • Select Signature Accumulator from the Rule Type list.

   • Use the Run If qualification to include or exclude signatures. The Run If condition is qualified on each signature, for example:

     $Approval Status$ = "Approved"

     If the Run If condition is met, the server will perform the Set Fields operation.

2. Click the Set Fields tab.
3. In the Set Fields Type field, select the appropriate action type. See Defining-actions-for-a-rule.
4. For a query, select a form name from the From Form menu.
    This value indicates in which form to search for the query.
5. In the On Server field, select the server where the form is located.
   • Current—The form exists on the current server.
   • Alternate—The form exists on another server. In this case, type the remote server name in the Server field.
6. Enter a qualification statement to define the parameters for retrieving the authority data.
    For example, to retrieve the current approver's signature authority limit, define a qualification statement that sets $Approver$ (the current approver) to equal the user name field on the signature authority form (such as Login Name on AP-Sample:Signature Authority).
7. In the Fields Data area, enter the name of the field or fields to receive the data in the Field Name column, and a value statement or the name of each source form field in the Value column.
8. Click Save.

Example of a Signature Accumulator rule

The Get Agreement sample application includes an integrated set of Signature Accumulator and Statistical Override rules in an Ad Hoc process. See Defining-Statistical-Override-rules.