A workflow is a set of statuses and transitions that and object moves through during its life cycle and typically represents processes within your organization. There are individual workflows for the modules Requirements, Test, Hazard, Reliability and FMEDA. This workflows are bound to the listed modules and can only used for the relevant ones. The workflows will be saved in your repository, and affect all projects. The following table shows which objects of the modules can be assigned with states:

SOX Module	Object(s)	State

SOX Module	Object(s)	State
FMEDA/BOM	Modules, Components	Open
Requirements	Modules, Requirements	Open
Test	Test Case
	Test Run
Hazard	Ratings

Customizing Workflows

Workflows can be customized to suit your requirements. You can define or edit transitions, states or actions.

For opening the workflows

1. Click on the Administration menu .

2. Choose Edit state machines.

3. Select your desired workflow. - Outcome: the selected workflow will be opened.

Note
Edits of workflows are not saved automatically. Be sure to click on Save or (Ctrl + S) when you exit the workflow editor. A (*) symbol in front of the workflow name displays changes to the workflow which are not already saved.

The workflow editor is similar for all workflows and is divided into the following parts:

Transitions [1]

In the transition matrix you can edit the transitions and subsequently define actions between two statuses.
After you have created a new state and action, you can click inside the empty cell between two states and
choose the desired action.

States [2]

In the state matrix you can organize your states for the current workflow. You can create, delete and
provide them with custom icons, colors, description and set them as initial state.

To create a new state:

1. Click on the plus icon next to the state matrix. - Outcome: new rows will be added to the state and transition matrix, and a new state object will be added to the transition graph.
   2. Enter a unique ID in the ID column (Recommendation: name + State + Id). SOX puts “newStateId” as the default, which can be edited.
   3. Enter a name in the name column. SOX puts “newStateName” as the default, which can be edited.
   4. Do a double-click inside the cell in the icon column. - Outcome: the Icon selection dialog will open.

   
   In this dialog you can find all default SOX states icons. With the plus symbol you can add icons (.png) from your system. The icon size (16x16) should not be exceeded. With the x symbol you can remove a selected icon from the SOX database.
   5. Select your desired icon and click OK.
   6. Make a double-click into the cell at the color column.
   This color will be set as background color for the corresponding object at the defined state.
   7. Activate the checkbox at the initial column for setting the according state as starting state when creating a new object. Initial states can't be deleted.
   8. Optionally, enter a description for the according state.

Outcome: a state with the defined properties was created and added to the states matrix, transition matrix
and transition graph.

Actions [3]

In the action matrix you can define new actions, which are necessary to trigger a transition between
two states.

To create a new action:

1. Click on the plus icon next to the action matrix. - Outcome: a new row will be added to the action matrix.

2. Enter a unique ID at the ID column (Recommendation: name + Action + Id). SOX puts “newActionId” as the default, which can be edited.

3. Enter a name at the name column. SOX puts “newActionName” as the default, which can be edited.

4. Do a double-click inside the cell of the roles column in order to grant a SOX user permissions for executing the corresponding action.

5. Optionally, you can activate the checkbox at the auto on change column. If the auto on change function is active, every change and edit of an object leads to the transition which is assigned to this action.

Outcome: a new action was created and added to the action matrix, transition graph and can be selected at
the transition matrix.

Transition Graph [4]

The transition graph displays the workflow as a diagram. You can move the statuses in order to design the
structure of the diagram to suit your requirements.

Importing/Exporting Workflows

With the buttons in the top right corner, you can export or import workflows in SOX.
The workflows will be saved as .sxcat, which is a SOX catalogs format using XML as its base language.