Using Tasks

There are many situations in which you can use tasks to inject BI data into an application. Several possible use cases are described below.

• Support single sign-on

  You can use a task to create a MicroStrategy session that allows seamless integration between an enterprise application and MicroStrategy.  

• Create reusable functionality

  You can create functionality once in a task and then reuse it whenever and wherever that functionality is needed. For example, suppose that a company has an internal web application to help the IT team manage user accounts. This application provides the IT team with the ability to add, delete, and modify user accounts and licenses for multiple applications, including MicroStrategy. Further, suppose that this application uses the MicroStrategy Task Infrastructure to provide the functionality needed to create a new user, associate a user with a group, grant privileges to a user, associate a security filter with a user, and so on. As a result, any additional applications that require this functionality can reuse these loosely coupled functions, regardless of the implementation of the application (that is, whether it was implemented using Java, .NET, COM, Flex, etc.)  

• Make relevant BI data visible at all times and at all levels needed

  You can provide MicroStrategy report XML/HTML/JSON to a third-party application or component with a task so that you are able to inject BI seamlessly into the daily workflow of employees. For example, an e-mail application can be made to provide KPIs or team performance indicators in the corner.  

• Control the logic in a business process based on BI data

  You can use a task to control the logic in a business process based on BI data. For example, assume that there is a business process that checks the inventory-on-hand (IOH) of products offered in stores and automatically submits a request to the warehouse to ship to a store when its IOH is low. By using a task that returns the IOH for an item, this business process can take the appropriate action based on BI data that is returned.

The ability to discovery and use tasks in MicroStrategy Web is based on the role of the user. This role-based security mechanism ensures that tasks are exposed only to users with proper privileges. Task-related roles include Task Invokers, Task Developers, and Web Server Administrators. The user's role determines whether available tasks can be viewed in a GUI application, which tasks that can be viewed and executed, and which servlet is used to execute a task.

The topics in this section first describe how to build and test tasks using the Task Viewer and Task Administrator applications and then provide a step-by-step description of what is required when a task is consumed by an application.  

• Task Administrator Application

  The Task Administrator application is available to users with the role of Web Server Administrator. It provides the names, descriptions, and parameters for all of the currently registered public tasks, both administrative and non-administrative tasks. The topics in this section describe how administrators can use this application to build and test URLs that invoke tasks—both out-of-the-box tasks and custom-built tasks that have been registered.

  The Web Server Administrator role is different from the MicroStrategy Administrator role.

• Building and Testing Task URLs

  This topic provides a simple example of how to use the Task Viewer application to build and test a URL that invokes a currently registered task.  

• Consuming Tasks

  Once you have constructed and tested tasks, they are ready to be consumed. This topic describe the workflow—and the consumer requirements at each step—when a task is consumed as a service by a web application.