Relations

The Relations module is used for creating dynamic relations related to roles between entities across a solution. This is especially useful when creating many-to-many relations and can be used to always have an overview of relations between entities and personnel.

Administrators can set up specific relation types e.g. Lawyer and/or Client, and relation pairs, such as Lawyer <--> Client. Relation pairs always requires a setup with two relation types which must both be unique. Setting up a relation enables users to quickly navigate to and from entities which have some relation to each other.

Permissions can also be set up in such a way that only specific people can see certain relations. This is referred to as "Security trimming".

Relations can be set up to be displayed in a webpart on a WorkPoint page.

Setting up and configuring the Relations module in a WorkPoint solution is done through the WorkPoint Administration, which can be accessed by following these steps:

1. In your WorkPoint365 solution click the "Home" button in the upper left corner of the page.
2. In the bottom of the side panel, click the gear icon to open the WorkPoint Administration.

From the WorkPoint Administration, follow these steps to access the Relations Module settings:

1. When on the WorkPoint365 administration, click the “Relations” button in the left navigation menu.

1. Click to either enable or disable security trimming. Security trimming makes it possible to control which people can see which relations. Security trimming introduces a minor performance impact when loading relations. This should therefore only be used when necessary.

An example of the use of security trimming could be users A and B who have access to a project. Users B, C, and D also have access to a company. In this example, only user B can see a relation between the two entities.

The relationship can be exemplified as in the following image:

2. On the “Relation settings” page there are two tables: One for “Relation types” and one for “Relationtype pairs”
3. Add the relation types that you might use. An example of a relation type could be “Lawyer”, “Client” or perhaps “Partner”. Relation types added in the left table will automatically be available for use when you add a “Relationtype pair” in the right table.
4. Add some relation type pairs based on the relation types you just added. These relationtype pairs define the kind of relationships that can be formed between business module entities (eg. Companies, Projects or others)
5. When satisfied with the setup, press the “Save settings” button below the “Relationtype pairs” table.

When you have defined a set of relation types and relation type pairs, you can start setting up WorkPoint Automate processes to actually facilitate creating relations between entities in your WorkPoint solution.

You can read more about how to create such processes in this article.

Once you have set up the necessary processes for your setup, you can set up My Tools buttons to run these processes.

1. When on the WorkPoint365 administration page, click the “My Tools” button in the left navigation menu

2. Select the business module you want to add buttons to, by using the “Select instance” select menu.
3. With a button group selected, press “Add button” to create a new My Tools button configuration.

4. Enter a title for the new button.
5. Select an icon to use for the My Tools button.
6. Select whether the button should be displayed in WorkPoint 365 (the browser version of WorkPoint), in Express 365, or both.
7. Select the "User Process" type.
8. Lastly, select the WorkPoint Automate process to create relations.

Relations can be shown in WorkPoint 365 with a specialized webpart for the purpose. This webpart is called the "WP365 - Relations" webpart.

The webpart can be set up in the following way:

1. When editing a page, click the "+" button to add a new webpart.
2. Search for a fraction of the word "Relations".
3. Select the "WP365 - Relations" webpart from the list.

4. Click the "Edit" button to configure the webpart.
5. Provide a title for the webpart.
6. Click the "Relation types" field to select which relations to add to the webpart. From here, you can select from the types of relations that are configured on the solution.
7. Toggle the "Show inactive relations" checker to make the webpart hide or display inactive relations for the entity.
8. Toggle the "Show relations in grouped list" checker to make the webpart show relations as a plain list or as a grouped list.
9. Use the Hide options to hide delete, edit relation, and edit entity options from the pop-up when relations are selected in the webpart.
10. Select which columns should be shown for each relation in the webpart. The checkboxes can be used to show or hide the columns, and the number selectors can be used to order the columns from left to right.
11. Select a business module to add additional columns from. Only one business module can be selected. In this example, the webpart is showing relations between projects and organizers - in this case a company. Therefore, we use the "Companies" business module to be able to show additional columns from the company related to the project we are currently located on.
12. Optionally select a MyTools button configured on the business module selected in pt. 10. This button will appear in the pop-up displayed when a relation is selected in the webpart, giving you easy access to functionality on the relation.
13. Select which columns to add from the selected business module. In this example, we add the Site icon which allows us to go directly to the site of the related company, and the company ID.
14. Use the checkers for the additional columns to show or hide them. Use the number selectors to order the columns from left to right.
15. Click the "Republish" button. If this is the first time publishing this page, the button will simply be called "Publish".

The result is a webpart like this. Note that we have re-ordered the columns to show the site icon and the company ID as the 3rd and 4th columns.:

Clicking the title of a relation opens a window displaying meta data from the related entity. In the following example, a relation has been created between a project and a contact person:

As previously mentioned, security trimming refers to who can see relations between entities. The concept is illustrated in the image below:

In this example, there are two entities; a project and a company. Some relation exists between these two entities.

Person A only has permission to view information for the project, and persons C and D have permission to view only information about the company. Person B has permission to view information about both the project and the company. The relation between the project and the company is therefore only visible to Person B while invisible to persons A, C, and D.

Please note that you should only enable security trimming if you have configured some security settings on your solution. Also note that enabling security trimming has a minor impact on performance when loading relations.

Security trimming can be enabled from the Relations Module settings page: