Demo environment convert to editable model

[gkanters]

I am evaluating Activiti if it would suit our needs, so I installed activiti on a linux server according to the install guidelines.

I have it up and running, but cannot convert any of the deployed process definitions (404 error, resource not available)

Also the documentation is unclear on how to manage dependencies with maven. I have maven installed but no idea where to run "mvn dependency:tree " If you are new to a product, a step by step install would be really nice. I find the documentation too much open for interpretation and/or predefined knowledge.

But I really want this thing fly, so please help and take in mind that I am a total newbie to activiti.

[trademak]

Did you change the context root / WAR file name? By default it expects to run with /activiti-explorer. If you use a different context root the app-cfg.js file in the editor-app folder needs to be changed accordingly.

Best regards,

[gkanters]

No I just copied activity-explorer to tomcat/webapps. The app-cfg.js refers to a contextroot /activity-explorer/service

[jbarrez]

> Also the documentation is unclear on how to manage dependencies with maven. I have maven installed but no idea where to run "mvn
> dependency:tree " If you are new to a product, a step by step install would be really nice. I find the documentation too much open for
> interpretation and/or predefined knowledge.

The documentation assumes some basic knowledge such as knowledge of Java and Maven. Maven is everywhere in Java-land. This is not a product, but a Java framework.

To start with the dependency:tree is not something *you* must run. It's just to show the dependencies of the library, that is all. When using Maven yourself, you need to add the Activiti dependency to your pom.xml file.


> No I just copied activity-explorer to tomcat/webapps. The app-cfg.js refers to a contextroot /activity-explorer/service

Then it's hard to say what is going on. This is what everybody does and it works for them. No stacktraces? Errors in the Javascript console?

[gkanters]

Thanks jbarrez, I do not understand why knowledge of Java and Maven is presumed if I want to work with BPM. I have built an app once in java, but did not come across Maven there. Anyway I found out what to do with maven now, so cloned the github master branch and tried to use maven on that. Another dead end unfortunately, it stops somewhere down the road on a dependency.

As to errors in the javascript console, nope ! Just the 404 when trying to edit a demo process. This is not really going forward.

Is the target audience of Activiti java developers ? Then I should quit my testing efforts since I have no intention to progress in that direction.

[jbarrez]

> I do not understand why knowledge of Java and Maven is presumed if I want to work with BPM

Cause Activiti is a Java framework, a library.

Hence why companies such as Alfresco built commercial end products on top of it, targeted towards end-users that hide most of the technical things.

> I have built an app once in java, but did not come across Maven there.

You can ofc built Java software without Maven (or Ivy or gradle), but any professional Java software developer will likely use a dependency management system.

> Is the target audience of Activiti java developers ? Then I should quit my testing efforts since I have no intention to progress in that
> direction.

Yes. Activiti is an open source Java BPM engine. There is a UI you can try out that shows its features. You don't need to do any git, maven or whatever to simply run the war file that is included in the zip file you downloaded from activiti.org.
It's hard to say what is wrong in your environment. We would need some error logs and information how it has been setup to give useful comment here.