Integration and automation for digital workflows

If you want to exploit the full potential of smapOne, you should use it as a cross-platform solution in your existing IT-Systems. For example, manage tasks and their status on your SharePoint, the CRM or ERP system and send your service technicians the tickets automatically to be completed as a task on the smartphone. This integration with existing systems is possible with using our Rest API. Automations can be implemented using Microsoft Flow, for example.

 

The smapOne architecture enables many connectors to your system:

 

smapOne architecture

 

Find out in this article how this works and what additional benefits arise from it.

Imagine...

The company "smapTwo GmbH" is a medium-sized craft business for machine maintenance and service orders. Thomas U. is a service technician and starts his workday.

  1. He opens smapOne on his smartphone and receives a list of the day's orders in the associated maintenance smap. To ensure that he has all available data a nightly synchronization process sends the customer list stored on SharePoint to the Data Record Selection module of the smap. In this way, Thomas U. can easily access the master data in each of his orders.
  2. Besides this, the list of customer orders is checked hourly for new entries. Each new entry is immediately sent as a task to the responsible technician. The task is immediately linked to the associated SharePoint entry to simplify subsequent tracking. The two possible states are"open" or "closed".

Thomas U. now drives to his customers, completes all the necessary work for the day and documents his tasks digitally via smap:

  • Brief description of the facts (e.g., visible damage, replace overdue wear parts, record meter data, etc.).
  • Logging of services
  • Additional Camera recordings to supplement (e.g. visible damage, etc.)

   3.  the customer master data is already stored and the digital signature of the customer completes the process. Thomas U. sends off the data record and the task is completed. Afterwards, the synchronization process that runs nightly retrieves all new data records and places them in a local file structure for import into the company's archiving system. In parallel, the linked task (in the SharePoint list) is marked with the status "closed".

 

Let´s have a look at the different data streams:

The company uses a SharePoint and an archiving system for data management, where the following data streams are created:

1. Third-party system gives data to smapOne:

  • A customer list is maintained in the SharePoint.
  • Orders are entered in the SharePoint.


2. smapOne returns data to the third-party system:

  • The current status of the order is recorded in the SharePoint ("open" or "completed").
  • Sent data records are available as PDF and are automatically stored in an archiving system according to the order number.

 

To implement this use case, here is an overview of the most important technical details:

 

Technical details of automation

  • Data is read from the SharePoint lists and partially fed back to them.
  • The technical processing takes place via Microsoft Flow (The creation of such a Microsoft Flow can be done for you by smapOne). This is started ad-hoc or interval-controlled, depending on the process.
  • The data transport between Microsoft Flow, the O365 environment and smapOne API is HTTPS encrypted.


Think outside the box...

In addition to this example, let's go into further information and knowledge about the scenario described above.

Automatic filling of the Data Record Selection module:

  • This is particularly suitable for master data lists, low volatility selection lists or generally tabular structured data.
  • Tabular data sources of all kinds are possible.
  • New entries in the DSAB can be configured by the content of a data record or the passing of a selected DSAB entry into a subsequent smap.

Automatic creation of tasks:

  • This is a pre-filling of a smap that is sent to exactly one user as a task.
  • The "forward task" function can be used to pass on complete contents of a form. In this way, very complex processes can be mapped easily. An example is an acceptance procedure for a machine with several involved departments an colleagues.

 

Think about how this information about integration and automation can help you with your processes. If you have any questions, don´t hesistate to contact us via support@smapone.com.


Subscribe to release notes

You will be regularly informed about the latest technical updates of the smapOne platform.

✉ Subscribe now