TABLE OF CONTENTS

• General concepts
• Workflow Template Overall Structure
• Dynamic workflows and Workflow steps
• Flow and flow control

General concepts

Workflow Templates and Workflow Runs

Workflows in Laboperator provide a powerful tool to orchestrate devices and data with information and control elements which enable lab scientists to create a digital twin of their processes in the laboratory. Workflows operate as a connecting layer between the device integration layer harmonizing device interfaces, commands, and data, and the API layer which provides data, commands, and resources in a unified format to third parties. Workflows can be utilized to provide the full scope of functionalities of a Laboratory Execution System (LES).

Workflows are defined and described in Workflow Templates, which can then be instantiated via execution as Workflow Runs. Workflow Templates can be uploaded and shared by any roles within an organization and collection that have the required privileges. Once uploaded, Workflow Templates exist as resources in a collection and can be executed by any role with the required privileges. Changes and parameterization of the Workflow Templates are only possible within the degrees of freedom defined and allowed when created.

Workflow Template Overall Structure

On a high level, a Workflow Template file can be divided into three parts: Header, Content Elements, Step Definitions, and Flow.

• Header:

The file header contains all workflow metadata that is summarized in the Info Section schema.

• Content Elements:

On a high level, Content Elements comprise all Workflow elements that harbor data in the forms of Fields, Arrays, and Tables. Once defined at this hierarchical level, they are available as global variables in the entire workflow.

• Step Definitions:

The list of the different steps, in which all the user interface (UI) Elements are encapsulated which makes the data visible and controls available to the user. These include, but are not limited to images, buttons, visualization elements like gauges or line graphs, input fields, dropdown menus, and many more. Workflow Steps are also usually the place where behaviors (consisting of triggers and actions) are managed as well as calculations and scripts.

Within steps, variables can also be locally defined as Fields. Locally defined Fields are not available outside the scope of a step. 

• Flow

In the Flow section, the Workflow Template file defines the sequential order in which the Workflow Steps in the previous sections are executed during the Workflow Run. Conditional and branching logic can be defined in the flow section as well.

Dynamic workflows and Workflow steps

In addition to defining entire Workflows within a Workflow Template, modular steps can be defined as Workflow Steps, which can be added to and combined into Workflows both at design time and at run time. Examples for Workflow Templates may i.e. be a dissolution test, where a weighing step for the sample to be dissolved may be represented by a Weighing Step, which may then be re-used within other workflows and protocols. 

Workflow Step templates can be uploaded, managed and executed the same way as Workflow templates. They also share similar schemata and can be enriched by Workflow elements in the same way. 

Flow and flow control

In the Flow Section of the Workflow Template YAML file, the sequential flow of steps and substeps as defined in the Step descriptions section can be defined as described in the Flow Section Schema.

Additional options for conditional flow and loops are listed in a high-level overview below.