Exploring Siebel Product Configurator

Siebel with version 7.x drastically changed Order Management and product Configurator by introducing a new GUI based Product Configurator and catalog management processes.

For those who are completely unaware of this new terminology should look at Neel’s Blog for a beautiful explanation. It is basically a tool that is built inside the Siebel that allows users to configure the product using graphical interface. It enables user to configure the products based on business rules and moreover the product compatibity rules.

For Example If a product is visible to a partner and hidden from other then it’s a business rule. But there are some rules specific to the products. For example if user is configuring a notebook computer then he must buy power supply compatible to the model selected, or if user have selected Windows Vista then computer must have at least 2 GB memory in it.

Product Configurator is closely coupled Siebel Pricing engine. It helps to show the price of the product inside the Configurator immediately on selection of any product in the Configurator.

Before going in to detail of configuration one can refer Neel’s blog part 2 on product configurator.

Few words of caution for new Product designers:
1. As divisions in Siebel, product are once created can’t be deleted in the Siebel although they can be made hidden in the application.
2. They are completely built inside the Siebel Client, not in Siebel tools.
3. They are migrated from one environment to other using Workspace import export utility.
4. To make any product visible in the system (visible in the pick applets), designer must release product once and end date of release should be valid.
5. There are several ways to make product hidden in the system, one of them being the orderable flag. If it is unchecked product won't be visible in the pick applet across the applications.



Next Post: How to create and configure products in Siebel?

Introduction to Siebel 8 Task Base UI

Task base UI is one the most talked about feature of Siebel 8.  In this presentation Scott Nash from oracle is explaining the need and the facilities that task UI Provides. 






Coming Up : Building Task UI in Siebel 8

How to use output of Business Service Simulator?

If you have ever developed business services and workflows you must have definitely gone to Business Service Simulator View, to test or simulate business services or workflows.

But have you ever wondered that can we use the output arguments of the simulation again as input to the next simulation?! Even i didn't really thought about this earlier, until in Acceptance test of our project i needed to reproduce the behavior of one my workflow in controlled manner.

At that time one of my colleague suggested me to use Move to Input in built functionality of the Siebel Business Service Simulator.

Lets see how it is done:

1. Go to Administration Business Service Screen and Simulate the first service.


In my case I first simulated EAI Siebel Adapter Service Query Method to generate Siebel message..



2. You will then see a record created in the grandchild Applet containing the output properties of the business service. Now if you want to use this output as input to another business service then there is one way to copy and paste value into the input or to use Move to Input button!!!

This button copies the output property set record to the input, and then these can be used to simulate another business service.see screenshot:


This is becomes very useful if our service is expecting derived inputs. By use of this we can simulate certain steps of workflow on the run.

Please let me know if it helps anyone. :)


Other Siebel Blogs

siebel-admin-l @ IT - toolbox

siebel-dev-l @ IT - toolbox