After a definition is deployed and an instance of that definition is started, it is up to the user to manage the life cycle of the instance. Instance management is controlled from the Instances tab. Below is an example of what the user might see:

The Instances tab displays every instance of every version of every workflow deployed in the system. They are listed alphabetically by “Definition Name” followed by “Start Date” in descending order. The search form at the top of the screen allows the user to find specific instances to manage. In particular, the Hide instances that have already ended checkbox allows the user to display only active, running instances. The date ranges also allow the user to search by “Start Date” and/or “End Date” (NOTE: Date ranges are inclusive of the day. For example, if the “Start Date” range was set to January 27, 2007 – January 27, 2007, then only instances that were started between January 27, 2007, 12:00am to January 27, 2007, 11:59pm would be displayed). The first row for each instance describes the state of the instance. Any subsequent rows in the instance define tasks associated with the current state. Often times, the current state and current task have the same name. In the example screenshot above, notice that websale version 2.0 is currently in the “Perform shipping and payment” state, and it has two outstanding tasks associated with it – “Wait for shipment to be delivered” and “Wait for money.”

The right-most column in the results table displays the actions the current user can perform on the given instance in its current state. The table below shows all of the possible actions and what each means:

Action	Explanation
Blank	3 possibilities: 1) The user does not have the appropriate role/swimlane to perform an action on the instance in its current state 2)The user does not have permissions to perform an action 3)The instance has already ended
Manage icon ()	The user directly has the appropriate role/swimlane to perform an action or the user belongs to a group which has the appropriate role/swimlane. If the user clicks on the Manage icon, she will be taken to a form which must be submitted to complete the task. See section 3.3 for more details
Signal icon ()	The instance is currently in a wait state and must be “signalled” to continue. Typically, signals come from eternal processes (e.g. the arrival of a package and the successful update of a legacy system) and are not manually entered by a user. However, in the case that user intervention is required, the “Signal” icon is available.
Waiting on sibling tokens to complete	This only occurs when the process has forked into multiple subprocesses. In order for the main process to continue, all of the subprocesses must complete. As each of the subprocesses completes, they will go into this state. Once all subprocesses complete, the main process will continue like normal.