Artifacts (BPM)

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Artifacts provide additional information about the business process. Using artifacts allows you to add non-standard elements to satisfy a specific need. Since you do not want to alter the basic look-and-feel of a diagram, you can use artifacts to link to the existing events and activities through Associations. Artifacts do not affect the basic Sequence Flow or Message Flow, nor do they affect mapping to execution languages.

Note: If you are entering text in an annotation element, the autotype text box is closed by pressing Enter.

The current set of artifacts includes: data objects, groups, and annotations. The table below describes the artifacts available from the Business Process Objects Palette:

Artifacts	Palette Icon	Description
Data Object		Data objects provide information about how documents, data, and other objects are used and updated in a Process. They represent data so are defined by a combination of entities or classes.   Data Objects are Artifacts because they do not directly affect a Sequence or Message Flow. They provide information on what activities are required or what they produce.
Group		Use the Group symbol to visually organize activities.   A Group is represented by a rounded corner rectangle drawn with a dashed border. The grouping can be used for documentation or analysis purposes, but does not affect the Sequence Flow.
Annotation		Textual annotation allows you to provide additional facts and details about an element.   Text Annotations are used to provide additional information for the elements of a diagram.
Off-Page Connector		If a process model extends beyond the length of one printed page you can use an Off-Page Connector to show how Sequence Flow connections extend across the page breaks.