Create a rule using a flow

Question

Can anybody help me to create a rule in OPA for the flow mentioned below. How can I make use of rule loop for the flow?
Step #     Activity (with Description) Goto
1     Update beneficiary info (if applicable) in the Elevation
spreadsheet for beneficiary account elevation for DB & HW benefits and send for processing. Step 2
2     Did batch produce rejects? (Yes/No) If Yes then step3 and If No then step5
3     Research reason for elevation reject ? Step 4
4     Resolve issue and update Elevation Spreadsheet ? Step 1
5     Create Life Event in HW Survivors Account to assign coverage to Survivor. Goto death initiation flow(//death initiation is some other flow//)
Please tell how can I create a rule for this flow?
Edited by: 902867 on Dec 16, 2011 8:25 AM
Edited by: 902867 on Dec 16, 2011 8:27 AM

Answer 1

Generally speaking rules should be declarative, not "flows" or "loops" (which would be procedural rather than declarative). Declarative (natural language) rules are generally specified in the following format: Do/Decide something if ...
This format enables rule authors to specify complete truths/policies without having to consider how the other hows, whats, whens that are required when specifying flows or procedures (which often assume something else happened first or will happen later and therefore require the author to check / ensure that those assumptions still hold whenever a policy requires a change).
Getting back closer to your question, I would suggest the following:
Assume the "Send for processing" bit is the external application deciding to consult OPA to make a determination. The external app sends in the relevant data. The rulebase might contain rules similar to the following:
rejects were produced if ...
<something> is rejected (what is the thing being rejected and should the rules specify the conditions under which the something is rejected)
the <something> should be investigated due to a rejection if
the something is rejected (you might care about which reasons in your rules?)
the survivor is assigned the coverage if
rejects were not produced and (what other conditions specify when to assign a specific coverage to a specific survivor?)
the death initiation flow should be initiated if
the survivor is assigned the coverage
One thing to keep in mind with declarative specification of rules / policies is that the order of the rules in the rule documents does not matter (i.e. the author need not be concerned with the order of specified rules nor order in which the rules will be evaluated). All decisions which can be made based on available data will be made and only those rules that can reach a definitive conclusion based on the data will "execute" and reach the conclusion specified in the rule.
Hope this helps ...
BTW - The OPM help and available training on the products provide a significant amount of content on how to approach writing rules (vs. traditional procedural / flow based coding). A few quick examples from the Oracle Policy Modeling Help: "What is a rule?" and it's related links, the topic "Rule principles for Oracle Policy Modeling", etc.