Is there a way to limit how can cancel a particular work type

1

how to limit by a group who is allow to cancel a task. canceling a task means the work cannot be track anymore and might cause delays upstream. or if there is a way to notify when a cancel occurs

2

Hey @lfalcantar,

You can use a boundary event that would cancel the task. You’ll need something to trigger that boundary event e.g. a Message, Signal or even an Event Registry event on the system channel (internal one).

Do you have some examples of what you have so that we can help you a bit more?

Cheers,
Filip

3

sorry i probably did not explain that i want to limit the cancel within flowable work.

I want to prevent operations from closing items and only allow admins(specific ad group) to have that power or when they cancel trigger an email to notify that the work might need to be recreated.

i saw a response about adding an event listener but that will required custom code in java to send the email.

I know we have the security policies that i can set, the problem is the admin are usually the enterprise team. which is not great having to put a request every time.

the other options
Owner, **Assignee,CandidateParticipant,Watcher
**
I was thinking on setting the owner a single person since it does not allow groups, but that is also a problem as is a single point of failure.

worst case we can disable the cancel and had to always put requests to the enterprise team.

Screenshot 2026-05-22 at 8.33.25 AM
Screenshot 2026-05-22 at 8.33.25 AM2428×241 20.9 KB

4

Hey @lfalcantar,

OK that is a crucial information :slight_smile:. If this is for the Flowable Work UI, then there is a different way to achieve this. This is the open source forum so I thought the questions is for something around Open Source. The enterprise forum is at https://forum.flowable.com/.

Anyways, the way you can achieve what you are looking for would be by changing the default action by using a custom action definition.

The BPMN Action looks like:

{
  "key": "bpmn-cancel-process",
  "name": "Cancel",
  "botKey": "bpmn-cancel-process-bot",
  "description": "Cancels a process instance",
  "ignoreConfirmationMessage": false,
  "scopeType": "bpmn",
  "mappedStates": ["ACTIVE"],
  "mappedSubTypes": [],
  "permissionUserIdentityLinkTypes": [
    "owner"
  ],
  "permissionGroups": [
    "flowableAdministrator"
  ],
  "global": true,
  "channels": [
    "quick-menu"
  ],
  "i18n": {
    "it_it": {
      "name": "Cancellare"
    },
    "de_de": {
      "name": "Stornieren"
    },
    "es_es": {
      "name": "Cancelar"
    },
    "fr_fr": {
      "name": "Annuler"
    }
  }
}

and the CMMN one:

{
  "key": "cmmn-cancel-case",
  "name": "Terminate",
  "botKey": "cmmn-cancel-case-bot",
  "description": "Terminates a case instance",
  "ignoreConfirmationMessage": false,
  "scopeType": "cmmn",
  "mappedStates": ["ACTIVE"],
  "mappedSubTypes": [],
  "permissionUserIdentityLinkTypes": [
    "owner"
  ],
  "permissionGroups": [
    "flowableAdministrator"
  ],
  "global": true,
  "channels": [
    "quick-menu"
  ],
  "i18n": {
    "it_it": {
      "name": "Terminare"
    },
    "de_de": {
      "name": "Beenden"
    },
    "es_es": {
      "name": "Terminar"
    },
    "fr_fr": {
      "name": "Interrompre"
    }
  }
}

If you remove the permissionUserIdentityLinkTypes then owners can no longer cancel the work instances. The permissionGroups define the groups that are allowed to execute the action.

Hope this helps.