You could use a global as OutputObject instead of a Fact. If you want to use properties of OutputObject in a LHS pattern you'll need to use "from" but this is not indexed and so using the two rules with a fact approach might give better performance in this case. ________________________________ From: rules-users-bounces(a)lists.jboss.org [mailto:rules-users-bounces@lists.jboss.org] On Behalf Of thomas kukofka Sent: 21 August 2008 15:03 To: Rules Users List Subject: [rules-users] object creation Hello, I have a rule which creates an object in the consequence part and updates this object each time teh rule is executed. So the object has to be created only the first time. So I always need two rules, one init rule which creates the object if it doesn't exist yet and one if it already exists and it should only be updated: rule "init rule" when "condition" AND not OutputObject() then OutputObject oo = new OutputObject(); insert(oo); rule "update rule" when "condition" AND oo: OutputObject() then #do something with the object update(oo); But is it really neccessary to write an extra rule only to create the output-fact initially? Is it possible/good style to make this in one single rule? Appreciate your help. Regards Thomas