This is not possible in this way.
You can add a read operator in front of your graph and reference this node.
See this example:
<graph id="Graph">
<version>1.0</version>
<node id="Read">
<operator>Read</operator>
<sources/>
<parameters>
<file>G:\EOData\Meris\RR\MER_RR__1PNBCG20050709_101121_000001802038_00466_17554_0001.N1</file>
</parameters>
</node>
<node id="BandMaths">
<operator>BandMaths</operator>
<sources>
<source>Read</source>
</sources>
...
However, I would not recommend it.
This makes the xml files not reusable, and this was actually the intention. Write one graph and let it run on thousands of products.
It is better to set up the graph by Python.
I’ll find several examples in the forum by searching for [GPF.createProduct(](Search results for 'GPF.createProduct()' - STEP Forum
Regarding ProgressMonitor, this might be of interest to you: