Auto Transition

[Shohrukhi.Ilhomzoda]

Hello everyone,

I have a question regarding the creation of an item and a workflow transition. I have two arrows: one labeled "CREATE," which goes from the workflow state "CREATE" to "Document in Review," and the other labeled "CANCEL," which goes from "Document in Review" to "Canceled."

Is it possible to create a transition from "CREATE" to "Document in Review" and then further to "Canceled"? To reach the "Canceled" state, one must go through the "Document in Review" state. 

CREATE -> DOKUMENT_IN_REVIEW->CANCELED

THANKS IN ADVANCE!!!

[sven.dickmans · Accepted solution]

Why do you need to go through the 'Document Review' status? Do you want to apply some processing (by script) before the process gets set to 'Canceled'? Or do you want to involve approvals / reviews by other users before cancelling the process?

To implement this subsequent status change to the canceled status, you could perform the 2nd transition to Canceled status by script, once the first transition is complete and if certain criteria is met. An action script attached to the initial transition could verify certain conditions and then optionally even trigger the next workflow transition. 

As an alternative, you could create a connection from CREATE to CANCELED and attach the same scripts to this transition that would usually be invoked upon transition to DOKUMENT_IN_REVIEW and CANCELED.

[Shohrukhi.Ilhomzoda]

I just wanted to see if it is possible to go from the first status to the third status via a second status, although there is no direct arrow from the first status to the third status. Normally the arrow goes from the second status to the third status.
As I understand now, it is not possible to go through one transition to the other.
Thanks for the answer Sven!

[philipfrench]

You can investigate performWorkflowTransitionByCustomID() in a workflow action, and this will make the workflow advance one more step.

Or just add another transition to the workflow?

If you are still puzzled, then please add a picture of your workflow, and explain in the picture what you are trying to achieve. I get the impression you have a simple problem that we are not understanding your goal correctly.

[Shohrukhi.Ilhomzoda]

So I describe my problem here in more detail:
When I create an item, I end up directly in the status "Document in Review". But under a certain condition, for example condition "XYZ", I don't want to end up in "Document in Review" but in "Automatic Distribution". But there is an arrow only from "Document in review" to "Automatic Distribution". The problem is, you can have only 1 outgoing arrow from the start, so no double arrow. Can I go from Start through "Document in Review" to "Automatic Distribution" under the condition "XYZ"?

[philipfrench]

A picture helped. Yes, Sven's approach is exactly what you need.

A script attached to the initial transition, that does your "XYZ" test, and conditionally advances the workflow, using the custom ID of the follow-on transition you want to call.

[Shohrukhi.Ilhomzoda]

I used to do exactly as you did but I can't create items it always runs an error.
"There has been a problem running a custom action (XYXY Workflow Actions). Please contact your system administrator."
Maybe it is because of no direct arrow from "Create" to "Automatic Distribution" ???

[sven.dickmans · Accepted solution]

Did you manage to solve this problem? Your remarks helped to understand your problem better and I validated my approach successfully in workspace Problem Reports: A script on the initial workflow transition now will skip the initial status if a given condition is met.

Usually, new Problem Reports remain in status Create until a user performs the Submit transition:

In order to skip the Create status, I added a checkbox 'Auto Submit' in the Item Details of Problem Reports:

This checkbox now gets evaluated by an action script attached to the very first transition:

Thanks to this setup, users can now check the box to have the Problem Report submitted right after creation. You can see this in the workflow history - the 2nd transition is triggered instantly. If the checkbox is not ticked, the process will remain in status Create.