Question

Create a form that summarise previous form submission for approval process

Workflow Forms Version 10 How To

Updated October 2, 2019

asked on September 23, 2019

Hello,

We have a recognition process in our company where people can nominate other staff members for demonstrating good behaviour, and suggest a number of points.

At the end of every month, the management team review the nominations: they can approve or reject each nomination and can choose a different number of points.

So far, for each submission, I have a workflow retrieve the variables, use token calculator tool to "summarise/clean" the initial data and set the variables in another form. Then I am using the report feature on Forms to get a visual summary of all monthly submission.

For the management review meeting, I would need a form that looks exactly like the report + additional columns for the decision and final sumber of points.

What would be the best way to do that? I was initially thinking of using workflow but not sure of how to target each monthly submission (they are not saved in the repository). Is there a way to do that without saving the data in our own database? I did some research on LF Answers about lookup directly in the forms database and it does not seem to be really recommended.

Thanks in advance for any suggestion !

Veronique

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Replies

replied on September 25, 2019

I agree with Matthew that a Custom Database is the best solution. I use Custom database extensively in my solutions for clients.

It as simple as in the Form Process is to call a Workflow Activity after Form is Submitted. In the Workflow, Retrieve Business Process tokens from the Form and use For each Value loop - Insert Data activity to save the data.

You can use Query Data activity to retrieve data this that Form data to calculate Summarise data to Insert Data the results in a new Summarised Table

1. Use the Summarised Table in Report Form

2. Use MS Power BI Desktop to make reports with Graphs and Diagrams

Happy to discuss more the possibilities.

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replied on September 24, 2019 • Show version history

You're going to have a very hard time doing this without a custom database...

Although doing lookups from the LFForms database is doable, it can be complicated (to say the least). If you did want to go that route, I would recommend starting from your SQL server and writing a query that joined values from several of the tables in the LFForms database. You would need to identify the specific process, the specific form, the specific fields, the specific instances, and the specific submissions to get what you want - so you are dealing with multiple tables. Once you have that query built and including everything you want it to show, you can save it as a View in the LFForms database and then use that View in the Lookup in a form process. I did something similar, creating a View that mimics the "Monitor" page in LFForms and uses Workflow to send email reports to managers regarding LFForms tasks that their staff are past due on. It was definitely complicated to create, but once I had it built, I was able to access it from multiple Workflows and Forms processes.

If you are willing to build your own database, you're going to have a lot easier time of it, since you just have to insert records into your database at the end of your form submission, and then other forms and workflows can then utilize that data. I do this on a lot of my processes, because it allows me a lot more powerful control of what I can report on than I can in the built-in report functionality in forms.

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replied on October 1, 2019

Hi David and Matthew,

I will go with a Custom Database. It is new for me, but with some training and the support of the IT Devs team, I should manage to do what I want.

Thanks for your advice !

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replied on October 2, 2019

You'll do it on a couple forms and realize that it completely changes the power of things you can do, track, and report - and then you're going to start coming up with all sorts of new things you can do with your custom database!

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Create a form that summarise previous form submission for approval process

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