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Feature Request: Workflow Sequences vs Decisions

Workflow Feature Ideas
Updated one day ago
posted one day ago • Show version history

Hello,

As workflow processes evolve, I sometimes find myself needing to change a conditional sequence to a conditional decision, or vice versa. Usually, that involves me taking a screenshot of the conditions so I can carefully recreate them in the new activity.

However, I think it would be helpful if conditions could be copied and pasted to another activity/branch, or if we had the ability to convert branches/sequences to the other type.

Basically, it can feel overcomplicated since the two activities are so similar. If I could copy/paste conditions that would make things easier and less prone to mistakes, but it would be even better if we could just convert.

For example, being able to remove the second empty branch of a decision turning it into a sequence, or adding a branch to a sequence to turn it into a decision, without having to recreate the activities.

We already have the ability to drag branches from one conditional decision to another, but that doesn't work for conditional sequences.

EDIT: As Blake pointed out, you can already copy/paste if you open the conditions, copy the individual rule, or a group of rules, then open the second activity conditions and paste, but working with groups of conditions is a little messier because the pasted items are nested under the default condition, and there's no context menu if all conditions have been removed.

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replied one day ago • Show version history

UPDATE: After some experimentation, I found that you can still paste conditions using keyboard commands even if the context menu is not present, which makes pasting groups easier.

To do that:

  1. right-click the top-level condition/rule on the source branch/sequence and select copy to get them all at once (or select it and use Ctrl+C)
  2. Open the target branch/sequence and delete the default condition
  3. Use Ctrl+V, and it should paste the group at the root and preserve any subgroup structures

 

Empty/Blank

Pasted conditions with subgroups

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replied one day ago

We've talked about "convert" functionality when the Conditional Sequence came about and decided it would be a lot of work for minimal gain going from the Decision to Sequence. The other direction was also going to be a lot of work for somewhat more gain, but still more cosmetic than functional because you can already drag the Conditional Sequence into the Conditional Decision and have it create a new branch and put the sequence into it for you.

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replied one day ago • Show version history

When I drag a Sequence into a Decision, it does create a branch, but it doesn't merge it just nests the sequence inside the new branch. What I'm looking to do is add a new branch to the decision with those conditions.

If the conversion is difficult, then maybe just allowing the context menu even when there are no conditions present.

However, after testing it out, I found that keyboard shortcuts still work for pasting so you can get around the nesting issue by deleting the default condition and using Ctrl+V, but it wasn't immediately apparent so enabling the context menu might clear that up a bit.

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replied one day ago

Right, you get an extra branch with no conditions, then the evaluation goes into the sequence. So the functionality is not really affected, which puts this into the "nice to have" category of requests, which would have low priority to implement.

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replied one day ago • Show version history

I get what you're saying, but the functionality is only unaffected when it is viable to just put the sequence in the final branch. If you need the logic to be evaluated before another branch, then you still need to move the conditions.

That being said, it makes sense that the effort vs reward might not work out for a "convert" functionality, especially considering copy/paste can get the job done fairly easily as long as you know the steps.

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replied one day ago

You can already copy and paste conditions between Conditional Sequences and Conditional Decisions. I just tested it in Workflow 11.0.2306.898.

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replied one day ago

Yes, though that only works in on-prem Workflow, so I'm assuming he's talking about Cloud Workflow.

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replied one day ago • Show version history

You're right, so I suppose it would just be the ability to convert, but the current copy/paste is a bit of a chore. You can copy individual conditions or entire groups just fine, but pasting groups of conditions is a bit messy since the context menu requires an existing condition.

When you copy multiple conditions, you have to copy them as a group and it won't paste them to the "root" so you have to paste first, then delete the "default" condition and drag the "pasted" items out.

In the following example, the first item is required to allow the copy/paste, and the four items nested at the bottom were copied and pasted, but they get nested as a subgroup; this isn't a huge deal for simpler conditions, but when things get complicated it can still be a chore to clean it up.

 

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