Run your flow
The attributes of a flow include what, if any, events trigger the flow to run, what constitutes successful completion of the flow, the type of email notification to implement regarding the flow, which flow exceptions to monitor for, and what to do if they occur.
When you create your flow definition, you need to know how and when you want the flow to run—will it run on a recurring basis, at a particular time? Or will it run when a file arrives in a particular location? Or a combination of the two? Provided that you want the flow to run under some specific conditions, you need to schedule the flow before you submit it to Process Manager.
The first decision you need to make is how the flow will be triggered. (Triggering a flow is the act of telling Process Manager to take a flow definition and create a flow from it.) A flow can be triggered manually or automatically by an event.
If you want to create a flow that can be run more than once, but want it to trigger it manually, see Creating a flow definition to be triggered manually for instructions.
If you can specify a recurring schedule for the flow, see Run a flow at a specific time for instructions.
If you want to run a flow whenever something happens to a particular file, see Run a flow based on file activity for instructions.
If the flow is to be triggered by one or more events, you need to specify each of the events that should trigger the flow, and then determine if the flow should trigger only when all events occur, or if any one of the events occurs.
If you want to run the flow only once, see Running your flow once for instructions.
About manual triggers
When you want to create a flow that can be run more than once, but there is no schedule by which the flow should be run, you submit the flow to be triggered manually, and then trigger it manually as required.
You can explicitly trigger any submitted flow from within the Flow Manager at any time, even if the flow definition is on hold. By manually triggering a flow definition that is normally triggered by an event, you create an extra occurrence of the flow.
When you manually trigger a flow, you can pass values to the flow for user variables that are used within the flow.
A flow is also triggered implicitly when you run a flow immediately from the Flow Editor. However, in this case, the flow definition is not stored within Process Manager, and you cannot trigger the flow later from the Flow Manager.
About automatic triggers
There are many ways to automatically trigger a flow:
- Using a time event, which triggers it at a certain time on the specified dates
- Using a file event, which triggers it when a certain file condition occurs
- Using a proxy event, which triggers it when another flow, or work item within another flow reaches a certain state
- Using an exception event, which triggers it when another flow generates a specific exception
Running a flow periodically
You can create a flow that runs on a recurring schedule, by specifying a time event to trigger the flow. The schedule can be as simple as running the flow daily at 9:00 a.m. or it can be as complex as running the flow on the second and fourth Mondays of the month, but not on a holiday. You use calendars to define the schedule criteria.
Running a flow multiple times on a date
You can define a flow to run on multiple dates by using a time event that references a calendar that resolves to multiple dates. However, if you want to run a flow multiple times on any of those dates, you need to define a time expression in the time event. You can do this with a calendar that resolves to one date or with a calendar that resolves to multiple dates.
Running a flow when a file…
You can define a flow that runs when something happens to a specified file by defining a file event to trigger the flow.
Running a flow when another flow...
You can define a flow that runs when another flow or work item in another flow completes or reaches a certain condition.