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SharePoint Fest Seattle 2017 Getting started with office365 sharepoint online designer workflows
1. WithumSmith+Brown, PC | BE IN A POSITION OF STRENGTH
1
SM
@pgbhoyar#SharePointFest
Getting Started with Office365/SharePoint Online Designer Workflows
Prashant G Bhoyar
SharePoint Fest Seattle 2017
10 August 2017
2. WithumSmith+Brown, PC | BE IN A POSITION OF STRENGTH
2
SM
@pgbhoyar#SharePointFest
Who AM I ?
⢠Born and raised in India
⢠Came to United States of America in 2007 for studies
⢠University of Maryland College Park Alumni
⢠Co-Author of the book âPowerShell for Office 365â
⢠Technical Reviewer of the book âPro : SharePoint 2013 Administrationâ
⢠Organizer of SharePoint Saturday Baltimore (SPSBMORE)
⢠Save the Date : August 26th 2017
⢠http://www.spsevents.org/city/baltimore/baltimoretecc
⢠Organizer of SharePoint Saturday DC ( SPSDC )
⢠Founder and Organizer of DC-Metro Office 365 User Group
⢠Monthly in person & online event
⢠http://www.meetup.com/DC-Metro-Office-365-User-Group/
⢠Recipient of Antarctic Service Medal
⢠Microsoft MVP ( Most Valuable Professional)
⢠Senior Consultant at Withum Smith and Brown PC
⢠Focus on Microsoft Solutions and Services
⢠http://www.portalsolutions.net/
Prashant G Bhoyar
(PGB)
3. #SharePointFest @pgbhoyar
⢠100 Level Session
⢠Contents are applicable for SharePoint 2013 and 2016
On Premise as well
⢠Architectural Changes in SharePoint Online
workflows
⢠Enhancements in SharePoint Designer 2013
Workflows
⢠Key Differences between SharePoint 2013 and
SharePoint 2010 style workflows
⢠Limitations of SharePoint Designer 2013 Workflows
⢠Best Practices
⢠Future??
⢠Demos
⢠Key Takeaways
⢠Q&A
Agenda
Outcome:
Familiarity with
SharePoint Online
Designer
Workflows
Objective: Getting
Started with
SharePoint Online
Designer
Workflows
5. #SharePointFest @pgbhoyar
Audience Poll
⢠How many of you are IT pros?
⢠How many of you are Developers?
⢠How many of you are Power Users?
⢠How many of you are Business Users?
⢠How many of you are already using SharePoint Designer
2013?
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7. #SharePointFest @pgbhoyar
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How to get Personal Office 365
Development Tenant?
⪠Sign up for Office 365 Developer
Program at http://dev.office.com/
⪠Get 1 year of Office 365 subscription for
free
⪠Excellent for personal development use
⪠1 Month Trial
⪠https://products.office.com/en-
us/business/compare-office-365-for-
business-plans
8. #SharePointFest @pgbhoyar
⢠Browser
⢠SharePoint Designer 2013
⢠Visio 2013
⢠Visual Studio
2012/2013/2015/2017
⢠Microsoft Flow
⢠Microsoft Logic Apps
⢠Third Party Tool
SharePoint Online
Workflow Tools
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⢠Free download from Microsoft
⢠https://www.microsoft.com/en-
us/download/details.aspx?id=35491
⢠Supported Operating Systems
⪠Windows 10 ,
⪠Windows 7,
⪠Windows 8,
⪠Windows 8.1,
⪠Windows Server 2008 R2,
⪠Windows Server 2012,
⪠Windows Server 2016
How to get SharePoint
Designer 2013?
11. #SharePointFest @pgbhoyar
Types of Workflows
Sequential State Machine
⢠Activities occur in sequence
⢠On rejection , begin from start
⢠Simple Business Processes example,
Leave Request
⢠Activities are not sequential
⢠Can by pass activities based on
business logic
⢠Complex business processes
example, Financial Aid
13. #SharePointFest @pgbhoyar
Typical SharePoint Workflow Life Cycle
Initiation
⢠When the workflow is started on list/library item
Running
⢠User Interaction via tasks ( optional)
⢠Status page reflects the status of the workflows
Termination ⢠End of workflow instance
Association
⢠When the workflow is associated with List/Library
14. #SharePointFest @pgbhoyar
⪠With SharePoint 2013 Microsoft released a new product called âWorkflow Managerâ
⪠SharePoint 2013 style Workflows are built using Workflow Foundation 4.5 and run out of
SharePoint
⪠There is separate server Product called Workflow manager and is not part of SharePoint
Infrastructure
⪠Communication between Workflow manager and client (SharePoint) occurs using REST API
and Oauth
⪠SharePoint 2013 style Workflows are fully Declarative
⪠SP2013 workflows are no longer compiled into .NET assemblies instead XAML files defines
workflow and their execution
⪠No more custom code
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SharePoint Online Workflows Architecture
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How does the workflow run in SharePoint Online?
Workflow
Instance
Starts
SP2010
Style
Workflow?
Use SP2010
Workflow Engine
Use New
Workflow
Manager
Workflow
Instance Executes
Workflow Instance Ends
Workflow
Instance Executes
Yes
No
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How to identify SP2010 style and SP2013
style workflows?
⪠List Settings -> Workflow Settings
⪠Site Workflows -> Site Administration
->Workflow Settings
⪠SharePoint Designer 2013 ->
Workflows -> Platform Type
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Major Enhancements in SharePoint 2013
Style Workflows
⪠Workflows are Fully Declarative
⪠SP2013 style workflows can call
SP2010 style workflows
⪠SP2010 workflows created using SPD
2010 will continue to work in
SharePoint Online but will not be
upgraded to SP2013 style workflows
⪠Option of manual upgrade ď
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SharePoint 2013 Workflows Associations
⪠List/Libraries
⪠No Content Types
⪠Solution : Check the content type
column and then initiate the workflow
⪠Sites
⪠SPD 2013 Workflows
⪠Visual Studio Workflows
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Major Enhancements in SharePoint 2013
Designer Workflows
⪠A visual Workflow development
experience that uses Visio 2013
⪠New Actions for creating a task and
starting a task
⪠A new Dictionary data type for working
with complex data type
⪠New workflow building blocks such as
Stage, Loop, and App Step
⪠A new action that enables no-code web
service calls from within a workflow
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Improved Workflow Logic & Control
SharePoint 2013 Designer
⪠Stages â Can create State Machine
workflows using Stages
⪠Loop : Repeat one or more actions a
specified number of times
⪠SP2010 Workflow Re-Use: SPD2013
enables starting an existing SP2010
workflow, including passing initiation
parameters.
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New Workflow Activities & Actions
New Actions & Activities
Microsoft Project Specific
Actions
Assign a Task Get Property from
[Dictionary/DynamicValue]
Create a Project from Current Item
Start a Task Process Count Items in
[Dictionary/DynamicValue]
Set the current project stage status
to this value
Go to This Stage Trim String Set the status field in the idea list
item to this value
Call HTTP Web Service Find Substring in String Wait for Project Event
Start a List Workflow Replace Substring in String Set this field in the project to this
value
Start a Site Workflow Translate Document
Build [Dictionary/DynamicValue] Set Workflow Status
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Example of fairly advanced workflow
http://sharepoint-videos.com/pull-info-from-a-blogs-rss-feed-using-sharepoint-designer-2013-workflow/
Example of using:
⢠Stage
⢠Loop
⢠Web service
⢠Workflow variables
⢠Dictionary variable
⢠XML to JSON
⢠Calculation
⢠Creating items
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Copying a workflow to another List or Site
⢠Save as workflow template
⢠Export to Visio
⢠Copy / Paste stages
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Packaging a workflow
⢠SharePoint Designer 2010:
⢠Only reusable workflows can be packaged
⢠SharePoint Designer 2013:
⢠List workflows, Reusable workflows and Site workflows
can all be packaged as a wsp
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⢠Naming Convention for Custom Workflows
⢠Use the naming convention that works best for you
and your organization
⢠For example, âList or Library + List or Library Name +
Purposeâ
⢠Use logging-
⢠âLog to History Listâ
⢠Create new tasks list and history lists for
each workflows and try to avoid using the
OOTB history list and workflow tasks list
⢠To create the new tasks list and history list, we can use
⪠Workflow Settings page
⪠SharePoint UI
Best Practices
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⢠Use SharePoint groups to assign the
tasks/send emails instead of individual
users
⢠Donât create the variable if you donât
have to
⢠50 is the limit
⢠Do not modify the OOTB global
workflows
⢠Create copy and then modify
⢠A lot more during tomorrowâs WF202
session..âş
Best Practices
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Limitations of SharePoint 2013 Designer
Workflows
⪠We can not start workflows on delete
event
⪠50 variable limit
⪠No source control for SPD workflows
⪠String functions are limited
⪠Can not deploy workflows as SharePoint
Apps
⪠For advance implementations you may
need to involve developers/architects
43. #SharePointFest @pgbhoyar
Recent Announcements
⢠There will NOT be SharePoint Designer 2016
⢠http://sharepoint-community.net/forum/topics/what-s-happening-to-sharepoint-designer-in-
sharepoint-2016-is-it
⢠SharePoint 2013 Designer will be supported till 2026
⢠Microsoft Flow
⢠https://powerapps.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/introducing-microsoft-flow-and-announcing-the-
public-preview-of-powerapps/
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What does this mean?
⢠SharePoint Workflows most probably will have same fate as
InfoPath forms services
⢠Microsoft will continue to support
⢠No future enhancements
⢠Time to explore other options
⢠Microsoft Flow
⪠https://flow.microsoft.com
⢠Logic Apps
⪠https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/services/logic-apps/
⢠Visual Studio Workflows
⪠Can deploy them only as âAppâ
⢠Other Third Party Products
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48. #SharePointFest @pgbhoyar
Recap
⢠Architectural Changes in SharePoint Online workflows
⢠Enhancements in SharePoint Designer 2013 Workflows
⢠Key Differences between SharePoint 2013 and SharePoint
2010 style workflows
⢠Limitations of SharePoint Designer 2013 Workflows
⢠Best Practices
⢠Future
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49. #SharePointFest @pgbhoyar
Other SPFest Seattle 2017 Workflow Sessions
⢠WF 104 - Transition Your SharePoint Designer Workflows to
Microsoft Flow
⢠WF 201 - Best practices for automating business processes in
SharePoint
⢠WF 202 - Future Proofing Your Workflow Investment: How to
develop maintainable custom workflows in Office
365/SharePoint Online
⢠WF 203 - Advanced SharePoint Designer 2013 Workflows
⢠WF 204 - Business Process Automation: Advanced Workflow
Solutions
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50. #SharePointFest @pgbhoyar
Key Takeaways
⢠Hopefully the contents we covered today made you to explore
SharePoint Designer 2013 workflows and you will go home
and play with it âş
⢠Sign up for Developer Program using https://dev.office.com/
⢠Keep track of new features getting added to Microsoft Flow
⢠https://flow.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/