advanced office365 sharepoint online workflows

#CAPAreaSPUG @pgbhoyar

Advanced Office 365/ SharePoint

Online Workflows

Prashant G Bhoyar (PGB)

CapArea .NET SharePoint User Grouphttp://www.meetup.com/CapArea-NET-SPSIG/events/229709059/

18 May 2016


2

• Senior Consultant at Portal Solutions

• Born and raised in India

• Came to United States of America in 2007 for studies

• University of Maryland College Park Alumni

• Technical Reviewer of the book “Pro : SharePoint 2013 Administration”

• Organizer of SharePoint Saturday Baltimore (SPSBMORE)

• 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

Who AM I ?

Prashant G Bhoyar (PGB)

http://www.meetup.com/DC-Metro-Office-365-User-Group/


Amazing Antarctica Adventure – November/December 2008


Amazing Antarctica Adventure – November/December 2008

• McMurdo Station, Antarctica (US Government Station)

• 1000-1100 people stays during Antarctic Summer (November to February)


About Portal Solutions

We deliver Digital

Workplace Products

and Solutions that help

organizations share

what they know and

find what they need by

connecting people,

data, and content.

5


OneWindow Workplace

• OneWindow Is Built On Office 365 and Microsoft Azure

• Available for Office 365 and SharePoint Hybrid environment

OneWindow

YammerSharePoint

OnlineSkype For Business Office Groups Office Graph/Delve

VideosOneDrive for

Business

OneWindow APIs

Planner

Analytics


What Do You Get With OneWindow Workplace?7

Amazing Experiences

• News

• Workspaces

• Knowledge Discovery

• People Directory

• Search

• Activity Feeds

• Tools and Apps

• Widgets

Platform

• Integration

• Lync/Skype

• Yammer

• OneDrive

• Office Graph

• Office Groups

• SharePoint

• Videos

• Analytics and

Personalization

Access Anywhere

• Responsive

• Native applications

(Mobile, Windows 10)


Next Steps

8

Interested in assessing if OneWindow Workplace

is right for you?

Let’s talk. Click here or go to http://www.onewindowapp.com to learn more.

http://www.portalsolutions.net/

http://www.portalsolutions.net/

http://www.onewindowapp.com/onewindow/contact

http://www.onewindowapp.com/


Upcoming Local Speaking Engagement

• Federal SP User Group (FEDSPUG) – 19th May 2016

http://www.meetup.com/fedspug-wspdc/

9

http://www.meetup.com/fedspug-wspdc/


• Intro of Office 365 / SharePoint Online Workflows

• Architectural changes in SP2013 workflows

• Key Differences between SharePoint 2013 and SharePoint 2010 style workflows

• Common Business Scenarios

• Throttling Limits in Office 365

• Visual Studio Workflows

• Best Practices/ Limitations

Agenda


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 End Users?

• How many of you develop/manages/maintains the

workflows?

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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 seat only

http://dev.office.com/


15

How to get Office 365 Demo Tenants

Tenant?

Login at https://www.microsoftofficedemos.com/Loginusing your partner account

Get 3 months of Office 365 subscription for free

Excellent for rapid client demos

More than 20 Seats

Customer Immersion Experience (CIE) is also an option

Formerly called as MEC

1 Month Trial E3, E5

https://products.office.com/en-us/business/compare-office-365-for-business-plans

https://www.microsoftofficedemos.com/Login

https://products.office.com/en-us/business/compare-office-365-for-business-plans


Helps to Automate Business Processes

Helps to meet the Industry Standards

Helps Organizations to function Effectively

Important for success of SharePoint/Office 365

sites Implementations

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What are Workflows?


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


Typical SharePoint Workflow Life Cycle

Initiation

• When the workflow is started on list/library item

Running• User Interaction via tasks

• Status page reflects the status of the workflows

Termination • End of the workflow instance

Association

• When the workflow is associated with List/Library


• Browser

• SharePoint 2013 Designer

• Visio 2013

• Visual Studio 2012/2013/2015

• Third Party Tools

Office 365 /SharePoint

Online Workflow Tools


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• The development/testing experience is

slow

Because of platform’s architecture

In general Workflow development is slow

process

Analogy : Public Transportation System

• Difficult to gather all the requirements

before start of the development

Be ready for multiple revisions

Workflow development/maintenance


Architecture of SharePoint 2013/2016 Workflows

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SP2013 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

Build WebServices for custom business logic

SP2013 workflows are available in Office 365/ SharePoint Online

There are no tools available to convert SP2010 Style workflows to SP2013 style workflows Only option is manual….

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New SharePoint 2013/2016 Workflows Architecture


How does the workflow run in SP2013/2016?

Workflow

Instance

Starts

SP2010

Style

Workflow?

Use SP2010

Workflow Engine

Use New

Workflow

Manager

Workflow

Instance Executes

Workflow Instance Ends

Workflow

Instance Executes

YesNo


What will happen during migration?

Existing Workflow

in SP2010

Migration to

SP2013 On

Premise

Migration to

SP2016 on Premise

Migration to Office

365/ SharePoint

Online

SharePoint Designer

2010 Workflows

Run as SP2010 Style

Workflows

Run as SP2010 Style

Workflows

Run as SP2010 Style

Workflows

OOTB Workflows Run as SP2010 Style

Workflows

Run as SP2010 Style

Workflows

Run as SP2010 Style

Workflows

Full trust Visual

Studio Workflows

Run as SP2010 Style

Workflows

Run as SP2010 Style

Workflows

Can not migrate

Third Party SP2010

Workflows

Check with Vendor Check with Vendor Check with Vendor


What will happen during migration?

Existing Workflow in SP2013 Migration to SP2016 on

Premise

Migration to Office 365/

SharePoint Online

SharePoint 2013 Designer

Workflows created as SP2013

Style Workflows

Run as SP2013 Style Workflows

(Provided workflow manager is

installed and configured)

Run as SP2013 Style Workflows

SharePoint 2013 Designer

Workflows created as SP2010

Style Workflows

Run as SP2010 Style Workflows Run as SP2010 Style Workflows

SharePoint 2013 Workflows

created as App

Run as SP2013 Style

Workflows/Workflow as App

(Provided workflow manager is

installed and configured)

Run as SP2013 Style

Workflows/Workflow as App

Third Party Workflows Check with Vendor Check with Vendor


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How to identify SP2010 style and SP2013

style workflows?

List Settings -> Workflow Settings

Site Workflows -> Site Administration

->Workflow Settings


Key Differences between SP2013 & SP2010 Style Workflows

SharePoint 2010 Style Workflows SharePoint 2013 Style Workflows

• Uses SharePoint 2010 Workflow Host

• Impersonation Step

• OOTB Visualization of Workflows

• No loops, stages in Designer WFs

• Custom task forms are InfoPath forms

• Can capture Approval comments OOTB

• Uses Workflow Manager

• App Step

• Need to create custom solution

• Looping, stages are present

• Custom task forms are .aspx pages

• Need to implement custom solution


How to capture approval comments?

• Not available OOTB in Task process

• High level steps

Create a new site column of type text to capture the approval comments

Create a new task content type and add the newly created site column

In the task process, use the custom task content type

In the task list, create a workflow either using SharePoint Designer 2013 or Visual Studio to update the approval comments in the workflow host (list item, document or document set).

This workflow will get the information about the workflow host from the “Related Items” field.


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• Information about associated Item we select in the Task Process

• Saves in the Information in Jason Format

[{"ItemId":5,"WebId":"3409b5b9-7fea-49b9-a325-63c730a63a96","ListId":"9e6939fa-bf53-4021-91bb-b73bed0efa39"}] ItemID

WebId

ListId

• We can retrieve the “ItemId” from the related items and use it to update/email captured comments

What are related Items?


User Experience

Task Process Custom SharePoint Forms

• User Interaction via Tasks

• Not a good user experience

• Provides the ability to send reminders

• Lot of OOTB webparts/options are available to aggregate the tasks

• User Interaction via Custom Forms

• Can provide good user experience

• All the data is at same place

• Need to implement the custom logic to send reminders


Throttling Limits in Office 365

• In Office 365 workflow manager has strict throttling limits for

SharePoint 2013 Style workflows

• The instance has exceeded the outbound http request quota for a

1.00:00:00 time period. The 5000 request limit was reached in <time>.

Analogy credit score

• Workflow instances can get suspended and we need to wait 24

hours to resume the suspended workflow instance by

clicking Resume for the workflow or

by using the SharePoint Workflow Client Object Model

• Suspended workflow instances will be terminated after 10 days.



• There is no OOTB email alert if the workflow get suspended

• We can find the suspended workflows on the page

/_layouts/15/WorkflowServiceHealth.aspx

• If we develop workflow as an “App” these throttling limitations

does not apply


Throttling Limits in Office 365 – Design Consideration

• Avoid infinite loops

We may use “Wait for field change in current item”

• Avoid using a workflow to execute complex algorithms

Workflows are intended to manage document-driven, human

processes and not to dispatch significant computational tasks.

• Avoid the use of the “Wait for Event in List Item" activity


What do we say when we are thinking about adding infinite

loops in the workflow in Office365?

NOT TODAY!!!!!

Image Source : http://gameofthrones.wikia.com/wiki/Syrio_Forel


Tips for developing maintainable custom workflows

• Naming Convention for Custom Workflows

Use the naming convention that works best for you and your

organization

For example, List or Library + ListName + Purpose

• Use activity “Add a comment” to write informative comments in

the workflow

End users will not see these comments unlike workflow history list

logs



• Do not modify the OOTB global workflows

Create copy and then modify

• Log information in the History List

Log variables, important info that will be helpful during

debugging/troubleshooting

End users can see the logs

• Create custom task content types for tasks with only one

logical outcome



• Use new Task List and History list for each workflow

To create the new tasks list and history list, we can use

Workflow Settings page

SharePoint Designer

SharePoint UI

OOTB “Workflow Tasks” List has additional notifications

To turn off -> List Settings – Advanced Settings -> Uncheck “Send e-mail

when ownership is assigned?”



• Don’t create the variable if you don’t have to

50 is the limit

• Use SharePoint groups to assign the tasks/send emails instead of

individual users

• Keep workflow initiation activity to minimum



• Capture the dates of various approval steps

Good for generating audit logs

• Save the Workflow status in a separate field

Avoid default workflow name

Helps if you divide workflows into multiple workflows

• Create a separate Workflow status field as text

Gives the ability of filtering and sorting

Approvers love this option



• Pay extra attention while modifying the Custom Task content

types

Task outcome field must be the last field

• Review the workflow starting logic

Limit how many times the workflow gets started

Make sure they won’t start unnecessarily after the workflow is ended

successfully

• Restrict the access


Tips for developing maintainable custom workflows?

• If possible Break down the workflows in multiple WFs

Helps a lot in development and maintenance

We can start SharePoint 2010 workflows from SharePoint 2013 only

We can not start SharePoint 2013 workflows from SharePoint 2013

workflows

You can use “Wait for field change in current item” to trigger the

workflows

• For large lists, don’t remove the workflow, but set to no new

instance

Do it in non business hours


When the night is dark and full of terror….

Image Source : http://www.vulture.com/2015/06/game-of-thrones-melisandre-how-much-do-we-know-about-her.html

• Means the

Production

workflows are

on fire..

Few techniques

can help you



• Implement the logic to stop/start at a particular stage

Super helpful in case the workflow instance terminates

Super helpful during migration (For on premise customers)

Helpful to update the business logic

• Using If condition and a custom variable, we can pick and choose the additional logging

Similar to #if debug directive in C#

The workflow will be long, but it can save a lot of troubleshooting/development time

End users will not see additional comments in Production


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Limitations

We can not start workflows on delete event

50 variable limit

No source control in SharePoint Designer Workflows

String functions are limited

For advance implementations you will need to involve devs/architects

You can not start the workflows on Task lists whenever new tasks gets created by SP2013 style workflows

Workaround : Create SP2010 style workflow in Task List


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

• Microsoft Flow https://powerapps.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/introducing-microsoft-flow-and-announcing-the-

public-preview-of-powerapps/

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http://sharepoint-community.net/forum/topics/what-s-happening-to-sharepoint-designer-in-sharepoint-2016-is-it

https://powerapps.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/introducing-microsoft-flow-and-announcing-the-public-preview-of-powerapps/


What does this mean?

• SharePoint Workflows will have same fate as InfoPath forms services

Microsoft will continue to support

No future enhancements

• Time to explore other options

Microsoft Flow Under Preview https://flow.microsoft.com

Visual Studio Workflows Can deploy them only as “App”

Other Third Party Products

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https://flow.microsoft.com/


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SharePoint 2013 Workflows Using Visual

Studio 2012

Full access to the Workflow Foundation in .NET Framework 4.5

Supports deployment as full trust solutions, Sandbox Solutions as well as SP Apps

You can use Source Control

Create Custom Activities

Create Custom Forms for workflows

Set Breakpoints on Activities


DEMO

Rich Set of Actions/Activities in VS Toolbox


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Limitations of Visual Studio Workflows

Develop workflow as an app

Steep learning curve

Management/Resourcing

Visual Studio is a licensed product

unlike SharePoint Designer


A man must know how he did today…

Image Source : https://throneslife.com/2015/04/09/jaqen-hghar/

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Questions? Feedback? Contact me:

Twitter: @PGBhoyar

Blog: http://pgbhoyar.com (limited contents)

Email: [email protected]

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Organizers, Sponsors and You for Making this Possible.

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advanced office365 sharepoint online workflows

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