Automation issue: Notifications

Phil E

I have a workflow built to notify a specific user based on if an approved by field is blank or not, which is triggered when a creation date field is populated. The creation date is recorded when a checkbox is selected and the sheet saved. This also generates a document. This has to happen in multiple workflows as recording a date or generating a document ends the workflow string.

In my sheet, I had to configure columns to extract the user's name from an email address, as this will be put on a generated document. This is a rather simple automation, but it keeps going invalid.

Attached are images of both the workflow, and the configuration of the created by information, the approved by information is setup identically. Below are the setup/formulas for the name information

Created By: This is a standard Contact List field

Approved By: This is a standard Contact List field

Created By (Extracted Name): =IFERROR(LEFT([Created By (Email)]1, FIND("@", [Created By (Email)]1) - 1), "")

Created By (Dot Location): =FIND(".", [Created By (Extracted Name)]@row)

Created By (Name Length): =LEN([Created By (Extracted Name)]@row)

Created By (Email): =LEFT([Created By]@row, FIND(" ", [Created By]@row) - 1) + "." + RIGHT([Created By]@row, (LEN([Created By]@row) - FIND(" ", [Created By]@row))) + "@xyz.com"

Created By (Name): =UPPER(LEFT([Created By (Extracted Name)]@row, 1)) + MID([Created By (Extracted Name)]@row, 2, [Created By (Dot Location)]@row - 2) + " " + UPPER(MID([Created By (Extracted Name)]@row, [Created By (Dot Location)]@row + 1, 1)) + MID([Created By (Extracted Name)]@row, [Created By (Dot Location)]@row + 2, [Created By (Name Length)]@row - [Created By (Dot Location)]@row)

Any ideas on what I can change to make this workflow functional?

Genevieve P.

Hi @Phil E

When you say that the workflow is invalid, do you mean that the formula is presenting an error or the workflow does not run?

One quick thing I would suggest doing is change your "Alert Someone" action blocks to point to the original Contact columns (e.g. the "Created By" Contact column instead of the formula one). This will make sure it's looking at the correct Contact type of value to send out an email, in case the formula presents something slightly wrong for the automation to read.

Let me know if that fixed it!

Cheers,

Genevieve

Phil E

@Genevieve P. ,

The workflow section states the workflow is invalid, and will not run. Unfortunately it doesn't give any details on why it is invalid.

I'll try changing the reference and see what happens.

Thanks!

Phil E

So I'm still having issues with this workflow. I've changed the conditions and the actions, and it keeps going invalid, but it just says "This workflow has been deactivated" in my email notification.

To clarify, the workflow DOES run, but immediately goes invalid/inactive.

Genevieve P.

Hi @Phil E

Do you have other workflows on this sheet? Is it possible that some of them may trigger each other? Smartsheet will automatically deactivate workflows that could cause infinite loops.

Phil E

I do have other workflows, but a change came up today to the process and I decided to remove the notifications from this sheet. There is no further need for it.

Trish Dillon

It would be awesome if automation workflows could be numbered in an order of operation to make multiple things run in a sequence!