SharePoint Designer: Pause workflow until a specific time.

7 Comments

1. 
   Posted July 14, 2014 at 9:24 am | Posted by: Ashwani | Permalink

   Hi JP Lavoie |,
   This is short and great.Thanx for sharing this info.
   I have one doubt,if the time has already passed and still i have put that passed time.
   1) workflow will still be paused state and run on next day?
   2)So irrespective of day/date , would it run daily?

   Thanks in advance.

   Reply
   • 
     Posted July 14, 2014 at 12:15 pm | Posted by: JP Lavoie | Permalink

     Hello!
     If the date as passed the workflow will move on to the next step immediately.
     In answer to question 2, Out of the box you can only run a workflow when an item is created, when an item is changed, or manually. So if you wanted to run it daily you would have to do so manually.
     Hope this helps!

     Reply
2. 
   Posted July 14, 2014 at 12:33 pm | Posted by: Ashwani | Permalink

   Hi JP Lavoie,

   Thanks for the quick response. Your article gave me food for the thought for one of requirement which i am stuck into for many days.
   Requirement:-I have to store the Current date in sharepoint list column and it should dynamically change when the day change.

   I created a set up of two workflows where one workflow triggers anothers and update the [Today’s Date] field where i have given pause of 30 mins.

   Problem:
   1) Workflow some times behaves strange, out of 100 items it runs for 90 items successfully and for rest of the item, it throws error “Failed to start”.
   2)Pausing for duration doesnt work effectively as workflow is always running on the any item. so pausing for a particular time of the day is possible?

   Thanks in advance, if you have any input
   if this is the incorrect thread to post this question please direct me to right thread.

   Reply
   • 
     Posted July 14, 2014 at 1:01 pm | Posted by: JP Lavoie | Permalink

     For question 1, I might suggest you look into something called Workflow Throttle which has something to do with concurrent workflows. I am not sure if that will solve your problem but it might give you a place to start looking.

     For question 2. You could potentially have 2 workflows that trigger each other when an item is changed. They could look like this:

     Workflow 1:
     If StatusField equals Set Time 1
     | Set DateField to [Today]
     | then Pause for 24 hours
     | then set StatusField to Set Time 2
     | The stop the workflow and log Set Time 2

     Workflow 2:
     If StatusField equals Set Time 2
     | Set DateField to [Today]
     | then Pause for 24 hours
     | then set StatusField to Set Time 1
     | The stop the workflow and log Set Time 1

     StatusField is a single line of text that would store the trigger for the other workflow.

     DateField is the field that you want to items current date to be stored.

     This would in effect create a loop that sets the items Current Date to today every 24 hours.

     This may work as a solution, though to be honest I have not tested this to see if it would work.

     Hope this helps!

     Reply
3. 
   Posted July 15, 2014 at 9:50 am | Posted by: Ashwani | Permalink

   Hi JP Lavoie,

   Thanks for the Solution, i created the same kind of set up as you suggested, but the problem i faced with 24 hour pausing.

   Suppose you have modified the record before the completion of 24 hour pause(Say at 11.55pm), workflow will run and set the
   old date only, and will be paused for next 24 hours and which will not set the current date.
   So i wanted to combine ur way of pausing for a particular time not for duration.

   Thanks,

   Reply
4. 
   Posted July 15, 2014 at 9:53 am | Posted by: Ashwani | Permalink

   Continuation…

   Moreover, for all the items this pausing will be different because items can be modified during paused state also.

   Reply
   • 
     Posted August 20, 2015 at 4:44 pm | Posted by: Pradeep | Permalink

     For your requirement, can we not use calculated column to show up the todays date based on condition.
     Correct me if I am wrong!!

     Reply