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How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)

This video (#5 in the series of How To Videos on SharePoint/MOSS 2007 "Document" Workflow with Visual Studio) addresses one of the most common questions/needs: "How can I build an Escalation workflow in SharePoint?". It turns out that this is a very Advanced Workflow scenario and therefore will take me a bit longer to demonstrate in video than some of the other videos that I've produced.

In the video I show how to escalate a task based on an expired (i.e., Overdue) Task Due Date, and automatically sending emails to the Original Owner of the Task and the person who has been Re-Assigned the task (using Outlook email/tasks).

(This is the SHORTENED, Low-resolution version. )

The Full (streaming) Hi-Resolution video download (WMV file): Click here

Source Code download: Click here

Checkout my entire collection of SharePoint "How To" Videos:

Enabling (incoming/outgoing) email for SharePoint/MOSS 2007 servers (Click here to see it)

Extracting document details from within a workflow (Click here to see it)

Extracting email addresses and sending emails (Click here to see it)

Programmatically Creating a User Task within a workflow (Click here to see it)

Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task with Visual Studio (Click here to see it)

Building an Approval Workflow with SharePoint/MOSS 2007 and VS 2008 (Click here to see it)

Building a Multilevel Approval Workflow with SharePoint/MOSS 2007 and VS2008 (Click here to see it)

~ Robert Shelton

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Thursday, November 01, 2007 3:36 PM

Your Comments.

# re: How to Video: (Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task) Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
The video download doesn't have any sound...

Left by Justin at 11/2/2007 6:44 PM
# re: How to Video: (Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task) Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
Thanks Justin for letting me know. I am not sure what happened, but I will re-render the video tonight and try to get it back on the site (with sound) by tomorrow. It takes a couple of hours to render.

I apologize for the inconvenience,

Robert

Left by Robert Shelton at 11/2/2007 6:48 PM
# re: How to Video: (Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task) Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
I had a backup copy, with sound, that I just copied up to the server. All should be good now. Again, I apologize to those of you who had any difficulties with the sound.

Robert

Left by Robert Shelton at 11/2/2007 7:04 PM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
Great example. Does this workflow actually end (i.e. goes to "Complete"). It seems to stay at "In Progress" even if you update the task to "Complete". Also the even though the task was complete, when it wakes up, seems to still go through the DueDateMonitor in the CAG, even though it shouldn't meet the conditions for it running.

Left by mkc at 12/18/2007 5:26 PM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
MKC,

Thanks for you positive comments, and yes the workflow will actually complete. The scenario that you are experiencing typically happens in one of two situations. One, if you have not properly exited the "While Loop" in other words, your code never exits the loop. Or, if you didn't add a "Complete Task" activity to your workflow, or forgot to set the Task ID property to the same ID of the "CreateTaskWithContentType" Activity.

Double-check both of those suggestions,

Robert

Left by Robert Shelton at 12/18/2007 7:58 PM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
Good example, We have until condition for CAG but we are not setting it to true.
I think we need to set workflowiscompleted = true in taskcompleted activity to exit CAG.

John

Left by John at 1/6/2008 4:55 PM
# Question
Robert, i am doing exactly the same excalating when overdue in a different way.
I am using a listenning activity, in one branch i put the ontaskchanged and on the other branch i put the delay activity. After the delay activity i put the code activity and the update task to escalate the activity. SO if the delay activity fires it executes the escalating.I think this approach is a little be cleaner. What do you think?

Left by Javier at 1/31/2008 3:17 PM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
Javier,

It's hard to say if it's "cleaner" since I haven't tried it, but if it is or isn't, I think the more options the marrier. The good news is that you can accomplish the same goals with multiple solution paths. I'd just wonder how the DelayActivity would work within your solution. Assuming that it does, you should blog about it, maybe give out the code in a download. It would give others an opportunity to learn from what you've done.

~ Robert Shelton

Left by Robert Shelton at 1/31/2008 10:37 PM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
Robert I will develop a simple workflow with the delay activity and i will send to you so you can see what i am talking about. I fix the delayactiviy problema installing the hotfix for this problem. The service pack 1 of wss 3.0 should fix the problem either becasue it has this hotfix installed but i didn't test it. I alwasy use the hotfix and it works great.
By the way your videos are great!!

Left by Javier at 2/1/2008 8:16 AM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
Robert i am putting my mail on this message if you want send me a mail or post your mail so i can send you some code.

Left by Javier at 2/1/2008 8:19 AM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
Thanks Javier,

Send me an email to the Contact Link above and then I will respond with my email. I don't want the spammers to be able to get it by just indexing my blog, looking for email address written in plain-text. :)

~ Robert Shelton

Left by Robert Shelton at 2/1/2008 8:22 AM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
I passed this information along via the MSDN forums here:

http://forums.microsoft.com/Forums/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=2891899&SiteID=1

Left by Justin at 2/22/2008 1:49 PM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
Thanks Justin,

If you have time, pop an email to me at the contact link above. I'd like to figure out what's happening from an Audio quality with this video. I just downloaded the hi-res version to a different machine and it sounds fine to me, but your post is not the first that I've received on this problem.

Thanks,

~ Robert Shelton

Left by Robert Shelton at 2/26/2008 12:09 PM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
Hi Robert,

Thanks once again for this video.

Even with hotfix released by MS I still have my delay activity not working correctly. Will Thread.Sleep work instead of delay activity? We can make the thread to sleep and check if the task is over due. Do you think this way would cause any performance issues?

Thanks

Left by RT at 3/5/2008 2:21 PM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
RT,

I am surprised that you are still having this problem. It was resolved for me with Service Pack 1. That being the case, I remember reading something on a MSDN Newsgrouop where a developer wrote a solution to the problem using Thread.Sleep. I don't remember all of the details, but I remember seeing that there was some problems around this solution, but again, I cannot remember the details.

You might want to try the MSDN Newsgroups and search for Thread.Sleep and SharePoint workflow. But before you spend too much time on it, please make sure that you've download SP1 and applied it to your SharePoint implementation.

~ Robert Shelton

Left by Robert Shelton at 3/5/2008 2:30 PM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
Robert,

Thanks for the great example.

I was able to get this example working, but my real solution involves starting another workflow when the task is escalated. Every time it runs I get a "Failed To Start (Retrying) error from the workflow that I tried to start from the code.

When I remove the Delay Activities, everything works fine. Of course I need the delay activities in order to provide the escalation functionality.

I've even created a dummed down version where I have nothing but a delay activity, then a code activity that starts the workflow. If the delay activity is enabled, I get the "Failed to Start" error. If I disable the delay activity, it works fine.

Do you have any idea whey this would happen?

Thanks!

Left by Eric at 5/5/2008 12:21 PM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
is it possible to make this work in VS2005? I haven't got any of the correct toolbox items when i cretae a project in VS2005 of type sharepoint sequential workflow!

Left by graham cooke at 5/19/2008 9:32 AM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
ignore the above, found it:

http://blogs.msdn.com/vsto2/archive/2007/05/08/sharepoint-workflow-activities-in-the-toolbox.aspx

Left by graham cooke at 5/19/2008 9:36 AM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
Very Very Nice blog, i want to thank you about it , it guide me to understand the workflow in depth

Left by Wael at 5/28/2008 9:42 AM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
Thanks Wael,

I am happy that you found the content useful.

~Robert Shelton

Left by Robert Shelton at 5/28/2008 9:45 AM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
Hi Robert
You are the man for SharePoint workflows.
My current reqmt requires an escalation WF plus review WF with dynamic number of reviewers.
So I added replicator activity inside conditionedActivity Group as sequence.
The code works fine for first time I deploy.
But after that escaltion never happens.
I had to remove delay activity from the if else loop as it was giving me some problem.
Any help appreciated.

Thanks
Jignesh

Left by Jignesh Thakkar at 5/28/2008 12:32 PM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
Hi
This mail is to report a bug that I found in the escalating WF.
The WF works great for the first time you run the WF,but for second time it does not work.
Debugging a bit I found that WF does not proceed beyond OnRecruiterTaskCreated on second run.
If anybody has a solution let me know.

Thanks
Jignesh

Left by Jignesh Thakkar at 6/5/2008 12:51 PM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
Jignesh,

The reason that you ran into this problem, is that for "demonstration purposes" I left out a few steps. The video is more of a "how to" then a "Production Application." The part that you need to change is how the GUID's (Workflow Guid, Task Guid's) are created. Instead of hard-coding them, like I did in the video, you need to generate them in code (Dynamically) using Guid someVariable = Guid.New();. This has to be done for each Guid, because the GUID can only be used for one run of the workflow, and each subsequent run needs to have a new set of GUIDs.

~Robert Shelton

Left by Robert Shelton at 6/5/2008 3:21 PM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
Robert
Thanks for your reply.
Changed to create a new GUID and also changed binding of other activities like complete task and now works perfectly.
Thanks again.

Regards
Jignesh

Left by Jignesh Thakkar at 6/6/2008 2:52 PM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
Jignesh,

You are very welcome and I appologize for the confusion on the issue.

~Robert Shelton

Left by Robert Shelton at 6/6/2008 2:54 PM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
Robert,
no problem.Thanks for all your help.
I have a query for you.If you deploy a WorkFlow on Document Library, is it possible for the underlying document in document library to be edited/changed while WF is also running?
Also can I create ASP.Net web part or ASP.Net pages and from there submit to SharePoint Document Library.

I am new to SharePoint and so appreciate you can answer my queries.

Thanks
Jignesh

Left by Jignesh Thakkar at 6/6/2008 3:41 PM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
Hi Robert
I need help with escalation WorkFlow.
In my case there could be more than one approvers.
So I need escalation WorkFlow inside a replicator.
Is it possible to do something like that.
Appreciate if you can share your thoughts on the same.Looking on how would you approach it

Thanks
Jignesh

Left by Jignesh Thakkar at 6/10/2008 1:55 PM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
Jignesh,

Yes, you are eithe rlooking at a Parallel activity or a Replicator Activity, depending on your goals. Unfortunately, I don't have any examples to give you, as I have not done one yet. I am currently working on some SharePoint Web Service examples, so it would take me a while to get to doing so.

~Robert Shelton

Left by Robert Shelton at 6/10/2008 3:34 PM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
No sound track for this video yet. Can you please update the video with sound.
Thanks
Sachit

Left by Sachit at 8/18/2008 3:04 PM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
Hi Robert,

I want my workflow to reassign a task to someother person if the first person dint approve it in 24 hrs. This post of yours has helped me a lot. But i see that even though i have run your script and even if the first person has approved the task but the workflow always seems to be in progress, It never completes. And if my DueDate will be after 24 hrs what should be done with the delay activity.

Please suggest me.

Thanks

Left by Paddy at 8/25/2008 9:27 AM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
And also for me even though if i have run your script my workflow seems to sleep for ever.Is there any fix released for this.

Please help me

Left by Paddy at 8/25/2008 9:41 AM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
Hi Robert,

I am also working on workflow escalation but not able to awake the delay activity. I am using VS 2005 for custom development. i ran your script also but i could not get the solution still. i will really appreciate your help in this regard.
yogendra.snehil@gmail.com

Left by yogendra at 11/6/2008 5:30 PM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
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Left by screensaver maker at 11/27/2008 9:07 PM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
Hi Robert,

Thanks for the video. What I try to do is continue escalate to the next person base on some logic until someone handles that task. So what I did is nest your updatetask and ontaskchanged of your escalation part into a whileloop, it executes the first iteration of updatetask OK but get stuck ontaskchanged and never go back to the loop and keep monitoring.

How can I force it to get out of ontaskchanged?

John

Left by John at 12/21/2008 10:33 AM
# re: How to Video: Programmatically Escalating an Overdue Task as a part of a Document Workflow in SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
Thanks for this whole series of videos - very helpful. I have been tring to develop a workflow very similar to the escalation of tasks like you have demonstrated. My challenage is that I want the workflow to interact with the task once its created. You example creates a task and then interacts with its task ID

public SPWorkflowTaskProperties createTask1_TaskProperties1 = new Microsoft.SharePoint.Workflow.SPWorkflowTaskProperties();

How do I get the TaskID of the task the generated the workflow, created prior to the "OnWorkflow Start" event?

Left by Kris McBride at 1/3/2009 4:54 PM