Post by wisdum on Sept 13, 2012 8:00:29 GMT -6
I am working on modifying a Sharepoint 3.0 workflow for a Discussion Board that is being used as an IT Help Desk/Knowledge base. The system functions fine, however I don’t understand how to achieve what I want in my workflow with the tools provided. I have been using the Sharepoint Designer 2007 software to modify my workflows.
Here is a rundown of my problem:
I am trying to get an auto-notify system setup. Ideally, when a user posts a problem (creates a new discussion) it will automatically sign them up to follow that thread and email them whenever there is a post. Then they would receive email alerts if someone responds or the status changes (Progress column).
When I setup my workflows I can get it to send out email updates, but I can’t seem to be able to get it to send to the original poster. Every time someone creates a reply the workflow sees that as a ‘new item’ so the “Created By” is the poster of the reply message, not the person who started the discussion.
In addition, I created a column that is the Work Order #. This is filled out automatically by the workflow, and seems to do well. However, the Work Order # column is only populated on the original post (start of discussion). I can’t get it to propagate down to replies. I would like to be able to access this number and include it in the emails that are sent out on replies or when IT changes the status of the ticket. Also, it would be nice for record keeping. When I export the discussion board to Excel you can see the holes in the data. I am not sure how, with workflow logic, I would keep that data straight so that every reply to a discussion automatically gets tagged with that Work Order #.
In other words, is there a way to identify the parent post’s creator so they can be email? I can’t figure out how to do that in the workflow logic.
Here is a rundown of my problem:
I am trying to get an auto-notify system setup. Ideally, when a user posts a problem (creates a new discussion) it will automatically sign them up to follow that thread and email them whenever there is a post. Then they would receive email alerts if someone responds or the status changes (Progress column).
When I setup my workflows I can get it to send out email updates, but I can’t seem to be able to get it to send to the original poster. Every time someone creates a reply the workflow sees that as a ‘new item’ so the “Created By” is the poster of the reply message, not the person who started the discussion.
In addition, I created a column that is the Work Order #. This is filled out automatically by the workflow, and seems to do well. However, the Work Order # column is only populated on the original post (start of discussion). I can’t get it to propagate down to replies. I would like to be able to access this number and include it in the emails that are sent out on replies or when IT changes the status of the ticket. Also, it would be nice for record keeping. When I export the discussion board to Excel you can see the holes in the data. I am not sure how, with workflow logic, I would keep that data straight so that every reply to a discussion automatically gets tagged with that Work Order #.
In other words, is there a way to identify the parent post’s creator so they can be email? I can’t figure out how to do that in the workflow logic.