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Welcome

Welcome to PhixFlow's Actionflow Course, where you will learn everything about creating and using Actionflows. This course is designed to give you a deeper understanding of what an Actionflow is, how they are used in PhixFlow and what you need to know to create and use them in your application(s).

In this course you will learn alongside walk-through examples of building Actionflows, starting with creating a simple Open Screen Actionflow, all the way through to creating complicated multi-phase Actionflows.

Note:  Actionflows are used in applications created in version 9.0 and beyond.

What's Covered on this Page?

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Course Prerequisites

In this course we assume you have completed the PhixFlow Fundamentals and are familiar with some of the terms we'll be using. If you haven't already, completed the Fundamentals course now.

We also assume you have completed the Introduction to Screen Building Course, or have prior knowledge of building screens in applications. If you haven't already, complete the Screen Building course before starting this course.

Completing these prerequisites will ensure you are able to understand the content of this course.

Course Structure and Objectives

This course is split into 3 modules (Foundation, Intermediate, Advanced). Each module takes approximately 1 day to complete but this is just a guide. 

By the end of this course you will become a high level user, capable of using all Actionflow features

  • Foundation:
    • Topics: We explore creating simple Actionflows, gaining theoretical knowledge of the processing involved
    • Objectives: Good knowledge of the product + ability to configure Actionflows for a simple application + with ability to assimilate knowledge from the Help
  • Intermediate: 
    • Topics: We explore creating Actionflows that require more complex processing logic
    • Objectives: Above + ability to configure Actionflows with more complex processing logic
  • Advanced:   
    • Topics: We explore complex Actionflows and competently use all Actionflow features
    • Objectives: Above + ability to use all Actionflow features to a high level 

Resources

Data

On the Learning Centre, scroll down to the section and download all School Data files to your laptop/PC.

ERD and Screens

There are a number of prebuilt screens that we will use throughout this course and can be found here:


Using the Resources

Before we dive into the course, let's first become familiar with the prebuilt ERD and screens we have provided for you.

  1. Open the Course Management ERD and spend a few minutes studying the one-to-many relationships between the tables, and
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     view the data. 
  2. Open the Course Management Screen. Explain items on the screen. Which table is backing what.
  3. Open the Course Form Screen. This is the form that we will later configure to add new courses to our Courses Grid and edit them, etc etc.





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titleTopics to Cover

Topics to cover

  • Start with screen with data on it - provided by us
  • The Canvas
    • Tool bar options
      • Show Event Location
      • Close Screen
      • Hide Spinner
      • Origins
      • Instances
      • etc.
  • Conceptual Overview
    • Inputs (for each instance)
    • Connection Points
    • Action Nodes 
      • "The difference between actions that run once per record (single circle around the node)  and those that run once per flow (e.g. open dashboard, start phase, open url ... double circle around the node ) - having written that shouldn't double circle mean more than once and single circle mean once" -David
    • Mappings
      • Mapping data into an actionflow for a specific instance
      • Mapping data between nodes on an action flow
        • Pass-through and Join nodes (only attributes common to all paths leading to the Join can be passed through)
    • Initiating Actionflows
      • Event handlers
        • On click
        • On change
        • On blur
        • On enter
        • Double-click (This is when the actionflow is set as the default action on a view)
        • Default Action for auto save on a view.
    • Instances/Reusability
      • Concepts
      • Locating Instances
      • Opening Instances
      • Actionflows vs instances
      • Nesting actionflows
  •  Connections
    • Inbound
      • No Data = On Click/On Enter
      • Data = Datasource
    • Outbound
    • Lookups (needs example content)
    • Driving vs Lookup connections
      • Driving connections (records are pushed one by one) 
      • Lookup connections (all records are pulled as a single block but only when the connection is referenced in an expression inside the node)
  • Nodes types
    • Actionflow (Nested Actionflow) (needs example content)
    • Open screen
    • View (needs example content)
    • Lookup (needs example content)
    • Calculate 
    • Gateway - map to output connection points (needs example content)
    • Open URL
    • Save
    • Analysis (needs example content) 
    • HTTP (needs example content)
    • Email (needs example content)
    • JSON (needs example content)
    • For Each (needs example content) (intermediate)
    • Loop (needs example content)
    • Funnel (needs example content)
    • Start Phase (needs example content)
      • Exercises to build each node in an actionflow
      • Separate app with completed build in
  • Referencing additional data Start Phase 
    •  Lookups
      • Creating a Lookup
      • Returns a recordset
    • Views
      • Creating Views
      • Returns individual Records
    • Lookups vs Views:
      • The differences
      • When to use each one/ use cases
    • The difference between actions that run once per record (single circle around the node)  and those that run once per flow (e.g. open dashboard, start phase, open url ... double circle around the node ) 
  • Phases
  • Wiring
    • Mapping attributes In and Out
      • Input Parameters: These are needed if you want to use an attribute in a node.
      • Output Attributes
      • Passthrough
      • Mapping data into an actionflow for a specific instance
      • Mapping data between nodes on an action flow
        • Pass-through and Join nodes (only attributes common to all paths leading to the Join can be passed through)
    • Disconnecting
    • Inserting Items
  • Working with structured data 
  • Confirmation dialogues (intermediate)
  • Security and permissions (advanced)
  • Record throughput and behaviours 
  • Exclusion Groups (advanced)
    • Concurrency?
  • Where they can be initiated

Additional Topics (advanced)

  • List all Actionflow and Screen Actionflow. Showing actionflow associated to a screen that are not connected. This occurs when we create actionflows in a workflow.

Scenarios to cover (need example content)

  • Counting records (lookups) (intermediate)
  • Checking for duplicates (lookups) (intermediate)
  • Checking a value is in a list (lookups)
  • Setup an API end point (intermediate)
  • Configuring a Validation Phase (or another example?) (intermediate)
  • Verify a record is selected (validation)
  • Configuring a Confirmation (intermediate)
    • Custom confirmation message and screen (advanced)
  • Debugging guide (intermediate)
  • Configure buttons
    • Pass data between screens
    • Populate a field
  • Dragging and dropping on a kanban (tutorial)
  • In grid editing Actionflows(intermediate)