Query related to flow designer

[Pooja_95]

With respect to this catalog item and flow designer we need some clarification
1. When The workflow is attached to catalog item, and if RITM of that catalog item is made as closed incomplete, the respective sc_tasks are also marked as closed incomplete. Seems this is a OOTB behavior, as we did a same experiment in our PDI also.
2. But when The flow designer is attached to the catalog item, and if RITM of that catalog item is made as closed incomplete, the respective sc_tasks are still in the original state(whatever the state it was before). we did a same experiment in our PDI also.
We need a clarification on,
1. When the workflow is attached in that case, the following sc_tasks are closed incomplete when parent RITM is closed incomplete. But why it is not same with flow designer
2. In that case do we need to handle manually to make closed incomplete all the child sc_tasks when parent RITM is closed incomplete in case of flow designer?
3. We wrote a Business rule to make tasks closed_incomplete but what happening is, The one who is making RITM closed incomplete, dont have access to all the sc_tasks, so only the tasks which are assigned to his group are made closed incomplete and rest are still open

Kindly help on this,
Pooja

[Brad Bowman]

Take a close look at both test cases to ensure the same action is being performed.  To clarify, how are you changing the RITM to closed incomplete - via the workflow, or by changing the State field on the RITM?  Is there anything in the workflow that also changes the Stage when this happens, or what is the resulting Stage in this case?  Same thing in Flow Designer - if you perform the same action to update the RITM, is the flow doing or not doing something the workflow is?  What is the resulting Stage in this test case?

[Anupam1]

Hi @Pooja_95 ,

1. Why Workflow closes child tasks automatically, but Flow Designer doesn’t

• Workflow engine has built-in, out-of-the-box (OOTB) behavior: when a parent RITM is moved to Closed Incomplete, the engine cascades that state change to all associated sc_task records. This is part of the legacy workflow’s tight coupling between RITM and tasks.
• Flow Designer, however, is more modular and event-driven. It does not have the same implicit cascade logic. Flow Designer only executes what you explicitly design in the flow. So unless you add a step to handle child tasks, they remain in their current state.

 That’s why you’re seeing different behavior in your PDI experiments — it’s expected.

2.    Do you need to handle it manually in Flow Designer?

Yes.

• In Flow Designer, you must explicitly add logic to update child tasks when the parent RITM is closed incomplete.
• This can be done via:
• A Flow triggered on RITM state change (to Closed Incomplete), with an action to query related sc_task records and update their state.
• Or a Subflow you can reuse across catalog items, which takes RITM as input and cascades the closure.

3.    Why your Business Rule only closes tasks the user has access to

This happens because:

• Your Business Rule is running “as the current user”. If that user doesn’t have rights to update certain sc_task records, those updates fail silently.
• In Workflow, updates are done as the system, so permissions aren’t an issue.

To fix this in Flow Designer or Business Rules:

• Run the update as system (use gs.getUserID() or gs.getSession().impersonate() carefully, or better: set the Business Rule to run as system).
• Or use a Script Action / Flow Designer action that runs server-side with elevated rights, ensuring all tasks are updated regardless of the user’s group.

Suggested Approach

Here’s a clean way to handle this in Flow Designer:

1. Create a Flow triggered on RITM state change → condition: State = Closed Incomplete.
2. Add an Action: “Look up Records” → table = sc_task, condition = request_item = current RITM.
3. Add a For Each loop → update each task’s state to Closed Incomplete.
4. Ensure the flow runs as system (Flow Designer actions run with elevated rights by default, unlike Business Rules tied to user permissions).

Summary

• Workflow: OOTB cascades task closure.
• Flow Designer: No cascade → you must design it.
• Business Rule issue: caused by user permissions → fix by running as system or using Flow Designer actions.

If my response helped please mark it correct and close the thread so that it benefits future readers.

Best,

Anupam.