Why do workflow Join activities contain an Incomplete path?

GoBucks · ‎02-26-2015

I was wondering when a workflow Join activity's Incomplete path would ever be taken? (This activity has two output paths: Complete and Incomplete)

I have a Join that joins up the paths of 2 parallel tasks that occur after a corresponding Branch activity. Regardless of what closed state I set the 2 tasks to (Closed Complete or Closed Incomplete) the Join always continues down its Complete path. Never do I see when the 'Incomplete' path would be taken. In what scenarios is the Incomplete path utilized?

acretion · ‎02-26-2015

You can make it go down the incomplete path from a join, but in practice I've never needed to do it. The trick is to have some sort of fork before the join that can skip it. I've attached a screenshot of a test workflow I just made to show you what it looks like. The incomplete path executes if the join gets skipped from what I understand, rather than any sort of task state value.

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tltoulson · ‎02-26-2015

Hi Jeff,

I could be mistaken as I have not tested this, but here is my understanding:

A Join activity has multiple inbound transitions from other activities. Each time a previous activity triggers an inbound transition, the Join activity checks to see if all the transitions have completed (number completed >= total inbound transitions is how its done in the definition). If all have been completed, the Complete path is triggered. If all have not been completed, the Incomplete path is triggered. So try closing just one of the parallel tasks and connect something to the incomplete.

As to why you would use Incomplete, I guess it just depends on your needs. I personally have never used it.

GoBucks · ‎02-26-2015

Thanks Travis. I did try the following:

1) Edited the workflow so that the Join was modified to direct its 'Complete' and 'Incomplete' output paths to two different activities that follow the Join.

2) I marked Task A as 'Closed Incomplete'

3) I marked Task B as 'Closed Incomplete'

4) result: both still go down the Join's 'Complete' path

The 'Incomplete' path of the Join must be utilized in some other way. Whenever it is utilized. I don't see a need to have that option. Do you just not connect your Joins' 'Incomplete' nodes to any subsequent activities? Or, do you just connect both the 'Complete' and 'Incomplete' nodes to the same activity (or activities) that may follow.

tltoulson · ‎02-26-2015

Strange, I will have to take a look at that when I get a chance. The activity definition seems to indicate the above but maybe I misread something in the script.

Usually, I just connect to the Complete and ignore Incomplete. If I am concerned that someone may see a condition without a transition... I just delete the Incomplete condition all together. I have never encountered any problems using this method.

GoBucks · ‎02-26-2015

I usually just ignore the Incomplete path as well. But I've always wondered about it. I hadn't yet bothered looking at the Activity definition for Join. I just now went into my workflow's Join record (outside the workflow diagrammer) and I see that this does provides some useful information regarding its condidtions. I rarely peek at my workflows' activity records themselves (outside the diagrammer work space), so I hadn't noticed this before...I"m almost always working within the workflow diagrammer space itself...