Playbooks in Workflow Studio release notes
Summarize
Summary of Playbooks in Workflow Studio release notes
The ServiceNow® Playbooks builder within Workflow Studio allows playbook owners to create and manage multiple-flow processes using diagram or task board interfaces. The Yokohama release introduces enhancements that improve playbook creation, flexibility, and integration capabilities across ServiceNow applications.
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Key Features
- Custom Translations: Add custom translations for playbook labels, descriptions, and UI layout properties to support multilingual environments.
- Restart Activities: Configure playbook activities to allow end users to restart tasks that ended in error, with automatic re-evaluation of variant conditions.
- Checklist Creation: Create checklists directly within the Workflow Studio side panel, eliminating the need for predefined checklist templates.
- Playbook Generation via API: Generate playbooks programmatically from other ServiceNow applications like IT Operations Management (ITOM), including references to active actions, flows, subflows, spokes content, or activity definitions.
- OpenAI GPT-4o Integration: Utilize the OpenAI GPT-4o large language model to generate playbooks from text input, enhancing automation and creativity.
- Enhanced Create Task Activities: More configurable fields are now available in the Create Task activity, improving task customization.
- User Interface Updates: The trigger label is renamed to "Start" for clarity, and triggers can now be edited when duplicating playbooks or managing variants.
Important Considerations for ServiceNow Customers
- After upgrading to Yokohama, update the Workflow Studio application from the ServiceNow Store to access the latest features and fixes.
- Legacy Create Task and Checklist activities continue to function but lack new configuration and inline editing capabilities introduced in the update.
- Workflow Studio is part of the ServiceNow AI Platform and is available by default; however, downloading the latest app from the ServiceNow Store is recommended to ensure full functionality.
- To use playbook generation features, also download the ServiceNow Otto for Creator application.
- Note that OpenAI LLM-based playbook generation is not available in the APAC region due to localization restrictions.
Related Applications
- Workflow Studio: A consolidated environment for designing and monitoring workflows, actions, and integrations.
- Flow Designer: Enables automation of approvals, tasks, and notifications without coding within Workflow Studio.
- Playbook Experiences: Customize the default playbook user experience for agents to better fit organizational needs.
The ServiceNow® Playbooks builder within the ServiceNow® Workflow Studio application enables playbook owners to create multiple-flow processes in a diagram or task board interface. The Playbooks builder was enhanced and updated in the Yokohama release.
Playbooks highlights for the Yokohama release
- Add custom translations for playbooks.
- Restart playbook activities that have ended in error.
- Create a checklist directly in the side panel without needing a checklist template.
- Generate a playbook via API in other ServiceNow applications such as IT Operations Management (ITOM).
- Generate playbooks from inputs that refer to active actions, flows, subflows, content from installed spokes, or activity definitions.
See Exploring playbooks for more information.
Important information for upgrading Playbooks to Yokohama
After you upgrade to Yokohama, update the Workflow Studio application in the ServiceNow Store.
New in the Yokohama release
- Translate playbooks content
- Add custom translations for labels, descriptions, and UI Layout properties in your playbooks.
- Restart playbook activities that end in error
- Configure activities so that end users can restart any activity that ends in an error and variant conditions are automatically re-evaluated when playbooks are restarted.
- Support for Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG) with playbook generation
- Generate playbooks from inputs that refer to custom actions, flows, subflows, content from installed spokes, or activity definitions. Include the names of commonly used and recently published actions, subflows, flows, and activity definitions available on your instance in your playbook generation requests.
- Generate playbooks with the OpenAI GPT-4o LLM
- Use the OpenAI GPT-4o LLM to generate a playbook from text.
- Add more fields in Create Task activities
- Add more fields in a more configurable Create Task activity.
- Create a checklist directly in Workflow Studio
- Create a checklist directly in the side panel without needing a checklist template.
UI changes
- Trigger label updated
- The trigger is now labeled "Start" in Workflow Studio.
Changed in this release
- Change triggers in any playbook
- Edit triggers when you duplicate a playbook, in a variant, etc.
Deprecations
- If you have the old Create Task activity in your existing playbooks, it will continue to function. You just can't add the extra fields that are available only in the new Create Task activity.
- If you have the old Checklist activity in your existing playbooks, it will continue to function. You just won't be able to update the checklist directly in Workflow Studio the way that you can with the new Checklist activity.
Activation information
The application comes with the Workflow Studio ServiceNow Store app. Workflow Studio is part of the ServiceNow AI Platform® and is available by default. Get the latest Workflow Studio features by downloading the latest Workflow Studio app in the ServiceNow Store, as well as related applications like the Process Automation Content and Process Automation Experience Demo applications. The application can be downloaded for patch fixes.
To use the playbook generation feature in Workflow Studio, download the ServiceNow Otto for Creator application.
Visit the ServiceNow Store website to view all the available apps and for information about submitting requests to the store. For cumulative release notes information for all released apps, see the ServiceNow Store version history release notes.
Localization information
Using OpenAI LLMs for playbook generation is not available in the APAC region.