Control Flow
The following activities belong to the control flow category:
Break
Breaks the current iteration of a given For, For Each or While activity.
For example, if you have a While activity with a Condition value of true (representing an infinite loop), you can break out of this loop using the Break activity.
Properties
This activity has no additional properties other than the shared set of activity properties.
Finish
Signals the workflow runner that the current composite activity should be stopped.
Since workflows are composite activities, this means that when this activity is used within a workflow, the workflow instance will enter the Finished state. When used in a child composite activity, that activity will stop execution and yield back control to its container. However, it will not stop workflow execution itself.
The activity also removes any blocking activities within the scope of the currently executing composite activity including any child scopes.
For example, if you have a workflow with one or more custom composite activities and any of them are blocked on some activity, they will all be removed and the workflow will be complete. But if you have a custom composite activity that executes a Finish activity, only blocking activities within its immediate and descendant scopes will be removed.
Furthermore, the Finish activity provides the means to send back output from a custom composite activity to its parent.
To see how this works, check out the Parent/Child Workflows guide.
It also allows you to schedule any additional outcomes other than Done on the parent composite activity (which is useful only from custom composite activities since workflows are root composite activities).
| Property | Description |
|---|---|
| Activity Output | The object to return as output from the currently executing composite activity to the parent composite activity. |
| Outcome Names | Zero or more outcomes to schedule on the parent composite activity. |
| Outcome | Description |
|---|---|
| Done | Always scheduled when the activity completed. |
| * | Any additional outcomes that are configured in the Outcome Names property |
For
Models a looping construct that is similar to C#’s for statement where the loop executes from a starting number to a final number using a given step value.
| Property | Description |
|---|---|
| Start | The number to start from when performing the loop. |
| End | The number to stop at when performing the loop. |
| Step | The number to use when incrementing the current value. |
| Operator | The operator to use when comparing the current value against the End value. |
| Outcome | Description |
|---|---|
| Iterate | Scheduled for each iteration of the loop. When an iteration ends, the activity will automatically determine if another iteration should be scheduled. |
| Done | Scheduled when the loop has finished. |
The scoped variable Output is set by the activity in each iteration to store the iteration index and can be referred by activities in the scope of the Iterate outcome.
For Each
Models a looping construct that is similar to C#’s foreach statement where the loop iterates over a collection of objects.
There’s currently a limitation that prevents the use of the
LiteralandLiquidsyntaxes when providing a value. Therefore, when using the designer, make sure to use theJsonorJavaScriptsyntax.
When providing an expression using Json or JavaScript, make sure that the expression evaluates to an array.
| Property | Description |
|---|---|
| Items | A collection of objects to iterate over. |
| Outcome | Description |
|---|---|
| Iterate | Scheduled for each iteration of the loop. When an iteration ends, the activity will automatically determine if another iteration should be scheduled. |
| Done | Scheduled when the loop has finished. |
The scoped variables CurrentValue and CurrentIndex are set by the activity in each iteration to store the value and iteration index (0 based) respectively. The variables can be referred by activities in the scope of the Iterate outcome.
The current value is also set as an output of the Iterate Outcome and can be accessed by the following activity by referring to the input variable.
Fork
Description: Fork workflow execution into multiple branches.
Category: Control Flow
Properties:
- Branches: Enter one or more branch names.
Input Properties:
- Branches: Enter one or more branch names.
If/Else
Description: Evaluate a Boolean expression and continue execution depending on the result.
Category: Control Flow
Properties:
- Condition: The condition to evaluate.
Input Properties:
- Condition: The condition to evaluate.
Join
Description: Merge workflow execution back into a single branch.
Category: Control Flow
Properties:
- EagerJoin: True if all blocking activities within the fork should be cleared.
- Mode: WaitAll: wait for all incoming activities to have executed. WaitAny: continue execution as soon as any of the incoming activity has executed.
Input Properties:
- EagerJoin: True if all blocking activities within the fork should be cleared.
- Mode: WaitAll: wait for all incoming activities to have executed. WaitAny: continue execution as soon as any of the incoming activity has executed.
Parallel for Each
Description: Iterate over a collection in parallel.
Category: Control Flow
Properties:
- Items: A collection of items to iterate over.
Input Properties:
- Items: A collection of items to iterate over.
Switch
Description: Evaluate multiple conditions and continue execution depending on the results.
Category: Control Flow
Properties:
- Cases: The conditions to evaluate.
- Mode: The switch mode determines whether the first match should be scheduled, or all matches.
Input Properties:
- Cases: The conditions to evaluate.
- Mode: The switch mode determines whether the first match should be scheduled, or all matches.
While
Description: Execute while a given condition is true.
Category: Control Flow
Properties:
- Condition: The condition to evaluate.
Input Properties:
- Condition: The condition to evaluate.