How to choose a trigger

The trigger is the first step of a What are workflows?, the one that sets it off. You add it on the workflow canvas in Brain › Workflows, and every workflow needs exactly one.

A trigger fires when a record is created or when a record is updated. See How to build your first workflow for the whole build.

How do you pick one?

Open Triggers on the step library's rail. The cards are grouped under each kind of record, and each card names the record and the moment, such as Repair created or Purchase Order updated.

Click the card you want and it lands on the canvas. Click it there to open its options, which show your choice under What starts this. To start from something else, delete the trigger and add a different card.

Which records can start a workflow?

Tideswell's own records and every Object your team has defined. Most offer both a created card and an updated card.

• Created and updated: Task, Campaign, Purchase Order, Supplier, Inventory Level, Wholesale Account, Wholesale Order, Special order, and the Shopify records Order and Product.
• Updated only: Customer.
• Created only: Decision.
• Your own Objects offer both, so a workspace with a Repair Object sees Repair created and Repair updated. See What is an Object?.

This list uses the default names. Your workspace may use its own word for this; Settings › Terminology shows both.

When should you use created, and when updated?

Use created for anything that should happen because a thing now exists. A sample request is logged, so somebody follows it up. A repair is logged, so the warehouse looks at it.

Use updated for anything that should happen because a thing moved on. A purchase order's expected arrival date changes, so the buyer hears about it.

A created trigger fires once for each record. An updated trigger can fire many times over a record's life, which is why you choose the fields it watches.

What are watched fields?

On an updated trigger, the options panel lists the record's fields under Only when these change. Tick the ones that matter, and the workflow fires only when one of them changes.

Leave them all unticked and it runs on any change to the record, including somebody fixing a typo in a field nobody cares about. The panel says so under the list: Leave all unticked to run on any change.

We recommend ticking at least one. A workflow that should react to a repair's urgency watches the Urgency field alone, and its card then reads "When Urgency changes". A card that reads "When any watched detail changes" is watching everything.

What if the work should happen on a schedule?

Use a different tool. A workflow reacts to a record being created or updated, so a job that belongs to the calendar fits better elsewhere.

For work on a rhythm, such as a weekly stock check, use a repeating task: see How to make a task repeat. For a standing watch over your store, such as low stock, use an automation: see What are automations?.

How quickly does it fire?

Within a few minutes. The Workflow engine job checks for new and changed records about every five minutes. It is listed on Brain › Automations under Background jobs.

Orders, products and customers come from Shopify, so the Shopify change watcher automation has to notice the change first, which can add another few minutes. Wait that long before you decide a workflow is broken, then check its Runs tab. See How to publish, switch on and read a run.

What can the later steps do with the trigger's record?

Everything after the trigger starts from the record that set it off.

• Conditions compare its fields. See How to add a yes/no decision.
• Update a field writes a new value to it.
• Create task, the other create steps and Notify someone can carry its values into a title or a message. See How to use values from the triggering record and How to create tasks and records from a workflow.

Can a workflow have two triggers?

Every workflow has exactly one trigger, so the trigger's options offer Delete but no Duplicate. Publishing refuses a workflow with no trigger or with more than one, and says "A workflow needs exactly one trigger."

To react to two different moments, build two workflows. Fairgreen Golf Co. runs one on Repair created and a second on Repair updated.