Workflow Soluiton

The following is a tip on saving a Send Email component as your default or as part of your Workflow Library for future use. Whenever you add a new component of that type, the component will be a mirror-image of what you previously saved, in both the text and the settings. This will serve in a manner similar to the Outlook function of creating and saving an email template.

(This may be a trick known to all of you Workflow experts out there, but I figured I'd post it for my fellow novices!)

1. Double-click the Send Email component that you want to modify in order to edit the configuration.
2. On the Email Contents tab, the From Address can be changed to a constant value or something referenced within the process or your Project Properties.
3. Set up the To, CC, and BCC address fields as applicable. You can also have a confirmation email sent to a specific address/entity.
   

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4. You may need to change the Subject and HTML Content to better correlate to the purpose of the email. Click the ellipse next to either option to access the text editor. For the HTML Content area, drag variables from within your process into the editor screen so that data will automatically populate in your email. Be certain that when doing this, or removing any of the variables currently within the text editor, you are not compromising any data. If your mail server allows for rich text messages to be sent and received, you can modify the formatting of your message.
   

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5. If you need to send a file with the email, for example, in a new hire process, you may need to send a blank W-2 form to a prospective candidate, click the ellipse next to File Attachments. Select Constant Value, then click Add. Clicking the ellipse next to Contents will allow you to browse for the file you need to send.
6. Click the Email Settings tab of the Send Email Editor window. From here, you can specify the SMTP server and port that you need to be connected to in order to send emails from your process. You can also change the priority level of the email, so that, if necessary, an email can be marked Urgent.
7. Once you have modified the component to suit your needs, you can save the component as a default one of two ways:
   1. Right-click on the component and select Save As Default Configuration; or
   2. Right-click on the component and select Save Component to Library.
   

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8. If you selected the first option, any time you add a new Send Email component to the workflow project, that component will contain the settings, text, and any attached files of the previous/saved Send Email component. This is useful if you have a process where the same standard email will need to be sent out at various stages. You can create a default, then drop the component onto the appropriate lines without having to worry about retyping the body or selecting the From and To addresses. The component is still configurable, should some modifications need to be applied.
9. If you selected the second option, you will be asked to provide a name for your saved component. Type a name that is intuitive and click OK. The component has been copied and saved to your Library.
   

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10. To access the component, click the Library tab in your workflow Toolbox (located in the left hand corner of your screen). Expand Components By Name to reveal your saved component. Instead of typing "send email" into the search field on the Components tab in order to find an empty version of the component, you can drag the already configured component from the Library tab.
    

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Utilizing the Save Component to Library option is most effective in processes where you may have three or four different emails (different in recipient, subject or body/text) that need to be sent. You can configure a Send Email component for each email type, then save each to your Library to be easily accessed and pulled into your process.