Workflow Soluiton

I’m having a brain fart at the moment and can’t figure out how to create clickable dynamic path to a file. Basically I have a link below that is made up of two variables V1-bold and V2-non-bold that I combine. I need to make this link clickable on a form\email so it opens up the document. If I use the variable web link on the drop-down it changes the slashes from “\” to “/” because it’s expecting it in the url form.

I tried creating the link with the <a href”var1\var2”>invoice link</a> but that didn’t work either or else I had my syntax wrong. Any idea on how to get this to work? Just to add I've already tried using a merge text to combile V1 and V2 but still need to have the link clickable so it pops open the file.

       V1                    V2

\\filepath\folder\filename.pdf

I'm trying to get it to work for you, but here's something to try in the interim: Try making your path absolute filth file:\\ in front of it (i.e. file:\\c:\blah.txt)

Thanks reecardo, the issue is trying to get the hyperlink tags wrapped around that variable which is also an <a href> anchor. So the path file:\\foldername\filename.txt works fin when in the email but I need to display it on a form as well. When putting this in a mergetext component on the form it shows file:\\\foldername\filename.txt with the extra slash.

Would I need to actually get that file and put it into memory and display it in a downloadlist component or something similar? There must be a way to show a link to the file.

I just tried this, and I didn't have any problems with the backslashes being substituted in the variable web link.  It worked fine for me in the \\filepath\folder\filename format.  Another thing you could try is using file:///filepath/folder/filename - you will just need to replace the backslashes with forward slashes in your path.   

One thing to keep in mind is that some browsers won't open links to files from a remote server (I believe this is the case for Firefox and Chrome).  It should work for IE if the site is on the Intranet.

Hi Joshua,

Sorry you were right about using a variable web link in the email and that works fie but if you used the same link above to display in a form it won't work as it adds another slash (file:\\\c:\picture\pic1.jpg) to it.

It works for me in a form as well.  Here is the actual html from the form using a variable web link with a value of c:\picture\picture.jpg.

<span>Test Link: <a href="c:\picture\picture.jpg">Variable Web Link</a> </span>

Maybe this has to do with workflow version?  I'm running 7.1 SP2.

You're right, they work for both in the email and on the form. It was weird though when I tested it on the form by putting the link in a HtmlMergeComponent on the form it would but an extra slash in file:/// but now it's not.

I may have had the wrong syntax in there but it woked in the email and not on the form but it doesn't matter as it works now. Thanks for the help and we're running 7.1 SP1.