Workflows
Introduction to Workflows
Learn the core concepts of building powerful automations with the Altostrat Workflow Engine.
Welcome to the Altostrat Workflow Engine, a powerful tool designed to automate your business processes, connect your services, and streamline your operations. This guide will walk you through the fundamental concepts of creating, managing, and monitoring your workflows.
What is a Workflow?
A workflow is an automated sequence of steps designed to accomplish a specific task. Think of it as a visual flowchart for your processes. You build workflows by connecting different building blocks, called nodes, to define a path of execution.
The Building Blocks
Every workflow is composed of three main types of nodes. Understanding these is key to building effective automations.Triggers
Every workflow begins with a single Trigger. This is the event that kicks off the automation. It could be a recurring schedule, a new user signing up, or an incoming webhook from another service.Actions
Actions are the workhorses of your workflow. They perform tasks like sending an email, calling an API, transforming data, or waiting for a specific period. You can chain multiple actions together to build complex processes.Conditions
Conditions are decision points. They evaluate data from previous steps and direct the workflow down different paths based on the outcome. This allows you to create dynamic, intelligent automations that can handle various scenarios.Execution and Monitoring
Once a workflow is active, it will run automatically whenever its trigger event occurs. Each execution is recorded as a Run.- Asynchronous Execution: When a workflow is triggered, it’s immediately queued for execution in the background. This ensures that the triggering system gets a fast response and the workflow can run reliably without being timed out.
- Run History: You can view the complete history of every run, see its final status (Completed or Failed), and inspect the data that flowed through it.
- Detailed Logs: Each step within a run is meticulously logged, showing the exact input it received and the output it produced. This is invaluable for debugging and understanding how your automations are performing.
- Resuming Failed Runs: If a workflow fails due to a temporary issue (like a third-party service being down), you can resume it from the last successful step, saving you from having to re-run the entire process.