Transitions

A transition is a way for a record to change state, such as Resolve, which takes it from In progress to Resolved. They're set up under Edit application → Transitions.

While an entity has no transitions, its records move to any state. Once it has one, its records change state only along its transitions: on a board, by dragging a card, and on the record, with a button for each transition.

How it's built

• Name — what its button says, such as Resolve.
• Entity — an entity with states.
• From — the states it leaves from. With none checked, it leaves from any but the one it leads to.
• To — the state it leads to.
• Only if — an optional condition, written as a formula that holds or not, such as [hours] > 0. If it reads an empty field, it doesn't hold. ME() is whoever makes it: [assignee] = ME().
• Message — what whoever tries to make it is told while the condition doesn't hold, such as Log the hours before resolving.
• Who can make it — users or groups with access to the application, or whoever one of the record's user fields holds. With no one checked, anyone who can edit records.
• Set fields — as it's made, puts values in the record's fields, each written as a formula, such as TODAY() for a closing date.
• Comment — a text left as it's made, written as a formula too. Only on entities that take comments.

On the record

The record shows its state and a button for each transition you can make from there. One whose condition doesn't hold is disabled, with its message underneath. Whoever can only view the record sees its state, with no buttons.

As it's made, the fields are set first, then the state changes, and last the comment is left. If a field can't be saved, the record doesn't move.

On a board

When a card is dropped on another column, a transition to that state you can make, and whose condition holds, is looked for and made, with its fields and its comment. If there's none, the card goes back and says why.

Approvals

A transition can ask for approval before it's made: check Needs approval before it's made and add up to five steps, one after another. Each step has its approvers, users, groups or whoever a user field holds as it's asked, and whether any one of them or all of them must approve. Optionally, choose where a rejection moves the record.

Making it then asks the first step's approvers instead of moving the record, which stays where it is until it's decided. Meanwhile it can be edited, but it doesn't change state. Whoever asks never approves their own request, and only those who can see the application count; a step left with no one can't be asked.

Each approver who hasn't decided yet is told, in the application and by email, as their step opens. Once a step has the approvals it needs, the next one opens, and the last one makes the transition, as whoever asked for it, with its fields and its comment. Before that, it's checked again: if the transition was archived, the record moved elsewhere or its condition no longer holds, the request is canceled saying why. A rejection needs a reason, closes the request and moves the record where the transition says. Whoever asked is told how it ended, and can withdraw it while it waits.

The record shows its approvals, the one waiting with its steps and decisions, and those before it. Approvals, at the top of the page, lists the requests waiting on you and those you asked for.

Fields a state locks

When you Configure an entity, each state can lock every field or some, such as an amount once approved. While a record is in that state:

• No one changes them by hand, not even its owner: the form shows them locked with a notice, and a bulk edit, a file or a drag that touches them is refused.
• A transition that sets them and automations do change them: they're part of the process.
• To fix one, the record goes back to a state that doesn't lock it, or the lock comes off.

And automations

An automation set off when a record changes state is also set off by a transition: that's how records are created as one is resolved. An automation's Change state action doesn't go through transitions: it acts on its own authority, even while an approval waits.

An automation can also be set off when an approval request is approved or rejected, of any transition or of one, on behalf of whoever decided last.

As with automations, a state or field a transition uses can't be taken away while it does.