Explains the new workflow tool for Office 365 - Microsoft Flow. Discusses scenarios where Flow could or should be used, and goes into details about how to start creating Flows.

1. Tom Castiglia
Konica Minolta Business Solutions USA Inc.
Microsoft Flow –
How, When and Why to use it

2. About KMBS > ECM > Microsoft Practice
Full Service SharePoint /
Office 365 Solution Provider
Content Migration
Office 365 FastTrack
Information Architecture &
Taxonomy Design
ECM & Records Management
Collaboration & Portals
Workflow & Online Forms
(Nintex, Flow)
Custom Development &
Branding
Gold Cloud Productivity

3. About Tom Castiglia…
KMBS/ECM –
Solution Architect
Speaker at various
SharePoint
Saturday
conferences
President of the
San Diego
SharePoint User
Group
Nintex vTE
(virtual Technical
Evangelist)
@TomCastiglia
linkedin.com/in/tomcastiglia
slideshare.net/tomcastiglia
tcastiglia@kmbs.konicaminolta.us
meetup.com/sanspug/

4. What is Flow
Why & When to use Flow
How to use Flow
Comparison to Nintex & SPD
Current Limitations
Agenda

5. What is Flow?
• A cloud-based, business-
automation service
• Helps you work smarter by
automating workflows across
your apps and services
• Enables integration with
dozens of cloud services and
on-premise applications
• Features including multiple
steps, looping, scopes
branching conditions and
more
• Common Scenarios
• Get Notifications
• Synchronize Files
• Collect Data
• Automate Approvals
• Released to GA in late 2016

6. Primary Features
Connectors Triggers Actions Templates
Conditions Recurrence Scopes Apply to Each
Mobile App
On-prem Data
/ Gateway
Custom APIs

7. Demo Time…
Create Account in Dynamics CRM
•Name
•Ticker
•Website
Triggers “Provision New Customer” Flow
•Email Approval
•Creates new client folder with standard templates in SharePoint library
•Creates item New Accounts list (with Name, Ticker, Website)
Triggers “Create New Account in Salesforce with NWC” Flow
•Triggered by item created in New Account list
•Calls NWC with External Start (sends Name, Ticker, Website)
Triggers “Create Account in Salesforce” workflow in NWC
•Salesforce Create Record action
•Sends confirmation email

8. TriggersScope
• Used to group related
actions together.

9. ConnectionsConnections
• Access data from dozens of
cloud services
• Connect with on-prem
systems like SharePoint and
SQL (using data gateway)
• Create connections on the
fly as you configure actions
• Manage connections
centrally
• Connections are shared with
PowerApps

10. TriggersTriggers
• Used to initiate a Flow
process when something
happens
• Common Trigger types:
• Recurrence – scheduled trigger
per interval
• Files or items are Created or
Modified
• Code is checked in or pushed
or a build completes (Visual
Studio Team Services)
• Social Media Posts (Twitter,
Facebook, Instagram, Yammer)

11. TriggersSharePoint
Triggers
• File is created in a
Document Library
• Item is created in a List
• File is modified from a
Document Library
• Existing item is modified

12. TriggersSteps
• Action
• Condition
• Switch
• Apply to Each
• Do Until
• Scope

13. Actions
• What the Flow does in
response to a Trigger
• Like Triggers, Actions are
based on connections
• Allows passing of data via
tokens from the Trigger or
other actions into
parameters of the action.

14. SharePoint
Actions
• List Folder – Returns list of file
objects in a folder
• List root folder – Returns list of
file objects in the root of a
document library
• Extract folder – extracts files
from a SharePoint folder into a
zip file and saves to another
SharePoint folder.
• Get file content – Gets content
of a file by the item Id
• Get file content by path - Gets
content of a file by the file’s
path
• Get entity values – Gets
possible values for a SharePoint
entity

15. Condition
• Used for basic “If /
Then” branching logic

16. TriggersApply to Each
• Used to iterate / loop
through multiple items in an
array.
• When adding an action
after another action that
returns an array, Flow will
automatically wrap the
action in a Apply to Each.

17. TriggersDo Until
• Used to repeat one action
until a value is changed
• Only supports one nested
action
• Limited functionality at this
time
• Better to use Recurrence
instead.
• Used with Common Data
Model only

18. Templates
Templates
Get started quickly with over
a hundred useful templates

19. TriggersMobile
• Apps for
• iPhone
• Android
• Features
• Activity summary
• Browse Templates
• Button Flows
• My Flows
• Flow Details
• Run History

20. Admin Center
Data Loss Prevention

21. TriggersCustom API
• Download and Save
Swagger to .JSON file
• Click Gear > Custom API
• Click + Create custom API
• Upload Swagger file
• Upload Icon
• Enter Description
• Specify Security
• Test

22. Editions
Flow Free
Limited to 750
“runs” / month
No co-authoring,
no on-prem
connectivity, no
SLA
Connect to
“standard” services
only
Flow for
O365 /
Dynamics
Included with most
O365 and
Dynamics SKUs
Limited to 2,000
“runs” / month
Run count is
pooled across all
users in the tenant
Connect to
“standard” services
only
Flow Plan
1
4,500 “runs” /
month
Connect to Full
premium cloud
and on-prem
services
No Governance or
management
features
Flow Plan
2
15,000 “runs” /
month
Connect to Full
premium cloud
and on-prem
services
Full Governance
and management
features

23. Templates
Limitations
What Flow
doesn’t do
…yet
These are in the
Nintex
Wheelhouse
•Escalation or delegation
•Reminders
Approvals
•String parsing actions
•Date conversion
•Math
Utility Actions
•Cannot Query by metadata
•Cannot Set or Update metadata
Document
Libraries
•Log to history
•Call to start another Flow
•Variables and Constants
Misc
•Reporting on usage, tasks
•Limiting user access to specific
actions
Administration

24. Flow
vs.
Nintex
vs.
SPD
Feature Flow Nintex SPD
Free X XX
External Triggers X X
For Each X X X
Do Until X X X
String Builder / Compose X X X
SharePoint Online Integration X XX XX
SharePoint 2010/2013/2016 Integration XX XX
Pause Actions X X X
Templates X X
Mobile Admin X
Mobile Forms X XX
Scheduled Start X X
External Connectors X X
Task Management (Escalation, delegation, reminders) X
Robust Administration X
State Machine X
Variables X X
Parallel actions X X
Utility Actions X X
Document Metadata Updates X X
Modular Design & Re-use XX X
Document Generation X

25. About Tom Castiglia…
KMBS/ECM –
Solution Architect
Speaker at various
SharePoint
Saturday
conferences
President of the
San Diego
SharePoint User
Group
Nintex vTE
(virtual Technical
Evangelist)
@TomCastiglia
linkedin.com/in/tomcastiglia
slideshare.net/tomcastiglia
tcastiglia@kmbs.konicaminolta.us
meetup.com/sanspug/

26. THANK YOU