HarePoint Workflow Scheduler Manual
For SharePoint Server Subscription Edition, SharePoint Server 2010/2013/2016/2019, SharePoint
Foundation 2010/2013, Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 and Microsoft Windows SharePoint
Services 3.0.

Product version 1.8Mar 3, 2022

( This Page Intentionally Left Blank )HarePoint.Com | Table of Contents

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Table of Contents
Table of Contents .......................................................................................................................................... 3
I. Introduction ............................................................................................................................................... 4
II. Deployment............................................................................................................................................... 5
1. System requirements ............................................................................................................................ 5
2. Licensing and support ........................................................................................................................... 5
3. Installing HarePoint Workflow Scheduler ............................................................................................. 6
4. How to repair, upgrade or remove the Product ................................................................................... 8III. Product Overview .................................................................................................................................... 9
1. Getting started ...................................................................................................................................... 9
2. Workflow tasks.................................................................................................................................... 11
3. Using parameters in workflow ............................................................................................................ 15
4. Manage product logs and alerts ......................................................................................................... 18
5. Task triggering mechanism ................................................................................................................. 20
Appendix A. Troubleshooting ..................................................................................................................... 21

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Table of Contents | HarePoint.Com

I. Introduction
Workflow Scheduler is a software product that allows starting workflows manually and according to aschedule with specified parameters. With its help you can automate the SharePoint portal by runningscheduled site workflows, start list workflows for all list items or those selected by a CAML query ormanually, test your workflows with various sets of parameters, and test servers’ load. The productsupports both declarative workflows created in Microsoft SharePoint Designer and workflows created in
Microsoft Visual Studio.

The product allows:
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Starting workflows for all list items or for those selected manually or by a CAML query.
Setting launch parameters, including parameters described in the InfoPath form linked tothe process.
Adjusting flexibly the autorun schedule: by days of the week, by dates in a month, daily at aspecified time, etc.
Receiving alerts, daily or weekly summaries by email or via SMS with workflows results.
Specifying accounts under which a workflow will be run.

HarePoint.Com | I. Introduction

4II. Deployment
1. System requirements
HarePoint Workflow Scheduler is designed to operate in:
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Microsoft SharePoint Server Subscription Edition,
Microsoft SharePoint Server 2019,
Microsoft SharePoint Server 2016,
Microsoft SharePoint Server 2013,
SharePoint Foundation 2013,
Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010,
SharePoint Foundation 2010,
Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007,
Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services 3.0(hereinafter referred to as SharePoint) environments.
The Product has no special requirements to the operating system and its components, RAM memory
space and CPU type. The Product may operate at any configuration where SharePoint is deployed; itrequires 10 Mb of disk space on each SharePoint server.

2. Licensing and support
HarePoint Workflow Scheduler is FREEWARE. It is means that you can use it for commercial and noncommercial purposes without any fee. Visit the Product’s homepage to get the full text of End-User
License Agreement.
We provide on-line technical support with normal priority for this Product. To get support, give feedback
or to thank, visit Support Area at our web site: http://www.harepoint.com/Support/

5II. Deployment | HarePoint.Com3. Installing HarePoint Workflow Scheduler
To install the product you‘ll need Farm Administrator rights.
Please access any WFE server of the SharePoint farm, unpack the product archive into a folder on thelocal disk. Run SETUP.EXE in the selected folder. Installation Wizard will start:

Press Next button on the wizard’s welcome screen and the wizard will check if the product can beinstalled:

Should any problems be detected, please rectify them and restart the installation wizard.

HarePoint.Com | II. Deployment

6At the next step of the Wizard, you’ll choose site collections where the Product should be deployed.
Select required site collections and follow the instructions of the Wizard to complete installation:

The Product does not require any post-install configuration and ready to work now. But we recommend
reading of article “Task triggering mechanism” in Section III before you start.

7II. Deployment | HarePoint.Com4. How to repair, upgrade or remove the ProductTo repair, upgrade or remove the product you’ll need Farm Administrator rights.
Please enter any WFE server of the SharePoint farm, unpack the product archive into a folder on thelocal disk. Run SETUP.EXE in the selected folder. Installation Wizard will be launched. Following
instructions of the Wizard, pass system check step similar to those ones during the product installation(see Chapter 3). Upon completing these steps the Wizard will ask you to repair, upgrade, or remove
Product components.

Select the required type of operation and follow further instructions of the Wizard.
After the Product is removed by Wizard, the Product’s logs, tasks and settings will be kept in the threecorresponding lists. Open the link “All Site Content” to view and/or delete “HarePoint Workflow
Scheduler Logs”, “HarePoint Workflow Scheduler Properties” and “HarePoint Workflow SchedulerTasks” lists.

HarePoint.Com | II. Deployment8

III. Product Overview
1. Getting started
To operate the Product you need Site Collection
Administrator privileges. Please note that all the productsettings have scope of Site Collection.
To start working with the Product go to Site Collection
Administration section and select HarePoint Workflow
Scheduler to open the Product’s main page.
Work with the Product can be brought to two main actions:
1. creating tasks for automated execution of workflows;
2. obtaining reports and statistics on results of tasks,
viewing logs.
On the product’s main page:-Tasks section demonstrates general statistics on current tasks of the product, clicking Edit Tasks
button moves you to the list of tasks of the Product (see next chapter) with the possibility toedit, create and manually start tasks;

9III. Product Overview | HarePoint.Com

--Logs section shows general statistics for increase of the Product’s log, clicking View Logs button
pops up a window with the product’s log:

You may use navigation links at the bottom of the window to scroll pages, select records by aspecified period using a form at the top of the page, sort records and apply filters by clicking on
the page’s column headers;clicking value in the Event column opens a history of implementing a specific copy of theworkflow;
Log Settings section specifies maximum size of the log, upon reaching any of threshold values(maximum number of records or maximum age) the log will be truncated.

The next chapter of this guide will explain how to create, run and edit tasks.

HarePoint.Com | III. Product Overview

102. Workflow tasks
To work with workflow tasks (hereinafter referred to as the ‘tasks’) in Site Collection Administration
select HarePoint Workflow Scheduler item, and click Edit Tasks button on the opening Product’s main
page . You will be moved to the page with a list of tasks:

To add a new task click “Add new item“ link, and a Create new task page will pop up in the new window:

11III. Product Overview | HarePoint.ComName
In the first mandatory section of task settings, please specify the task name as it will be displayed in thetask list and log files.
Workflow and List Items
Select a workflow in the “Workflow and List Items” section.
The product supports declarative workflows created in
Microsoft SharePoint Designer, and workflows created in
Microsoft Visual Studio.
When selecting List Workflow, two additional settings(“Views” and “List items”) will appear in the section.
Views . Selection of views linked with the list. It is extremelytopical for such lists as Tasks where you may select, forexample, “Due Today” view so that the workflow would
process only tasks for today, rather than all contained in thelist.
List items. You may select one of three options:
1. All. In this case the workflow will be run for each
item in the current view.
2. One. In this case you select manually a list item forwhich the workflow will be started by clicking“Select List Item” button.
3. Selected by CAML query. In this case you need to create a Where-type CAML query to select list
items at the moment of triggering the task. The workflow will be started for each selected item.
If you are unfamiliar with CAML queries then you may start learning this language by reading the article
in WikiPedia which contains links to articles for more in-depth studying:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collaborative_Application_Markup_Language
Under the form of the CAML query text editor you can find a list of fields of list items available for usage
in the query and “Insert field XML” button which inserts a string of the following type
<FieldRef Name="PercentComplete"/><Value Type="Number">FIELD VALUE</Value>
to the text editor. The “FIELD VALUE” text must be replaced manually with the required value.
We also recommend a freeware utility U2U CAML Query Builder to create complicated queries:
http://www.u2u.be/Tools/wincamlquerybuilder/CamlQueryBuilder.aspx
HarePoint.Com | III. Product Overview

12Event Parameters
If the selected workflow uses parameters, including those specified via an InfoPath form, the “EventParameters” section will be displayed after the “Workflow and List Items” section:

When selecting a workflow which does not use parameters this task settings section will be hidden. See
next chapter for more information on use of workflow parameters.
Triggers
This section specifies the schedule of the task’s implementation. A workflow task may be disabled forautomated execution by unchecking the “Enabled” field:

A task may be programmed for a single running or for everyday running with any frequency up to one
minute, or for running on specified days of the week, dates of a month or dates in the year. Please notethat you can select only one type of schedule (for example, only days of the week) for a task. Whenselecting a schedule type the form of schedule programming is reloaded on the page:

User AccountThis section specifies an account under which the workflow will be run. By default this option shows theaccount of the current user.

13III. Product Overview | HarePoint.Com

After filling in all the fields, click Save in the task edit window, the window will be closed and you will
return to the task list.

When moving the cursor over the line with a task, a mark appears in the “Task Name” column. Clickingon this mark opens the task’s context menu. This menu contains the following options:
1. Run now. Starts the task. Please note that some time may pass between putting the task into aqueue to start and updating its status due to specific features of SharePoint architecture.
Refresh the task list page manually to see changes in the task status (it will change to “Started”)
in the “Last Run” column.
2. Disable/Enable. Disables/enables execution of the task according to the schedule.
3. Edit item. Opens a task edit window (this can also be done via List Tools\Items taskbar).
4. Alert Me. Allows to subscribe to events linked with the task (this can also be done via List
Tools\Items taskbar). See chapter 4 for more details.
5. Manage Permissions. Opens a standard permissions settings page for the selected task.
6. Delete Item. Deletes the task.
Values of other columns in the task list:
1. Enabled. Value “No” means that automated execution of the task according to the schedule isdisabled. But the task may be started manually via the context menu.
2. Workflow Name. Name of the workflow started by the task.
3. List Name. For List Workflows it contains the name of the list linked with the workflow, for Site
Workflows the field is empty.
4. Triggers. Contains the task execution schedule.
5. Last Run. Contains the result and time of the last run of the task. Clicking on the value in thecolumn opens the program’s log. Please note that after manual start of the task the value in thisfield is not updated automatically, so you should renew the page manually.

HarePoint.Com | III. Product Overview

143. Using parameters in workflow
Parameters may be passed to a workflow at its startup via the InfoPath form or a page with the form on
the SharePoint site. To specify parameters, open or create a workflow in SharePoint Designer and click
the “Initiation Form Parameters” button:

Parameters inside a workflow can be easily
accessed by the same method as the one used toaccess the workflow variables.
When defining parameters for a workflow an
InfoPath form for input of the defined parameters
is automatically created on the Microsoft
SharePoint Server. And an ASPX page is created at
the Microsoft SharePoint Foundation; this page canbe seen when starting a workflow manually by astandard method.

15III. Product Overview | HarePoint.Com

When creating a task for such a workflow in HarePoint Workflow Scheduler the “Event Parameters”
section (see chapter 2) will appear on the page.

Clicking the “Set Workflow Parameters” button opens a pop-up window for input of parameters of theworkflow:

Defined values of the parameters will be usedeach time the task starts.
Please note that parameters do not always have
fixed values. For example, you may selectcurrent date as a default value for dates or in thetask settings.
However if you need to integrate a workflow
with other services, for example, databases orweb-services, then it will be quite difficult to doit via parameters. In this case we recommend
HarePoint.Com | III. Product Overview

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taking notice of our commercial product HarePoint Workflow Extensions which contains about 200activities for workflows providing a variety of functionalities for workflows from SharePoint
administration and integration with Active Directory up to converting graphics and office documents.
HarePoint Workflow Extensions is free to download at our web site:http://www.harepoint.com/Products/HarePointWorkflowExtensions/17

III. Product Overview | HarePoint.Com4. Manage product logs and alerts
Information on results of tasks execution in Workflow Scheduler can be obtained via the program’s logs
or via the SharePoint standard alert tool.
To view the Program’s logs select HarePoint Workflow Scheduler in Site Collection Administration. The
Product’s main page will open where you can define maximum size of log files and open a log file forreading by clicking “View Logs” button (for more see first chapter).
To create an alert in Site Collection Administration, please select HarePoint Workflow Scheduler theProduct’s main page will open. Click the “Edit Tasks”. A page with the Product’s task list will open.

Select a task for which you want to receive an alertand select “Alert Me” in the task’s context menu
(opens by clicking a mark in the “Task Name” column)
or on the List Tools \ Items taskbar.
You may also set up sending alerts via email or SMS
and either receive alerts after each change of thetask’s status (e.g., changes from Completed status toStarted status at the start up) or subscribe to a daily
or weekly report.
If a task is implemented more than once a day, it ispreferable to subscribe to event summary (select“Send a daily summary” in the “When to Send Alerts”
section) so that your mailbox would not be
overloaded with messages.
A summary sent to email looks as follows:

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To unsubscribe from alerts, select “My Settings” in the user menu in SharePoint and click “My Alerts”
link on the page opened:

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III. Product Overview | HarePoint.Com5. Task triggering mechanism
Two timer jobs are created during the product installation: “HarePoint Workflow Scheduler Job” and“HarePoint Workflow Scheduler Job Logs Clearing”.
By default “HarePoint Workflow Scheduler Job Logs Clearing” is started once a day to check andtruncate the product’s logs.
By default “HarePoint Workflow Scheduler Job” isstarted with a one minute interval and checks if
there are any tasks to run. If, for some reason, you
set up starting this service once in 30 minutes, andlet us suppose the SharePoint starts it at 00 and 30
minutes of each hour, then:
1. a task scheduled for start at 3.15 p.m. will
be started at 3.30 p.m.;
2. a task scheduled for start at 3.10 p.m., 3.20
p.m. and 3.30 p.m. will be started ONCE at
3.30 p.m.
To change the job launch schedule, please open Central Administration site, go to the Monitoring
section and open the “Review job definitions” link. Select the job for which you want to change thelaunch schedule from the opening list.
Due to specific features of theSharePoint architecture, after theproduct installation it may takesome time before the first launchof “HarePoint Workflow Scheduler
Job” which is required to starttasks created in the product, eventhough the job is scheduled tostart every minute andtheoretically it should be launched
immediately after the Productinstallation.
After the first manual job start any
subsequent jobs will be started
according to the settings.

HarePoint.Com | III. Product Overview

20Appendix A. Troubleshooting
A.1 Product is not available at Site Collection Administration
Open “Site Collection Features” at Site Collection Administration and check that “HarePoint Workflow
Scheduler” feature is activated.
A.2 Tasks starts later than specified or not start.
Check the “HarePoint Workflow Scheduler Job” schedule at Central Administration site. See chapter 2 ofSection III for more details.

21Appendix A. Troubleshooting | HarePoint.Com