Restricting a workflow status to only be able to go to 'In progress'
Asked by Spasimira Genova:

Hi community,

I've been going nuts with what seems to be a really basic task.

An internal team have requested that the following change is performed in their workflow:

They want the status 'Waiting for support' to only be able to transition to 'In progress'. Everything else should stay as it is.

When clicking around it seems like the configuration of this workflow is unusual. 'In progress' is mapped to the other grey statuses in a way I haven't seen in other workflows.

Additionally, when I go to the text view there is a step called 'Investigating' but no corresponding status with that name in the diagram view.

I've tried to just delete all transitions and map everything from scratch, but the workflow gets super cluttered as every status pretty much needs to have an outgoing and incoming transition with all other statuses, aside from Waiting for support.

Is there a neat and smart way to do this? Will everything work as expected if I delete the big 'In progress' transition and just create new transitions? Maybe I'm missing something and overly complicating things.

Many thanks!

![Screenshot 2024-09-02 at 15.47.56.png](/t5/image/serverpage/image-id/345216i15FB9A8251EBE2DE/image-dimensions/473x300?v=v2 "Screenshot 2024-09-02 at 15.47.56.png")![Screenshot 2024-09-02 at 15.48.15.png](/t5/image/serverpage/image-id/345217iD710C8A26D68F7D6/image-dimensions/495x150?v=v2 "Screenshot 2024-09-02 at 15.48.15.png")


Answers:
author: Seon Shakespeare
body: Hi Spasimira,

Your workflow has "All" transitions, which means issues can move between almost any status. This can make things complicated!

**Do you really need those "All" transitions?** If not, removing them would simplify your workflow AND automatically solve the problem of restricting "Waiting for Support" to only go to "In Progress".

If you *do* need the "All" transitions, you can add conditions to each one so they're hidden when an issue is in "Waiting for Support". This will prevent unwanted transitions.

Also, "Investigating" is likely the name of a transition (the line between statuses), not a status itself.

Hope this helps!

comments: author: Spasimira Genova
body: Hey [@Seon Shakespeare](/t5/user/viewprofilepage/user-id/2079193)

Thanks so much for this input - you are right, investigating seems to be the name of a specific step.

When I remove the "All", I think I end up with the initial issue, which is creating outgoing and incoming transitions for all other statuses aside from Waiting for Support. All other statuses should be able to both go into the rest, and be transitioned to from any other status. I think this will make the workflow very cluttered.

What type of condition could be used here?

Many thanks!


author: Seon Shakespeare
body: Hi Spasimira,

You can use the "**Previous Status Condition**" to restrict those "All" transitions.

Here's how to set it up:

1. Click on one of the "All" transitions (E.g for "Awaiting Third Party")
2. Click "Conditions" \> "Add condition"
3. Choose the "Previous Status Condition"
4. In the condition configuration:
   * Select "Waiting for Support" as the Previous status.
   * Tick all three options:
     * "Most recent status only"
     * "Include current status"
     * "Reverse condition"
5. Click "Add"
6. Publish your workflow.

You'll need to do this for each "All" transition you want to hide from the "Waiting for Support" status (E.g for "Awaiting Development", "Waiting for Creator" etc)

Hope this helps!


author: Manoj Gangwar
body: Hi [@Spasimira Genova](/t5/user/viewprofilepage/user-id/5468025)

You need to remove the transitions from

Waiting for Creator, Awaiting Development, Awaiting third party to In progress.

It will not impact anything because the rest of the statuses have all trantions so the user can move tickets from In progress to any status.


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