October 2020 Release Preview

Jeff_146001
Jeff_146001 Posts: 296 admin
edited September 2020 in Roadmap

Builder Updates and Connected Forms

In our release planned for October 13, we’re planning more exciting updates to make building workflows even faster and easier and new capabilities to connect multiple forms together.
The features described for the October release are subject to change. Please share your questions and feedback as comments below!

Builder Updates

Copy / Paste Actions


Instantly duplicate an existing step in your workflow with all the same parameters to make it quick and easy to create multiple variations of the same action. You’ll also be able to copy a step from one workflow to another, saving lots of time and re-typing.

New Field Type: Multiple File Upload

The new Files field type will enable your users to upload two or more files at once, and it will save the uploaded files in a table.

Section Headers and Comments

Keep your workflows clear and organized with the new section headers that enable you to label each sequence of actions or input comments to describe what happens. This can be useful in defining workflow phases and making your workflow easier to understand for other builders.

Conditional Branches

This new action block enables you to set up a condition for a series of actions that should all execute when that condition is true. The actions will be indented, similar to inline workflows, to keep your workflow organized and easy to interpret.

Drag-and-Drop with Inline Workflows

Currently, when reordering steps within an inline workflow, builders first need to open that inline workflow in its own tab. This update will enable builders to easily drag-and-drop to reorder steps within an inline workflow without needing to leave the main workflow builder page.

Simplified Settings Navigation

We will be updating the navigation for the workflow configuration options on the Settings page to make it easier to directly jump to the feature that you need to update.

Connected Forms - Phase 1

We have seen a number of use cases that would benefit from the ability to present web forms on a series of linked pages, as well as the option to run actions in between each page.
The October release will include a set of features that will unlock new possibilities for these use cases. We consider this the first step in a broader set of capabilities that will ultimately enable you to evolve your Catalytic forms into web apps.
Here’s just some of the exciting use cases that will be possible with these new features:

  • Save web form progress: Automatically save each page as it’s submitted and send auto-reminders to prompt users to continue where they left off.
  • Authenticate web form users: Validate a username and password against a data table before allowing a user to view and complete a web form.
  • Generate document and provide download link: Intake submissions from a web form, generate a dynamic document, spreadsheet or slide deck, and then present a link to download the file on the next page.
  • Customize the form success page: Redirect to a page of your choice or create your own page to display after a form is submitted.
  • Dynamically populate Data Table fields: Filter or otherwise update data table fields on a subsequent web form page based on what a user submits on the first page.
  • Enable users to submit the same form multiple times: Provide an option for users to submit their first form and then reload the form with blank fields for subsequent submissions.
    We look forward to seeing what creative solutions that builders like you invent with these new features!

Email: Send a Form - Set URL When Form is Submitted

In the October release, we plan to release a new version of the Email: Send a Form action that will enable you to set the URL that should be displayed after an emailed web form is submitted. This not only enables you to configure the post-submission success page, but it also enables you to create a multi-page experience for emailed web forms by using this new parameter to define one or more Web Form Trigger pages to link to after the first web form is submitted.
To connect the results together, you can auto-populate a field in each web form with the recipient’s email address or another unique identifier, and you can save all of the results to a data table using actions, such as Tables: Add a Row and Tables:Update a Row.
As each page is submitted, the results are automatically saved, and you can set up auto-reminders using the Email: Send a Form action to prompt users to continue from where they left off.

Webhook Trigger - GET Requests and HTML Response

The approach above is perfect when your goal is to simply break up a large form into multiple pages, but some use cases require you to run some actions before a web form is displayed or in between web forms in a multi-page web form experience. That’s why we plan to release two new options for Webhook Triggers in October:
GET Requests: Currently, Webhook Triggers only allow for POST requests. The new capability will provide the option to accept GET requests. This means that you can enable a workflow to be initiated when someone visits a URL in their web browser.
HTML Responses: We will be adding text/html as a content-type response option for Webhook Triggers. This means that you’ll be able to run one or more actions and then redirect to a web form or display a custom web page.
With the release, we’ll provide templates and guidance for using these new features to tackle common use cases.

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Comments

    1. For the New Field Type: Multiple File Upload, would the user HAVE to upload more than one file? Can the user still upload only one file?
    2. I really like the Connected Forms idea! I hope it can be applied to web form triggers really soon!
  • Jeff_146001
    Jeff_146001 Posts: 296 admin

    @Kevin_579059 The new multiple files field type does allow users to upload a single file.

    For Connected Forms, it's possible today with Web Form Triggers to some degree. The help article, Customize and add features to web forms includes some tips for this. Specifically, adding ?ref-success=https://www.kevins-domain.com at the end of the web form trigger URL will route the user to that web page after submitting. You can combine this with Auto-populating fields in order to populate a value like email address or ID on the 2nd web form. For example: ?field-email=jeff@catalytic.com&ref-success=https://www.kevins-domain.com.

  • @Jeff_763648
    For the "Text Formatting Toolbar" will there be any options to change the font as well or what text stying functionality will be included in October?

  • Jeff_146001
    Jeff_146001 Posts: 296 admin

    @Jacob_154284 The initial version will simply be geared to make it easier for builders to format text without needing to know markdown syntax, but it will provide a nice foundation for future enhancements.

  • Jeff_146001
    Jeff_146001 Posts: 296 admin

    Update for October release

    The following 2 features are still in development and will be planned for a January release:

    • Easy Column References
    • Text Formatting Toolbar

    The rest of the features mentioned in the post above are on track for October.

  • I love the ability to copy/paste steps, because I often find myself needing to create two actions with just a small adjustment. Copy/pasting steps saves me a metric ton of time. However, I have noticed that sometimes, some steps refuse to be pasted. I receive the below error, and no explanation.

    What can cause this and what can I do to be able to keep working (other than create the step from scratch)?

  • @Jeff_146001 Can you please provide an update on the connected forms feature? Specifically on the ability to perform intermediary actions in between two pages of the form? Thanks!

  • @Kalin_126161 Are you able to provide any updates on connected forms?

  • Dylan_191182
    Dylan_191182 Posts: 92 admin

    @Taylor_730565 using the GET Request with a Webhook trigger you can run actions between forms. Let me know if that doesn't work for your use case and we can drill in

    @Tom_855096 any update specifically you are looking for?

  • @Dylan_478989 Is there a how-to guide on this feature? The help article for the webhook trigger help doc doesn't mention it.

    The current workflow I'm working on is something like this:
    1. User answers a few questions on web form trigger.
    2. Based on answers, a few things can happen when the user clicks Submit:

    • Start workflow to send an email to person X
    • Start workflow to send an email to person Y
    • Redirect user to webpage A
    • Redirect user to webpage B

    I was thinking that the GET webhook trigger could help me accomplish this.

  • Dylan_191182
    Dylan_191182 Posts: 92 admin

    @Tom_944137 we have a show and tell on how to use it here.

    The GET webhook trigger can absolutely help you accomplish this. You could add a ref-success query parameter to the end of the web form trigger link you share that points to the GET webhook trigger. That GET webhook trigger could choose which workflow to start based on the data the user entered and where to redirect to as well.

    Let me know if the show & tell isn't enough.