Lifecycle of a Workflow

The lifecycle of a workflow includes different phases. This section describes all the phases of a workflow.

Save a Workflow without Publishing the Workflow

An admin can create workflows and save the workflows at any time, even if the workflow state is incomplete. You can view all the saved workflows in Freestyle Orchestrator dashboard list view. You can resume editing of any saved workflow at any time. All the required elements and steps must be complete before publishing your workflow.

Publish a Workflow on an End User Device

When all the required elements within a workflow are complete and the workflow steps have no errors, you can publish the workflow to your end user devices. After you save and publish your workflow, the resources within a workflow do not get installed on the devices. When the device regularly checks for any updates, the workflow resources start installing. Once a workflow is published, any additional changes to the workflow are also published without an intermediate save option.

In an OG, multiple admins can modify an already published workflow. For example, an admin modifies a workflow and publishes the workflow, subsequently another admin also modifies the same workflow and publishes the workflow. As a best practice, before publishing a workflow, admins must enter the change log accurately to track the changes made to a workflow. The change log provides information about the changes made to the workflow and the admin details who modified the workflow.

Update a Workflow

After you successfully publish the workflow to the devices, you can modify the individual resources in a workflow or change the workflow itself. When you modify the workflow or the workflow resources, you create a newer version of the workflow. When a workflow is first saved and published the workflow version number is 1 and with every update to the workflow the workflow version number is incremented by 1. You can find the workflow version information in the header when you open a workflow’s details page.

You can publish a newer version of the workflow to the devices. When the devices check-in for updates, the devices receive a new version of the workflow, else, the device is marked out-of-date.

Note: Changing the workflow assignments do not trigger a new version of the workflow.

As an admin, you can perform the following changes on the workflows:

You can change the platform of the workflow while creating a workflow. If you change the platform, the following warning message appears: ‘Changing the platform will erase all the other resources, steps, actions you have entered into the workflow. Are you sure you want to continue?’
You can search for applications based on the following categories: Platform, Managed by, and Categories
You can reorder the steps in a workflow after you create the steps in a workflow.
When an admin selects an application based on an application name; the admin must be able to see all the available versions for a selected application at the OG where the application is managed.

Workflow Actions

When you navigate to Freestyle > Freestyle Orchestrator dashboard, select and click on a workflow, the workflow details page is displayed. The workflow details page lists all the devices that are assigned to this workflow. You can select a single device from the device list and perform actions such as Sync workflow and Force execute a workflow.

The Sync workflow option sends any updates to the device and fetches the workflow status information from the device. The Sync workflow action updates outstanding changes to all the workflows. To sync your workflow to devices, navigate to Devices > List View > Select and click on any device > click More Actions and select Workflows.

An admin can also select any device and force execute a workflow on the device. The Force execute action re-runs the entire workflow on the device irrespective of the previous state of the workflow, that is, even if the workflow execution is in progress or in a completed state, the workflow is again run on the device when you select the Force execute action. You can navigate to Devices > Details View > and click the Workflows tab and run the Force execute action to re-run the entire workflow on the device irrespective of the previous state of the workflow.

Pause a Workflow

In case, there is an issue with the workflow deployment, you can pause the deployment using the Pause action. The administrator can modify the workflow to make the necessary changes and resume the deployment of the workflow to the devices.

Delete a Workflow

You can delete a workflow when the workflow is no longer applicable to devices. If you have the permissions, you can delete any workflow created at a given organization group (OG). Deleting the workflow does not trigger the removal of resources from the assigned devices.

To delete a workflow, perform the following steps:

Open the Workspace ONE UEM console.
Navigate to Freestyle > Freestyle Orchestrator dashboard.
Select the workflow to be deleted and click Delete. The following warning message is displayed: ‘Deleting this workflow will remove the resource assignment from the devices in this workflow. This action cannot be undone. Resources currently installed on the devices will remain unless manually removed. To remove the installed resources, navigate to the Device Details view for each device, or the Assigned Devices view for each resource. Do you want to continue?’

Delete a workflow screen

Click Delete to delete the workflow else click Cancel to retain the workflow. When you click Delete, the workflow is deleted from Freestyle Orchestrator dashboard.

Duplicate a Workflow

The duplicate workflow feature permits an admin to create an exact copy of the workflow within the same OG. Admins can use the Duplicate workflow feature to avoid manually replicating workflows. On the workflows list view page, an admin can select a single worklfow or multiple workflows, then choose to duplicate the worklfow within the same OG or to a different OG.

Admins can use the Duplicate workflow feature to avoid manually replicating workflows in the following scenarios:

Test a minor modification to a workflow with a test group of devices without needing to interrupt the execution of an existing workflow. For example, if an admin wants to ensure a major release version of an app deploys correctly in a workflow before deploying the app to all users during production. Admin can duplicate the workflow, add a test smart group, and ensure the deployment runs smoothly. Once confirmed, admin can pause the original workflow, modify the workflow, and push the workflow to all the devices.
Modify a workflow to retire an older version of the workflow without interrupting the execution of an existing workflow. For example, an admin is performing several major changes to their onboarding workflow. Admin can duplicate the existing onboarding workflow, modify the workflow, test the new changes, and ensure the workflow is progressing as expected. Admin can then pause the old workflow, add the correct smart group to the new workflow, and deploy the workflow.
Reuse a complex workflow with minor modifications to the workflow for different personas, user groups, geographies, store locations, and so on. For example, an admin creates a device onboarding workflow for the AMER geographic region. Admin must replicate the same workflow with different productivity apps for the EMEA region. So, admin can use the Duplicate workflow feature to create a copy, rename a workflow, and swap several apps within a workflow. Admin can continue to duplicate a workflow and make changes for the APAC region, and so on.

How to Duplicate a Workflow within the same Organization Group?

An admin can duplicate a workflow to create an exact copy of the workflow within the same OG. The following procedure describes the steps to duplicate a workflow within an OG.

Prerequisites

To duplicate a workflow, ensure that the workflow to be duplicated is already created in the OG. In this example, Scripts-Test is the workflow that will be duplicated.

Procedure

The following procedure describes the steps to create a duplicate workflow within the same OG.

Log in to the Workspace ONE UEM console and navigate to your organization group.
Click Freestyle > Freestyle Orchestrator.
On the Freestyle Orchestrator dashboard, select a workflow that you want to duplicate and click Duplicate. Here, Scripts-Test is the workflow that is being duplicated.

Duplicate a workflow screen

Confirm the action through the lightbox and click Duplicate.

Results

Navigate to the Workflows tab in the Freestyle Orchestrator dashboard and view the duplicated Scripts-Test workflow.

Note: When the workflow starts duplicating, the admins can check the progress of the job in the Processing tab. If the duplication is successful, the workflow disappears from the Processing tab and appears in the Workflows tab, along with the other workflows. If the duplication failed, the workflow remains in the Processing tab and displays a Failed status. The admin must again try selecting the workflow and manually retry the duplication.

When an admin clicks a newly duplicated workflow, the admin can view an exact copy of the workflow. The complete workflow is duplicated including the platform, deployment settings, conditions, applications, profiles, scripts, and sensors. The smart groups are not imported to the duplicated workflow. Admin can proceed to edit and save the workflow.

How to Duplicate a Workflow to another Organization Group?

An admin can make a copy of a workflow to another OG and not all resources are carried to the other OG if the resources do not exist in the other OG.

The following procedure describes the steps to duplicate a workflow to another OG.

Prerequisites

To duplicate a workflow, ensure that the workflow to be duplicated is already created in the OG. In this example, Netflix-Pub-WF is the workflow that will be duplicated.

Procedure

The following procedure describes the steps to create a duplicate workflow within the same OG.

Log in to the Workspace ONE UEM console and navigate to your organization group.
Click Freestyle > Freestyle Orchestrator.
On the Freestyle Orchestrator dashboard, select a workflow that you want to duplicate and click Duplicate. Here, Scripts-Test is the workflow that is being duplicated.

Duplicate a workflow screen

Choose the destination OG through the lightbox.
Toggle the Include Sensors and Include Scripts options if needed.

Duplicate a workflow screen

Click Duplicate to confirm your action.

Results

Navigate to the Workflows tab in the Freestyle Orchestrator dashboard and view the duplicated Scripts-Test workflow.

When you edit a workflow duplicated from another OG, an identical framework of all the workflow steps and conditions is created, along with scripts and sensors if the option was selected. However, some resources, such as apps and profiles, might be missing from the imported workflow. The missing resources are highlighted in the UI and the admin can search and select the missing resource or remove the step if the step is not applicable to the new workflow. You can continue to edit, save, or deploy the workflow.

Note: Ensure the applications and profiles are preloaded in the OG in which workflows are imported to ease the remapping process.

Export a Workflow

An admin can select a single workflow or multiple workflows and export the workflows as a zipped folder of .json files. Scripts and sensors are the only resources that can be exported, the apps and profiles within a workflow cannot be exported. The exported workflows appear in the Exports tab on the Freestyle Orchestrator dashboard. While the workflow is being exported the status is displayed as In Progress. Once the export is complete, the status changes from In Progress to Ready and you can download a single export or multiple exports.

Workflows are downloaded as .json files. Do not modify the .json file as you might see errors while you try to import the workflow. If multiple bulk exports are selected, this might result in a zipped folder of zipped folders of each bulk export. To import a workflow, the admin must group together the workflows into a single zipped folder.

Import a Workflow

An admin can upload a single workflow or multiple workflows and import the workflows as a zipped folder of .json files. Admins can use the import workflow feature in the following scenarios:

Build and test workflows in the UAT environment, export, and import the workflows to Production instead of manually recreating workflows in the Production environment.

How to Import a Workflow?

To import a single workflow, you must upload a single .json file (either in a zipped folder or standalone) and for uploading multiple workflows, you must ensure the workflow is formatted as a single zipped folder with all the .json files within the zipped folder. This scenario describes the steps to import a single workflow.

Prerequisites

To import a workflow, ensure that the .json file to be uploaded is saved on your system.

Procedure

The following procedure describes the steps to import a workflow:

Log in to the Workspace ONE UEM console and navigate to your organization group.
Click Freestyle > Freestyle Orchestrator.
Navigate to Workflows or Processing tabs of the Freestyle Orchestrator dashboard.
Select the workflow to import and click Import.

Import a workflow screen

Click Upload File to select the workflow file or files to upload.

Import a workflow screen 6. Check that the correct file is selected and select the Organization Group where the workflow must be imported. 7. Select to include or exclude the sensors and scripts in the imported workflow. Note: If the import fails, reselect the .json file and try to import the workflow again excluding the scripts and sensors. 8. Click Import.

Results

After confirming the import, the workflows appear in the Processing tab, where you can view the status of the import. Once import job is complete, the job moves from the Processing tab to Workflows tab. When you edit an imported workflow, an identical framework of all the workflow steps and conditions is created along with scripts and sensors, if the scripts and sensors option was selected.

However, some resources, such as apps and profiles will be missing from the imported workflow. The missing resources are highlighted in the UI and the admin can search and select the missing resource or remove the step if the step is not applicable to the new workflow. You can continue to edit, save, or deploy the workflow.

Note: Ensure the applications and profiles are preloaded in the OG in which workflows are imported to ease the remapping process.

Freestyle Orchestrator Dashboard Details and Features

The Freestyle Orchestrator dashboard displays a list of all the workflows that are saved and published. You can navigate to Freestyle > Freestyle Orchestrator to view a list of all the workflows. The dashboard provides the following details of the workflow:

Name of the Workflow
Description of the workflow
Number of resources assigned to a workflow
Number of Smart groups associated with the workflow
Organization group details that manage the workflow
Platform assigned to the workflow
Status of the workflow, whether the workflow is published, saved, or paused
Date of creation of the workflow

You can also click on any individual workflow in the dashboard to view the details of the workflow. The following workflow details are displayed:

Version - Displays the version of the workflow. The version of the workflow is incremented every time based on the updates made to the workflow.
Created - Displays the date on which the workflow was created.
Published - Displays the date on which the workflow was published
Modified On - Displays the date on which the workflow was modified by the admin.
Modified By - Displays the details of the admin who last modified the workflow.
Managed By - Displays the OGs associated with the workflow.
UUID - Displays the universal unique identifier (UUID) of the device.
Change log - Displays the log details of the last modifications to a workflow.

On the Freestyle Orchestrator dashboard, you can view the following features:

New - Create a new workflow using the New feature in the Freestyle Orchestrator dashbaord.
Edit - Edit an existing workflow using the Edit feature in the Freestyle Orchestrator dashbaord.
Publish - Publish a workflow to your end user devices when all the required elements within a workflow are complete and the workflow steps have no errors.
Duplicate - Create an exact copy of the workflow within the same OG.
Export - Select single or multiple workflows to export as a zipped folder of .json files.
Delete - Delete a workflow when the workflow is no longer applicable to the devices.

Configure On-Demand Workflow Deployment Options

When admins create a workflow, the admins can configure deployment options for individual workflows. In the workflow Admin Panel, after you enter the Platform and select a smart group for your workflow the following deployment options are displayed:

Auto Deploy - If this option is selected, upon device check-in, the workflow is automatically deployed on the end user’s devices.
Show in App Catalog - If this option is selected, you must enter the Display Name and optionally enter the Display Description and upload an image in the Icon. These options are displayed on the Workspace ONE Intelligent Hub catalog under the Apps section on the end user’s device. The end users can click the install action and start the workflow installation immediately.

The end users can view the assigned workflows in the Workspace ONE Intelligent Hub app catalog. The admins cannot view a list of devices that are assigned with a workflow immediately. But when the end user initiates the workflow installation at least once, then the devices start showing the workflow in the Workspace ONE Intelligent Hub app catalog. When you publish the workflow, you might not view any devices, but the end users can view the workflows in the Workspace ONE Intelligent Hub app catalog. Once the end users install the workflow, the admins can view the status of the workflow. There are no admin-side actions to force execute a workflow.
Auto Deploy and Show in App Catalog - If this option is selected, the workflow is published to the devices on next check-in and the end users can view the workflow in their Workspace ONE Hub catalog under the Apps section. When required, the end user can initiate the workflow action.

Note: This feature is supported on both macOS and Windows devices. Admins can select either of the deployment options for their workflows. After the admins publish the workflow, the workflow is added to the Freestyle Orchestrator list view and is also displayed on the end users Workspace ONE Intelligent Hub app catalog.