[Automations] Trigger based on the current state of the item
Hi, it would be great to allow the creation of automations whose trigger is not necessarily based on a change that needs to occur within the item but rather on the current state of the item.
Let me provide an example to clarify the idea: suppose we want all tasks belonging to a folder named XYZ to have a certain custom field set in a specific way (if it doesn't already have a value). It would be optimal to delegate this task to an internal automation, specifying that the trigger is the task's membership in the XYZ folder and is conditioned by the custom field not already having a value.
Currently (if I am not mistaking) this is not possible because the available triggers must always involve some change within the item. I believe this would be a highly useful implementation for many use cases.
Giovanni De Giovanni could you use the trigger "When Status Doesn't change in"? You could have it run every day and set the custom field values.
Hi Russell,
thank you so much for reading and sharing your idea, which I find brilliant. Indeed, this could be a good workaround, and I admit I hadn't thought about it.
The only concern I have is that the minimum time frame allowed by the automation to check for the "non-change" of status is 1 working day. Unfortunately, all tasks that are worked on during a day and undergo a status change will be excluded from the trigger, and the automation will not operate on these tasks.
If it were possible to set a shorter time frame (for example, a few hours), I could set the automation to run overnight when the office is closed, and realistically, no employee would modify the task statuses. [but unfortunately it is not possible to choose a timeframe shorter than 1 day]
Another solution I could adopt (let me know if you think it's a good idea) is to simultaneously activate two automations, where the action is always what I want (for example, changing the value in a custom field conditioned on the circumstance that the custom field doesn't already have one), while the trigger could be, in one case: "if status does not change in 1 day" and in the other case: "if status changes to any status." This way, after a day of activating both automations, the "sum" of the two automations should have allowed me to achieve my goal, and at that point, I can "turn off" both of them. Do you think this could be an effective solution, or do you see any potential bottlenecks or collateral damage?
Giovanni De Giovanni I was going to suggest something similar, using the status change as a trigger as well. I think it would work fine.