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New Trigger for Changes to a Column in an Item in SharePoint Fails

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Posted on by GeorgeAnderson

A new trigger has just been released. A video tutorial posted by @Chakkaradeep is found at Video Walkthough of New Trigger/Action. This is meant to allow you to trigger when a column within an item in SharePoint changes, not just when the item changes anywhere in it.

I attempt to set up the flow to detect when the Status column changes and then send an email. However it fails for me.
The error message is: sinceInput not specified.

Here's the attempt:

When an existing item is modified

Get changed for an item

Since = Trigger Window Start Token

Until = Trigger Window End Token

In the Select an output field AND in the first of the two conditions the Dynamic Content choice is Has Condition Changed: Status

Error message received:

Inputs Inputs

What am I missing?

Categories:

Building flows

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Pstork1 68,717 Most Valuable Professional on at

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First, is the Status column included in the view you are using for the trigger and the action?

Second, is versioning enabled for the list?

Also, could you show us the condition statements you are using to check for changes?

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GeorgeAnderson 27 on at

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@Pstork1 ,

I made a reply to your questions and got a message that my reply was marked as spam and removed. I'll try again without any screenshots.

First: Yes. The Status column is included in the view that I'm using.
Second: Yes. Versioning is enabled for the list.
Third: The condition is shown, but I'll type it out for clarity

Has column changed:Status is equal to true
AND
Status Value is equal to Draft

What I do then... Save the item with a status NOT equal to Draft (one of the other status possibilities on the drop down). Then, go into the item again and save the item with the status equal to Draft. And, then, I get the error message.

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Pstork1 68,717 Most Valuable Professional on at

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I didn't try with a second condition (status value = draft), but it does work for me with just the main condition. I'll add checking for a specific value and let you know. But the screenshot stops at the end of the Get Changes. The error is shown, but not the definition of the condition.

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Pstork1 68,717 Most Valuable Professional on at

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I just tried with both conditions and its working for me. Can you show me the definition of your condition statements?

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GeorgeAnderson 27 on at

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@Pstork1 ,

OK. Hold the horses!

Your screenshot shows an "fx true", mine just has the text "true" typed in the field (you couldn't see mine cuz they labeled my first reply as spam and removed it). Can you explain your fx true, and why that instead of just text "true"? In the tutorial video that @Chakkaradeep created and posted, he only used the text "true" not the fx true. Is fx true important for some reason, or is it equivalent to the text "true"?

Also, you didn't put your condition inside a Apply to Each box. The video did... so I did... though I don't know why or what exactly the Apply to Each does for me in this situation. Now looking back at the video again, @Chakkaradeep was talking about getting the collection of changes from an item, but then he kind of faded out on that discussion, maybe abandoned that line of thought, and then switched to another demo. Very confusing to me! I thought the point was that you need to capture all of the changes of an item in order for this all to work... but... maybe not.

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GeorgeAnderson 27 on at

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@Pstork1 ,

So, I modified my flow to be more like yours, rather than what was in the first part of the tutorial by @Chakkaradeep .a

It fails on the 2nd step before it ever gets to the conditional.

Here's what the General steps are now:
2nd try - General Steps
Here's the Step 1 Detail:

2nd Try - Step 1 Detail
Here's the Step 2 Detail (where it fails):
2nd Try - Step 2 Details
When run it fails on Step 2 with this message:
Try 2 - Error message

I could show you the inputs and outputs of the first two steps, but I'm concerned the Moderator is going to call this spam and deleted, maybe because of too many screenshots. Let me know if you want to see the inputs and outputs, or can you see the problem without that?

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Pstork1 68,717 Most Valuable Professional on at

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1) When trying to compare to a boolean I find it best to use the true or false expression rather than a literal. The literal will work, but it is actually a string, not a boolean and the automatic cast seems to be case sensitive. So whenever testing against a boolean I always enter the value via the expressions tab to make sure I'm getting a boolean value and not a string.

The apply to each isn't really needed if you are using a singular trigger. The trigger fires when one item is modified and i'm just testing the one item to see if the column changed. I don't remember whether the video used a loop or not, but its not necessary unless you are doing a recurrence flow and retrieving multiple items. You do get all the changes for that one item, but its not in a collection. They show as independent values. They may have been a collection of changes in an earlier version of the trigger. @Chakkaradeep has been working with that trigger since its earliest inception.

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Pstork1 68,717 Most Valuable Professional on at

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I'm assuming your list is set for both major and minor versions. I would try setting the second step to include minor versions = Yes. If its ignoring minor versions it may not find any changes even though changes occurred, but were stored as a minor version.

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GeorgeAnderson 27 on at

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Found it!!!

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GeorgeAnderson 27 on at

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Found it!!!

I wrote this flow starting from a template, thinking that the first step was the same as the new trigger... it was not!

Therefore, I was using an old trigger:
When an existing item is modified

@Pstork1 and others on the forums were using the new trigger:
When an item or a file is modified

I thought I was using the new trigger... but I was not. My eye thought they were the same...
It does works properly, as advertised, when using the correct trigger.

So, if you use the wrong combination:
When an existing item is modified
with
Get Changes for an item or a file (properties only)
You will get the error: sinceInput not specified

This reminds me of the old days of "Bad command or file name" which could mean 31 different things. I do wish error messaging could be more revealing as to what the problem actually is. @Chakkaradeep you might put this in the documentation for the new trigger.

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