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Many work flows often involve a number of people filling out different sections of a single form. So when you're designing this type of flow, you're most likely dragging the same form into the flow designer repeatedly to create the different steps in the flow. Another way to create this type of flow is to use the Linked Steps feature of the flow designer. In this method, you create a linked version of a form for each step you want in your flow. One great advantage of this method is that if you need to make changes to the form step(s) after you've created your flow, you only have to edit the "parent" form — the editing changes are automatically propagated to its linked forms in the flow. Conversely, if you drag multiple copies of the same form into a flow to create steps, you'd have to make any changes to each copy of the form in each step. If you want to show or hide different parts of a form depending on which user is filling it out, you can easily do this in a flow designed with linked steps using the Security tab or Business Rules. One circumstance in which you might not want to use linked forms is a flow in which each user is filling out a different form. - To create linked forms in a flow, add a step to the flow by dragging a form into the flow designer.
- Click on the step and then click
 LINK icon to create a linked form. - Continue clicking Link icon to create as many of the linked forms as you want.
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- Click the Link Icon to create a linked step.
- Click the pencil icon to open a step in the Form Designer to edit it.
- Click the delete icon to remove a linked step.
- Click the download icon on the parent step as a standalone form.
- Click the Image Modified Edit Step Properties to access the Property tabs for the flow step.
Linked Steps Workflow Examples
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Example 1 - Linked Steps using Business Rules
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Consider an Expense Report with 3 steps: - Step 1 is filled in by an employee
- Step 2 is approved/rejected by a Manager
- Step 3 goes to the Finance department for final processing.
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Drag a New Form step onto the flow canvas. Click on it.
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Create Sections in the first step of the flow for the Expenses, Manager and Finance. Design the sections using any of the Palette Controls. Minimally, you can use a table to collect the Expenses and a Signature control for the employee to sign in the Expense section, a TextArea control and a Signature in the Manager section and a Paid on Date and Reference Number field with a Signature on the Finance step. Save Step 1.
Click on Step 1. Open the Settings tab in one of 3 ways:
- Click the Image Modified Edit Step Properties icon on the step then click the Settings tab.
- Click the icon in the Properties Navigator on the left side of the screen. This takes you directly to the Settings tab.
- Click anywhere in the General Settings section of the Properties Navigator. This takes you directly to the Settings tab.
- Type the name of the flow step in the Name field on the Settings tab. For this example, the name of the first step is Employee.
Click the Image Added Link icon twice to create linked steps for the Manager and Finance steps. The linked steps are copies of Step 1. Note they are represented by a double box in the Flow Designer.
Click on the second step.
Open the Settings tab in one of 3 ways:
- Click the Image Added Edit Step Properties icon on the step then click the Settings tab.
- Click the icon in the Properties Navigator on the left side of the screen. This takes you directly to the Settings tab.
- Click anywhere in the General Settings section of the Properties Navigator. This takes you directly to the Settings tab.
- Type the name of the flow step in the Name field on the Settings tab. For this example, the name of the second step is Manager.
Click on the third step.
Open the Settings tab in one of 3 ways:
- Click the Edit Step Properties icon on the step then click the Settings tab.
- Click the icon in the Properties Navigator on the left side of the screen. This takes you directly to the Settings tab.
- Click anywhere in the General Settings section of the Properties Navigator. This takes you directly to the Settings tab.
- Type the name of the flow step in the Name field on the Settings tab. For this example, the name of the first second step is Employee.Finance.
Save the workflow.
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Example 2 - Linked Steps using the Security Tab
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