Outlook not opening approval task in a small window

Question

I am using  SharePoint Designer 2010 approval workflow with Outlook 2010, when approvers click "open this task" in outlook, some get the nice Infopath form with approve and reject buttons and can approve from within the email, however others are taken to the task list associated with the workflow, leaving Outlook and some users don't get anything

Unfortunately it seems like the users who are least familair with workflow and tasks list, go to the backend SharePoint Task List.

Any feedback appreciated.

Answer 1

Hi,

Thank you for your post.
I'm trying to involve someone familiar with this topic to further look at this issue. There might be some time delay. Appreciate your patience.

Thanks & Regards.

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Emir Liu

TechNet Community Support

Answer 2

Thank you, looking forward to your response.

Also, everyone uses Outlook 2010

Answer 3

Hello,

I was consistantly able to get the InfoPath form for all users who saw "Open this Task" button in Outlook.

This issue seems specific to your environment and is currently too broad to make a conclusion about what could be the issue. Could you please provide us some specifics e.g. under what scenarios the users are routed to SharePoint Task List / are there any specific set of users who get this behavior etc / Is this happening for a specific SharePoint site?

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Please remember to click 'Mark as Answer' on the post that helps you or click 'Unmark as Answer' if a marked post does not actually answer your question. This can be beneficial to other community members reading the thread.

Regards,
Nishant Shah
Microsoft Online Community Support

Answer 4

Hi Nishant,

I know this is un related here....

Is it possible to open the approve/reject  Infopath form in a client mode (like, the way it opens when you click Open this Task button from Outlook client/ Word) from my approval email body other than this approach?

In other words, where do i see the script for Outlook email clients Open This Task ribbon script, so that i can try to mimic the same functionality from the email body/ any thoughts?

Answer 5

Hi Mariam123,

I would like to suggest you to modify the link of the 'Open this task' text on the email. To replace the link first go to task list and open one of the tasks in a new tab. Now cop the whole link from the address bar to the link on the 'Open this task' text. And replace ID number in the link (in my case 1) ID=1 to ID=TaskList.ID from Current task variables. Publish he workflow and see if this helps. 

http://intranet/TaskForms/Task.aspx?List=4910183e%2Da7e4%2D490d%2D91dc%2D705f1e7e014d&ID=1&;ContentTypeId=0x010801CB58C5539DB54C9C918117656CDE5F5400764C32A52DCF2F48ABA574981774C895

I hope this helps.

Regards

P

Answer 6

Hello TarSam,

When you click on "Open this Task" in Outlook; it results in a SOAP request to .../_vti_bin/workflow.asmx web service and passes 3 parameters i.e. item, taskId, listId. You can run Fiddler while clicking on the button to understand the traffic pattern.

More details: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/microsoft.office.workflow.workflow.getworkflowtaskdata.aspx

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Please remember to click 'Mark as Answer' on the post that helps you or click 'Unmark as Answer' if a marked post does not actually answer your question. This can be beneficial to other community members reading the thread.

Regards,
Nishant Shah
Microsoft Online Community Support

Answer 7

Hi  Pooja

Thanks for the tip.. That takes care of my keep on "Processing..." issue. (refer my questions in seperate thread http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/sharepoint2010general/thread/82405c21-5090-49da-82fb-634d38e27689)

(If you reply to my question, i will propose that as answer over there..)

Hi Nishant,

Thanks for the info. Could you please more elaborate how can i  call the client style approve reject infopath from outllook email body so that user doesnt have to see the sharepoint task list unnecessarily, Thanks

Answer 8

Hi Tarsam,

Thanks for the above response to this post. I have added link to this answer on your post. I also want to comment on your question to Nishant, 

1) When you add a task to a workflow, and you click on the task name you get an option to customise its completion condition, behaviour of single task, behaviour of overall task. In order to modify/customise the email you receive on Outlook you need to go to modify Behaviour of single task. On step 'When task is Pending', you need to find lines 'Email task notification to Approver(s)' and  'Email WorkflowContext:Initiator'. These are the emails that are being sent and you can modify 'Open this task' by creating a link as described in my answer above to open the form directly in modal dialog.  

2) And, opening another page rather that the task list after action on task form is not possible as you are basically modifying the task form which is part of task list and hence after action the task form modal dialog gets closed and shows the list it belongs to (task list). Correct me if you find a way to jump to other list right away.

Regards

P