Core Concepts

Once you have built a workflow or two, a handful of ideas explain how everything fits together. This section covers the concepts that show up again and again: how steps connect and pass data, how to compute values on the fly, how to keep sensitive information safe, how a workflow gets started, and how to test it before you rely on it.

You do not need to read these in order. Start with whatever you are trying to do and follow the links from there.

The essentials

Nodes & Connections

How steps and the arrows between them form a workflow.

Variables & Data Flow

How data travels from one step to the next as a run proceeds.

Build text and compute values from the data your steps produce.

Keep your agency’s shared settings in one place and read them from any step.

Store API keys and passwords safely and reference them by name.

Running and starting workflows

Starting a Workflow

Define the information a run needs, including file attachments.

Triggers & Webhooks

Start a workflow from another system, a form submission, a Facebook lead, or a Gail call.

Timeouts & Retries

What happens when a step is slow or fails.

Testing & Debugging

Step through a run and watch what each step does.

Reuse

Save a workflow’s design and reuse it as a starting point.