Formatting Date List Items from SharePoint when sending an E-mail notification

[Anonymous]

As part of an otherwise working and pretty straightforward FLOW, I'm sending an e-mail message that pulls in a date field from SharePoint into the body of the e-mail, but the format is pretty ugly...and I can't figure an obvious way to change the formatting. 

Assuming 12/31/1999 is the value I have for an item, it looks like the following in the e-mail: 1999-12-31T21:00:00Z 

Even restricting the SharePoint list item to be a short date does nothing to influence the formatting of the e-mails getting sent by FLOW. Is there a simple way to change this that I'm missing? In Workflow Designer 20XX this could be adjusted in seconds.

(Edit for clarity)

[v-micsh-msft]

Hi @Anonymous,

Yes, that could be done.

We could take use of Compose Action, together with the formatdatetime function to format the date format.

Assume the date field from SharePoint is Named with Date, then we could follow the flow below to format the date:

The formula used under Compose Action input is the following:

"@formatdatetime(triggerBody()?['Date'],'MM/dd/yyyy')"

Then use the output of the compose to replace the Date part in the Send Email Body or Subject.

See the results:

The lanugage used here is Workflow Definition Language.

If you have any further questions, please post back.

Regards,

Michael

[Anonymous]

Hi @v-micsh-msft - Thanks for the reponse! Your solution makes perfect sense...and it seems like it should work easily for my situation, but my FLOW fails at the Compose input stage with: 

" InvalidTemplate. Unable to process template language expressions in action 'Compose' inputs at line '1' and column '2031': 'The template language function 'formatdatetime' expects its first parameter to be of type string. The provided value is of type 'Null'. Please see https://aka.ms/logicexpressions#formatdatetime for usage details.' "

In my case I'm trying to do:

"@formatdatetime(triggerBody()?['Report Sent to Installer'],'MM/dd/yyyy')"

Seems pretty straightforward? I've tried inserting dynamic content for the Report Sent to Installer date field and even

"@formatdatetime(triggerBody()?['Report%20Sent%20to%20Installer'],'MM/dd/yyyy')" but still with the same failure message...

[v-micsh-msft]

Hi @Anonymous,

The error message indicates that the field value you have specified under the formatdatetime function is "Null".

If Report Sent to Installer is a field defined under your sharePoint list, and the value comes from the SharePoint -> When a new item is created trigger, then the formula should be:

"@formatdatetime(triggerBody()?['Report_x0020_Sent_x0020_to_x0020_Installer'],'MM/dd/yyyy')"

Flow uses _x0020_ to replace the space.

Besides, would it be convenient for you to share the flow configuration details?I will then perform some tests from my side and update you the proper formula.

Regards,

Michael

[Anonymous]

Hi @v-micsh-msft, thanks again for the insight. However for some reason I'm still hitting the same error even when I format the Compose as suggested:

"@formatdatetime(triggerBody()?['Report_x0020_Sent_x0020_to_x0020_Installer'],'MM/dd/yyyy')"

What's the easiest way to share config details? Screenshots?

Many thanks,

Dan

[WiggityZwiggity]

I receive the same error message on formatting date times from SP. Have you figured out how to do this yet?

[Anonymous]

@WiggityZwiggity - no success yet. I'd be curious to hear from anyone who has successfully implemented a FLOW where a SP Date/Time field was formatted with something other than the default way it shows up in FLOW.

[v-micsh-msft]

Hi @Anonymous,

Yes, the screenshots please.

For the flow configuration, including the Trigger, and the Action you used in your flow.

Also the Field from the SharePoint list.

In addition, please add a condition, then put the corresponding field content into the first Input box, click Advanced Mode, you should be able to find the corresponding field name, for example:

Use the item()?['haiz'] as the field parameter.

Regards,

Michael

[WiggityZwiggity]

Thanks, unfortuantely I am trying to convert multiple date values within a get items action which would cause a nested for each.  I assume there is no way to do this globally? 

[SLarson]

So, I figured out the error in the example of this.

you shouldn't be using triggerBody() when you're getting the value from a sharepoint list

It should be body('Get Item')

e.g.  

• @formatdatetime(body('Get_item')?['Impact_x0020_Start'], 'g')

[SLarson]

Perform a compose for each date value before you call it later in the flow, then just select the correct Output (i.e. Output 1, Output 2)

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the suggestion @SLarson. It makes sense, but incredibly I *still* can't get this to work.

If I use this for my Compose Input:

@formatdatetime(body('Get_item')?['Report_x0020_Sent_x0020_to_x0020_Installer'],'MM/dd/yyyy')

I just get that entire string of text verbatim spit back in the e-mail where I specify Output.

If I try to use the same line from above but instead of using text to specifythe actual field I'm trying to reference (e.g. "Report_x0020_Sent_x0020_to_x0020_Installer") I insert it using parameter, then I get the same results except it doesn't even show the full field name in the e-mail, instead it shows this:

@formatdatetime(body('Get_item')?['@{triggerBody()?['Report_x0020_Sent_x0020_to_x00200']}'],'MM/dd/yyyy')  

Bold is added for emphasis. The implication being that the field name is actually too long to work with??? But that's a wild guess. I'd have expected the first approach here to work.

[mmikkelson · Accepted solution]

Not sure if you got this to work yet, but I found a solution here:  here  - recreated below.

1. Add a Compose Action after the trigger/Action, then specify the Compose input with the following format:

"@formatdatetime( ,'yyyy-MM-ddThh:mm:ss')"

2. Click at the first parameter part of the formatdatetime, then choose the corresponding dynamic content, save it,

3. Microsoft Flow won't save successfully, and would notify the error message of validation failed,which then we may find the corresponding part for the input,

4. Copy and paste the corresponding data within the braces @{ } into the function first parameter, then save the flow

Adding screenshots as reference:

[Anonymous]

Bravo @mmikkelson - brilliant! These steps allowed me to finally get this working! Thank you so much for posting this!

Putting aside my hours of troubleshooting and imagine someone else starting from these steps...this is still a ludicrous amount of effort IMHO to achieve something so simple (that again had a straightforward built-in feature in SharePoint Designer 2013) but it is what it is. This works!

Thanks to everyone who replied along the way!

[CindyZ]

Thanks so much! 

I've gotten some part of this working but not all of it!  When I look at the "compose"' outputs, it shows me a date of 08-16-2018 which is what I want.  However, when I run my flow, it still shows 2018-08-16.  Here is my input

"@formatdatetime(triggerBody()?['In_x002d_Hands_x0020_Date'],'MM-dd-yyyy')"

I deleted and then replaced my dynamic content field hoping that was the issue, but I'm still getting the date format I don't want.  

[GaryHounslow]

Thanks @mmikkelson this is exactly what I was looking for and it worked perfectly for me.

Why it has to be so difficult to change the date format I will never know.

Gary

[Anonymous]

Hoping you can help with mine. My compose input is: 

@formatDateTime(triggerBody()?['General_x0020_On_x002d_Sale'],'dd/MM/yyyy')

Yet it is still not working, what am I doing wrong? 😞

[Anonymous]

I don't know how I have managed to do this, but been playing around with it and it now works!

I entered this in "Expression" rather than into the "Input" text field.

formatdatetime(triggerBody()?['General_x0020_On_x002d_Sale'],'dd/MM/yyyy')

[RHCC]

After all the research and troubleshooting, it was your solution that worked. Thanks @Anonymous!

[AlbertoSP]

Instead of showing the date format as 'yyyy/mm/dd.
Is there a way to show a long date? Like F riday March 1st, 2019