Solved: Re: Trigger mail by items of calculated collumn (d...

MichVer · ‎02-01-2023

Hi,

I'm trying to build a flow to trigger a calculated date inside a sharepoint list.

If the calculated date is equal to present date, I would like to send a mail.

My calculated date [Date Alert] isn't triggering anything.

If I replace this date collumn with a normal date collumn, the flow works just fine.

Conclusion: calculated items don't work inside Power Automate? Or is there a solution/workaround for this?

I used the formatDateTime(utcNow(),'yyyy-MM-dd') expression in the condition.

Thank you in advance!

Best regards.

MarvinBangert · ‎02-01-2023

Hi @MichVer

Please see the following list, it should be quite like yours:

I have a "Date" column from column type "Date and Time" (only Date):

I have a choice field "MeasurementType":

And I have a calculated colum "AlertDate":

I created four different items; we would like to get the items that have "true" in the name as the alert date is the current date (2/2/2023 or 2023-02-02). Using the filter query in Power Automate is using a REST API Filter towards SharePoint (read more here, but it's very developer orientated and just a basic overview how SharePoint REST API works). As I already said, calculated columns are not supported within this filter query, so we would need to use another column. As the "Alert date" is just calculated from a date column and a choice column, we can redo the calculation within Power Automate and within the filter query.

For the filter query you can basically think about it like:

Without a filter query, you are telling SharePoint "Give me just all items, I will do the work by myself to get the right stuff". With a filter query you are telling SharePoint "I just want to have these items, do the work for me". For SharePoint this is an easy task, so SharePoint just uses your filter and checks on every item if the filter applies to this and returns you all the items the filter applies to.

The filter query follows a specific pattern, so that SharePoint is able to look for the right stuff:

<SharePoint internal column name> <comparison> <value>

(Sometimes there are also other patterns like startswith() or substringof(), but that shouldn't be part for today, this query is called "OData query" you can read more here (again focusses on developers)).

Your calculated column is a bit more complex, but we will go through it step by step and combine them all together in the end.

1. First, we want to filter for the "Measurement Type". This is easier, as we just need to give a value it should look for, without any expression written yet. You always need the internal SharePoint column name (the Displayname can be different). Within your list click on the steering wheel - List settings - select your column - check the URL:

At the very end of the URL, you will see the unique and internal name of your column, that is the one we need within the filter query:

next we need the comparison, it's often shortened, e.g., "equals" is "eq", "less or equal to" is "le", "greater or equal to" is "ge", "not equal" is "ne". You will easily find some blog posts using your favorite search engine about SharePoint filter queries and comparisons you can use. Finally, we need to tell SharePoint what value it should look for, in this case it should look for 'Inter-Instrument'. If you are looking for a word (or called string) or date, you need to use single quotes, if you are looking for a number you can leave them.

If you run the filter query from above, you would receive only the items from SharePoint where the Measurement Type is Inter-Instrument. As from your calculated column, we also need to check for the date as it could be different for "Inter-Instrument" and "Inter-Period". That is the next thing we will do:

Same again, look for the internal column name, but now for the value we need to do some calculation:

Before the query is sent to SharePoint, Power Automate will turn the expression into a value and this value is then compared within SharePoint to only select the values you are looking for. Here is the expression:

addToTime(utcNow(),-3,'Month','yyyy-MM-dd')

Here you can see the parameters "addToTime()" requires: Reference guide for expression functions - Azure Logic Apps | Microsoft Learn

First the timestamp "utcNow()", this will give the current date and time the flow runs (as already explained, as the flow runs each day, it will always be the current date and time). Next the interval or number of a unit to add, if you put a minus infront, it will subtract. Next the time unit used with the interval, this could be "Second", "Minute", "Hour", "Day", "Week", "Month" or "Year". Next the format the date and time should be returned to. If you let your flow run first (with or without any filter arrays), you will get some JSON and you can also see the format the date is returned as:

Usually, dates are returned as "yyyy-MM-dd".

Again, if you run your flow, it should only return values where the date is "2022-11-02" ("2023-02-02" (today) - 3 Months)

Now we need to combine these two queries together as we want to only get the items where the Measurement Type is equal to "Inter-Instrument" and the date equal to "2022-11-02". To combine queries, you can use "and" or "or". With "and" both needs to be true and or only one needs to be true. We need "and" as both needs to be true:

You can add brackets around the individual queries to make it look clearer where a query starts and ends. This will just return all items where Measurement Type is "Inter-Instrument", and date is "2022-11-02".

Using the, we can also extend the query to include the "Inter-period" and date is "2022-02-02" (One year ago), we can just combine these two queries using "or":

((MeasurementType eq 'Inter-Instrument') and (Date eq '@{addToTime(utcNow(),-3,'Month','yyyy-MM-dd')}') or (MeasurementType eq 'Inter-Period') and (Date eq '@{addToTime(utcNow(),-1,'Year','yyyy-MM-dd')}'))

Here is the result:

The list with all items:

The flow action with the filter query:

The result (I am using a "create HTML table" action to format the results as a table:

Last tipp: if you don't want to send individual emails (or teams message), you can also use a "Create HTML table" to format the results and send this to yourself (or someone else):

Result:

Does this help you? Otherwise please give me some more information.

Best regards
Marvin

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View solution in original post

MarvinBangert · ‎02-01-2023

Hi @MichVer

You can use calculated columns within Power Automate, they are just not working if you try to use the "filter query" within "get items". Could you please share how the "Alert date" values are formatted? As you are using an "is equal to", the date must be exactly the same, maybe there are more information saved within the "Alert date" (like time) which will not make this work, because the condition is:

"2023-02-01" is equal to "2023-02-01Z00:00:00"

this will always be false.

I would recommend also changing the flow to make it more efficient. Currently (if you don't use any filter query within the get items) you are loading all items from the list into your flow and "apply to each" runs through all of them. If you have 500 items and your flow only runs on 2 of them, this is very inefficient. You can use the "filter query" action within "get items" to just get the items you are looking for and don't need to check later using a condition.

As I already said, you are not able to filter on a calculated column, but (depending on your SharePoint calculated formular) you can rebuild it. e.g., if your "Alert Date" is always 14 days before a "Due Date" column and "Due Date" is a date field, you can write this as an expression within Power Automate:

addDays(utcNow(),14)

This will add 14 days to the current date (as your flow maybe starts every day, each day it will be always the current date) and this date could be the due date, so we need to compare it.

The formular you now add inside the "Filter Query" of your SharePoint action could look like:

DueDate le '@{addDays(utcNow(),14)}'

"DueDate" is the internal SharePoint column name (if you have spaces, it's "Due_x0200_Date"); le stands for "less or equal to" and our expression. So "Get all items if 'Due Date' is less or equal to today+14 days" is the query send to SharePoint and you will only receive the items you are looking for.

Afterwards you can just add the "Send an email" action for each item that is returned and you don't need to use the condition.

Here is also some (longer) information how to do it: Power Automate filter on SharePoint Date and Time column (tomriha.com)

Does this help you? Otherwise please give me some more information.

Best regards
Marvin

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Andrew_J · ‎02-01-2023

Can you see the calculated column in the first part of the condition. As both sides of this need to match. Also look at putting each part of the condition into a separate compose before the apply to each.

MichVer · ‎02-01-2023

Hi @MarvinBangert ,

Thank you for your reply.

The Date Alert value is calculated as follows:

=IF([Measurement Type]="Inter-Instrument",DATE(YEAR(Date),MONTH(Date)+3,DAY(Date)),
IF([Measurement Type]="Inter-Period",DATE(YEAR(Date)+1,MONTH(Date),DAY(Date))))

BUT I think I want to go with your alternative. It sounds much more efficient. The purpose of the flow is to trigger a reminder mail 3 months after the measurement date [Date] that's being added inside the list.

Did I get it right that you said DueDate is a variable and not a custom made collumn? I'm not (yet) familiar with the functionality of filter query. How does this option know which column is to check inside the list?

If you need more information just ask and I will try to give it to you.

Best regards.

MarvinBangert · ‎02-01-2023

Hi @MichVer

Please see the following list, it should be quite like yours:

I have a "Date" column from column type "Date and Time" (only Date):

I have a choice field "MeasurementType":

And I have a calculated colum "AlertDate":

I created four different items; we would like to get the items that have "true" in the name as the alert date is the current date (2/2/2023 or 2023-02-02). Using the filter query in Power Automate is using a REST API Filter towards SharePoint (read more here, but it's very developer orientated and just a basic overview how SharePoint REST API works). As I already said, calculated columns are not supported within this filter query, so we would need to use another column. As the "Alert date" is just calculated from a date column and a choice column, we can redo the calculation within Power Automate and within the filter query.

For the filter query you can basically think about it like:

Without a filter query, you are telling SharePoint "Give me just all items, I will do the work by myself to get the right stuff". With a filter query you are telling SharePoint "I just want to have these items, do the work for me". For SharePoint this is an easy task, so SharePoint just uses your filter and checks on every item if the filter applies to this and returns you all the items the filter applies to.

The filter query follows a specific pattern, so that SharePoint is able to look for the right stuff:

<SharePoint internal column name> <comparison> <value>