Power Automate Infinite Loop may have caused a hiccup? Keep getting emails saying Power Apps/SharePoint field/column updated to a value (from June/July - the dates for the actual updates are old).

[axray]

Power Automate Infinite Loop may have caused a hiccup? Keep getting emails saying Power Apps/SharePoint field/column updated to a value (from June/July - the dates for the actual updates are old).

I have never seen this happen and I have no idea how it is happening or how to fix it. I have had a flow in place for a while now that sends an email to a few people every time one specific Power Apps/SharePoint field/column is updated. It had been working as expected - until I tried creating a few different flows that would concatenate some other fields (none related to the field that the emails say was updated)... those flows wound up going in an infinite loop, so I shut them off. However, because a few of my other flows are set to run when an item is modified, it kicked off all those flows, too. So now all my flows are just running in loops, constantly, even though I turned off the flows that caused the issue in the first place. 

Now, all that being said, I have NO idea if any of that is even related to this - it is just sending constant emails about two Power Apps/SharePoint tickets that were changed in June/July - and only the one field. This is so strange. Has anyone ever seen or heard of this happening??? How do I stop those two item ID # emails from being sent out multiple times a day?

ID #s 160 (6/28) & 161 (7/2) - emails are all from that field being updated on 6/28 (160) & 7/2 (161). I just scrolled through the entire list and they are all for those two ID #s and those two dates. 

[axray]

I think I might have figured it out... but I'm not positive. The unrelated infinite loop flow kicked off a TON of runs of all my other flows - so I'm thinking it is just slowly making its way through all of those runs and sending the same email each time it succeeds. Since that infinite loop flow has been turned off, I'm thinking once this is done running through the weeks of runs, the emails will stop? I hope?

[v-jefferni]

Hi @axray ,

Have you tried and turn off this flow for a while?

Best regards,

[sandeepstw]

Hi There,

The problem you are encountering is indication of a cascading trigger in Power Automate. Examine the flow that are triggering emails. Validate the trigger conditions. It should specifically look for changes in the intended column, not just any modification in the list item. Verify if any flow is making changes to the SharePoint list item, as this would cause any "When an item is modified" triggers to run.

Also within your flow, introduce a condition to check the modified date against the current date. If the modified date is older (like from June/July), the flow shouldn't proceed.

Please give kudos and mark as solution if it helps.  

Thanks, 

Sandeep Mishra 

[axray]

I turned both flows off - then I turned this one back on (the one that caused the problem is staying off). I am currently in the process of cancelling all running instances, but I can only do 20 at a time, so it is taking forever.

[axray]

I have the condition listed in the flow (if column has changed), but not as a trigger - is there a way to write a trigger to only run if a specific SharePoint column value has changed?

[sandeepstw]

Hi There, 

There is not direct trigger, but you can do like this - 

Trigger: "When an item is created or modified"
Get the current item
Condition: If "Status" is not equal to "PreviousStatus"
-> Yes (i.e., column has changed):
- Perform desired actions.
- Update "PreviousStatus" with the current value of "Status".
-> No:
- Do nothing (or any cleanup tasks if necessary).

Please give kudos and mark as solution if it helps.  

Thanks, 

Sandeep Mishra 

[axray]

Correct, that is how I already have it set up. Thanks.

[axray]

Oh, I realized I forgot to respond to this part of your suggestion: "Also within your flow, introduce a condition to check the modified date against the current date. If the modified date is older (like from June/July), the flow shouldn't proceed."

Since the infinite loop flow was going in and modifying every single item in my SharePoint list, the "Modified" SharePoint date was updated every day, so adding a Modified Date Condition to the other flows wouldn't work in this situation. Thanks!