How workflows run
Ask first or run automatically, start a workflow with a phrase, and see which workflows ran.
Ask first or run automatically
Each action that sends or creates something is either Ask first (it waits as a draft for you to approve) or Run automatically. On iPhone, the setting is When it runs.
Hi Sam, I'm running late.
You can switch that with a word. Add "Send right away if you say “pronto”" to an email that asks first: a Clip ending "… pronto" sends at once, and the same Clip without it waits as a draft. Events and reminders say "Add right away", and Run agent "Act right away". It works the other way too: "Ask first if you say “check first”" holds back an action that runs automatically.
The word itself is left out of what Italic writes, and the email's activity says why it went, such as "Sent automatically because you said “pronto”".
An email with nobody to send to always waits for you, even when its action runs automatically.
A phrase in a recording runs a workflow
Here's a workflow end to end:
Add Email from a phrase
On the Workflows page, choose Add beside Email from a phrase.
Record a Clip
Say: "Send an email to myself saying the test works."
Approve the draft
Within about a minute, the Clip's page shows "Your workflow “Email” ran because you said “send an email”." with the email draft. The same card is in Chat and Tasks. Choose Send.
A Memo recorded in the web app with a calendar workflow drafts the event on its page, without a reload.
Italic asks instead of guessing
Italic never guesses who, when or which account:
- Two contacts named Sam? The workflow pauses on "Which Sam?" with up to three people and their addresses. Tap one, or reply in the chat ("the second Sam", or an address). The workflow then continues as it's set.
- An event with no time asks for one.
- An email that more than one of your accounts could send asks which.
Reply "cancel" to end it; nothing is sent. Until you answer, nothing after the question runs, even in a workflow that runs automatically. Only that workflow pauses; others on the same recording carry on.
See which workflows ran
Every Clip list (Home and search on iPhone, Home in the web app, and the Italic for Mac menu) adds a line naming the workflows that ran, after a bolt.
On the web and the Mac it reads "Ran Email myself, Add to Reminders". A failure comes first, in the warning colour: "Email myself failed · Ran Add to Reminders".
On iPhone each name is followed by where that workflow stands, such as "Email myself · Done". The status is one of Failed, Interrupted, Needs approval, Needs answer, Done, Auto-run (it acted without asking you) or Discarded. The most urgent comes first, and "+1" counts the others: "Email myself · Failed +1".
On the recording's page, the run's card ends with Show in chat, which opens Chat at that run.