Date formatting in emails

[joebordes]

These tests would seem to indicate the contrary:

https://github.com/tsolucio/coreBOSTests/blob/master/modules/com_vtiger_workflow/VTSimpleTemplate.php#L284
https://github.com/tsolucio/coreBOSTests/blob/master/modules/com_vtiger_workflow/VTSimpleTemplate.php#L288

as there are two evaluation in the same string.

[partnerwerk]

I don't see two general workflow functions in a row in these templates.

This is what the templates use:
$(general : (__WorkflowFunction__) uppercase(firstname ) ) $(account_id : (Accounts) accountname)

this is what I want to achieve
am $(general : (__WorkflowFunction__) format_date($date_start,'d. F Y') ) um $(general : (__WorkflowFunction__) substring($time_start,0,5) ) Uhr.

It works with a line break before "um" but it does not when put on one line.

[joebordes]

Ok, I added it to our to-do list

[partnerwerk]

Thank you very much.

[joebordes]

I did some additional testing and came up with a way to do it by putting all the operations in one WorkflowFunction call:

https://github.com/tsolucio/coreBOSTests/blob/master/modules/com_vtiger_workflow/VTSimpleTemplate.php#L304

Anyway, I also created a ticket to get it working as you propose.

[partnerwerk]

It seems this is still an issue. However I found a (very fragile) workaround and just post it here for anybody who is interested:

Goal: have the results of multiple workflow functions in one line of html code in workflow emails.
Problem: If they are not seperated by a line break or several spaces they „eat up” some of the code around, apparently even cannibalizing each other.

I wanted to have a custom field value and a date and time of an event in one line like this:

Quote:special appointment on Dec. 6, 2018 at 6.15 a.m.

The code I used is the following:

PHP Code:

<p>$cf_851 on $(general : (__WorkflowFunction__) format_date($date_start,'d. F Y') ) at $(general : (__WorkflowFunction__) substring($time_start,0,5) )</p> 


The result is that the time does not appear at all. So I seperated them on different lines like this:

PHP Code:

<p>$cf_851</p>
<p>on $(general : (__WorkflowFunction__) format_date($date_start,'d. F Y') ) </p>
<p>at $(general : (__WorkflowFunction__) substring($time_start,0,5) )</p> 


But that's ugly:

Quote:special appointment
on Dec. 6, 2018
at 6.15 a.m.

Seperating the functions in the html source code like this is working if...

PHP Code:

<p>$cf_851 
$(general : (__WorkflowFunction__) format_date($date_start,'d. F Y') ) 
at $(general : (__WorkflowFunction__) substring($time_start,0,5) )</p> 


Results in the desired formatting...
...if:
- you do not switch to the wysiwyg editor before saving
- if you never edit the email again without fixing these line breaks at the same time.

[joebordes]

You can try using a 'concat' function, something like this unit test example:

https://github.com/tsolucio/coreBOSTests/blob/master/modules/com_vtiger_workflow/expression_engine/VTExpressionEvaluaterTest.php#L141

https://github.com/tsolucio/coreBOSTests/blob/master/modules/com_vtiger_workflow/VTSimpleTemplateTest.php#L354

https://github.com/tsolucio/coreBOSTests/blob/master/modules/com_vtiger_workflow/VTSimpleTemplateTest.php#L358

[partnerwerk]

Thank you Joe,

I tried this:
$(general : (__WorkflowFunction__) concat( translate(format_date($date_start, 'd. F Y') ) ," um ", substring($time_start,0,5)," Uhr.") )

The result:
19. January 201908:16

Expected result:
19. Januar 2019 um 08:16 Uhr

Have you got any other idea or did I write the function wrong?

[partnerwerk]

It seems I need to use single quotes.

Code:

$(general : (__WorkflowFunction__) concat ( format_date($date_start,'d. F Y') ,' um ', substring($time_start,0,5),' Uhr.') )

This gives the expected result if I put in an empty space after the function. Probably this needs to be done for parsing the function correctly.

So this:

Code:

<p>Event on <strong>$(general : (__WorkflowFunction__) concat ( format_date($date_start,'d. F Y') ,' um ', substring($time_start,0,5),' Uhr.') ) </strong></p>

results in:

Quote:Event on 19. Januar 2019 um 08:16 Uhr

But the Wysiwyg editor strips the space before the closing strong-tag. So after saving it once the source code of the email is:

Code:

<p>Event on <strong>$(general : (__WorkflowFunction__) concat ( format_date($date_start,'d. F Y') ,' um ', substring($time_start,0,5),' Uhr.') )</strong></p>

Which results in:

Quote:Event on 19. Januar 2019 um 08:16 Uhr/strong>

and the rest of the email is printed bold because there is no closing tag.

How can I make the functions persistent in the wysiwyg editor? Or is there a way to completely disable it? It is quite useless if it behaves like this.

[joebordes]

I just added a couple of tests for this use case, the trick seems to be adding a "separation" character after the workflow function:

https://github.com/tsolucio/coreBOSTests/commit/fc20d04d1cc5abdde484ea7992bd2f52b5718555