Activate, Monitor, and Troubleshoot a Flow

Learning Objectives 

After completing this unit, you’ll be able to:

• Activate a flow to automatically sync data in the production environment.
• Monitor and troubleshoot a flow while it’s running.

Activate a Flow

After you’ve tested the flow to your satisfaction, you’re ready to activate it using your production data. First, swap out each of your existing test connections with a newly created production connection, and then activate the flow. Activating the flow enables it to run and perform the expected integration tasks between the source system and target system.

Let’s activate the Sync Service Cases with Slack Notifications flow you learned about in unit 5.

Follow these steps to activate a flow.

1. Click Edit in the Sync Service Cases with Slack Notifications flow.
2. In step 1 of the flow, click the ellipsis icon, and then click Change Connection.
3. Click the Connection picklist and select Add New Salesforce Connection.
4. Name the connection NTO production org, leave the checkbox This is a sandbox organization deselected, and click Create.
5. Enter your NTO production org’s username and password and click Log In.
6. Click Allow to grant MuleSoft Composer the permissions. MuleSoft Composer automatically tests the connection. If no error message appears, you have a successful NTO production org connection.
   
7. In step 2 of the flow, click the ellipsis icon, and then click Change Connection.
8. Click the Connection picklist and select Add New Slack Connection.
9. Name the connection NTO Slack production and click Create.
10. Select the Slack NTO production workspace from the Slack workspace picklist.
11. Click Allow to grant MuleSoft Composer the permissions to the NTO Slack production workspace. If no error message appears, you have a successful NTO Slack production connection.
    
12. In step 3 of the flow, click the ellipsis icon, and then click Change Connection.
13. Click the Connection picklist, select NTO Slack production, click Change, and then click Confirm.
14. Save the flow.
15. Click Activate. The flow is now running and automatically syncing customer service cases in Salesforce with case notifications in Slack.

Now that your flow is active, you learn how to monitor the flow and troubleshoot any problems that arise.

Monitor and Troubleshoot a Flow

After your flow is active, it continues to run in the background. MuleSoft Composer automatically handles where to deploy the flow, how to manage it, and when to scale it for optimal performance. 

If there’s an error with any of the runtime instances of the flow—and assuming MuleSoft Composer is configured for email notifications in your Salesforce org—MuleSoft Composer sends you an email notification. You should monitor your emails for any notifications from MuleSoft Composer. For more information on configuring email notifications, see MuleSoft Composer Installation and Configuration.

Typically, an email notification shows which flow has an error, the number of failed runs out of the total runs, and the start and end time of the report. You should then take steps to troubleshoot the error.

Assume you’ve received an email from MuleSoft Composer notifying you one of your flows called Sync Service Cases with Slack Notifications has an error.

Follow these steps to troubleshoot a flow.

1. Open your email notification. It looks something like this.
   
2. Click the flow name link. MuleSoft Composer is launched, and the flow details page of the flow appears, showing its run history.
   
3. If you see one or more failed instances, narrow down the run history to failed instances by selecting Status Failed from the Any Status picklist. Here’s an example of some failed instances of the Sync Service Cases with Slack Notifications flow.
   
4. Click CLIENT_ERROR on a failed instance. Its detailed runtime error message appears. In this example, the instance failed because an invalid value was passed to a Slack channel. To resolve the problem, enter a valid value for the Slack channel.
   

Keep in mind that you lose access to MuleSoft Composer when your license expires. So make sure to renew your MuleSoft Composer license before it expires.

Congratulations, you’ve done it! You’ve learned how to use MuleSoft Composer to automate data sync between systems with a flow, thus eliminating the manual tasks and achieving near real-time integration.

Wrap It Up

In this module, you learned how to use MuleSoft Composer to create a flow and add trigger and action steps. You discovered how to map and retrieve data in action steps. And you learned how to make decisions and perform repetitive actions in your flow. You learned how to transform data using functions and formulas in the Custom Expression Editor. Next, you learned how to manage connections and action steps and test a flow. Finally, you learned how to activate a flow so that it automatically syncs data between systems in the production environment and monitor and troubleshoot a flow while it’s running.

To get step-by-step instructions to solve other common integration problems using MuleSoft Composer, take the other modules in the MuleSoft Composer Trailmix.

Resources 

• Salesforce Help: MuleSoft Composer for Salesforce
• Salesforce Help: Composer Connector Reference
• Salesforce Trailblazer Community: MuleSoft Composer