I have built a new Rule in my project that when a task is added to the Kickoff section, some event tasks are automatically generated. That part is working, but what I see happening is that the task creation is happening too fast and doesn’t allow the variable fields to be filled in so then Asana is creating TWO of every task.
See the image for reference. The Rule is "create a task titled “Schedule Tech Check for {Event Name}” So task 1 on the list is correct and has the variable filled in (“Test Webinar 123”) and has assigned the proper due date, etc. This is also true for task 4 on the list.
But it also created tasks 2 and 3 which are the same details only not completely filled in – you can see the variable field shows “[no value]” which is inaccurate. All 4 tasks were generated by the same rule and I can see in the task Activity that tasks 2 and 3 started first and then tasks 1 and 4 followed about a minute later.
Which means that the system needs about a minute to process/think. Can I force in a wait step of like 5 minutes to allow the variable fields to be filled in before the task is created? Is this something that AI Studio can do that a standard rule cannot?
I think I have figured out the why but don’t have a solution. When Asana is creating a new task, it uses the same Section where the original task lives while it is being built. That work isn’t always visible (or happens too quickly to view in real time) but Asana is seeing a new task being added to the Kickoff section and triggering the rule to run a second time. And since the newer tasks don’t carry over the Custom Fields, the variables show as [No value].
When I tested again this afternoon, it was continuing this recursive loop of creating new tasks based on new tasks and I ended up with 19 copies of the same task!
Example:
Submit form with a Custom Field value in {Webinar Title} as Test Webinar 123
Form submission lands in Kickoff section
Rule is triggered to create a new task called “Schedule Tech Check for {Webinar Title}” and move to section called Details
a. New task is created called Schedule Tech Check for Test Webinar 123 in the Kickoff section
b. New task is moved to Details section
Simultaneously, the rule is triggered by the task created in 3a which creates another task (because the task in 3a doesn’t carry over the Custom Field values, the newest task shows [no value] where those variable fields are)
Depending on how quickly Asana moves the newest tasks to the Details section, the rule continues to trigger. This afternoon there was significant lag and I ended up with 19 copies of the same task.
I’m not entirely sure I’m following your process (it’s hard in this setting), but generally, I use a custom field to check whether a rule(s) has already run (e.g., if I have 1 rule, I create a field and set it after the rule has run so it doesn’t keep running; if it’s a sequential process with multiple rules in sequence, I use the same logic but with different options to “check” whether the rule has already run that option).
If you’re creating a bunch of tasks/subtasks with rules, you can use this same logic to exclude certain tasks from having rules run on them (e.g., pre-set the field when creating the task via rule, then add the condition to check whether is set).
field and set it after the rule has run so it doesn’t keep running; if it’s a sequential process with multiple rules in sequence, I use the same logic but with different options to “check” whether the rule has already run that option).