Why is a workflow considered updated when the active state is toggled?

Questions
1

I have a workflow that acts as a scheduler for other workflows that have a specific tag. Those other workflows are normally set to inactive.

When it’s time for them to run, my scheduler sets each one in turn to active, executes it, then sets it back to inactive. One of the side affects is that these workflows are considered to be updated. So those workflows are always at the top of my list when I sort by last updated.

If I’m looking at a Project list of workflows and toggle a inactive/active toggle, this also sets a workflow as updated. Does anyone know why this should be the case?

I’m not complaining but I don’t see the logic. For instance, I run a workflow nightly that backs up all my workflows that have been edited in some way but the workflows that have simply had their active/inactive state toggled are not considered changed and are not backed up (and I wouldn’t expect them to be).

Just wondering. :thinking:

2

Hi, I guess it’s because that’s the state you want it to be after you restart you n8n? If you wouldn’t save after activating/deactivating you have the previous state when something happens

Reg
J.

1 Like
3

I’m not entirely convinced that setting a workflow to active or inactive is necessary, as it should ideally have a proper trigger to execute without needing to be set to inactive afterward.

This suggests a feature request: changing the active/inactive state of a workflow should not update its “last updated” timestamp, right?

1 Like
4

@darrell_tw:
It is if you have a limit to the number of workflows you can have active at anytime.
I agree this is more of a feature question but there could be a legitimate reason for doing this. That’s why I was asking.

@jcuypers:
That makes some sense. Personally, I wouldn’t consider that an update and I would prefer the “Sort By Last Update” be limited to making changes to the nodes or the workflow logic.

As a side note, you cannot toggle the active/inactive state of a workflow while editing that workflow if it starts with a Execute By trigger. It has to be done from the project list or by another workflow.