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Testing a workflow

A test run tries out your workflow from start to finish before anyone relies on it. Malleable stands in for the people it would normally ask.

Start a test run

Test runs are most useful on a draft, before you publish it. In the workflow editor, ask Malleable in chat. For example: "Test this with a request for a $4,000 laptop." If the workflow has a draft, you can also open the Run menu and click Ask AI to test.

When the test ends, Malleable tells you what worked and what didn't, and suggests fixes.

A test run freezes the draft version it uses. When Malleable applies a fix, it creates a new draft so the earlier test keeps the version you actually tested.

Choose what happens in your other apps

Tell Malleable whether the test should touch your other apps. It can:

  • Simulate everything, so nothing in your other apps is read or changed.
  • Read real data but simulate changes, so nothing is sent or updated.
  • Run everything for real, so emails go out and records change. A simulated person still answers, which keeps it a test.

A test that runs for real asks for your approval once before it starts. If real people answer too and it starts from the beginning rather than picking up from an earlier run, it isn't a test. It's a regular run: it shows in the runs list, and Malleable doesn't report back on how it went.

Who answers forms and messages

In a test run, a simulated person answers for you. It fills in forms, responds to approvals and replies to messages.

This includes hand-offs. When the workflow waits on someone else, such as a manager in Slack, the simulated person answers for them.

The simulated person goes along with the workflow unless you describe a scenario for it to play out. For example: "Test it where the manager rejects the request as over budget." The form or event the test starts from is made up to fit that scenario too.

If you'd rather answer yourself, tell Malleable. The test then waits for you whenever it needs an answer.

Test from partway through

To re-test a later stage without repeating the earlier ones, ask Malleable to pick up from an earlier run. For example: "Re-test the approval stage using yesterday's run." The test starts at that stage, using what the earlier run collected.

Watch a test run

When a test starts, the run opens in a panel beside the current tab. Switch between Canvas and Run history without closing the panel or losing your replay position. The canvas shows which stage the run is in and which path it took. The run stays in the page's address, so you can reload or share the link. While a test is running, click Stop test run, or the stop icon at the top of the run panel, to end it early.

The open-in-new-tab icon at the top of the panel opens the run on its own page, both while it is running and after it finishes.

Replay a finished test

Use the arrows at the top of the run panel, or drag along the track next to them, to step back through the test. The canvas and the panel rewind together, so you can see what happened at each point.

Find test runs later

Test runs are hidden from the runs list. To see them, open the Run history tab at the top of the workflow and turn on Show test runs. Each one has a Test badge.