Triggers

The first step of every workflow is called a Trigger. Triggers represent the event that initiates the workflow to run. Below, we review a few different types of triggers in MESA.

Event-Based

Polling

Certain Triggers use/offer a polling system to initiate the workflow at specific time intervals. Depending on the Trigger, you may be able to select the polling interval or it may be native to the third-party service's data send. Whoa - that's technical, so what does that mean? Every hour, or whatever frequency the polling is set at, MESA will look for any recent activity associated with the trigger and process all the updates gathered within the hour (or another time interval).

TL;DR It's a bulk data delivery at a scheduled time.

To change the frequency, go to Advance Options in your workflow trigger and select.

Other Common Triggers

Schedule

The Schedule trigger enables scheduling automated workflows either on a recurring basis or as a one-time event. For recurring schedules, workflows can be triggered at regular intervals, such as hourly or daily. Alternatively, the one-time option triggers a workflow at a specific date and time you select, occurring just once. This feature provides flexibility in automating tasks according to precise timing requirements.

Webhooks

Webhooks are a popular standard on the internet for sending event notifications. MESA's built-in Webhook trigger allows you to integrate any 3rd party service that supports them, even ones that don't have an integration yet.

Web Request

While webhooks are a great way to send "back end" event notifications, Web Requests allow a "front end" web client to send data to a workflow and receive a response.

Email

The email trigger allows you to initiate an automation by sending an email to a unique MESA email address. The details within the email, including the subject, message body, and sender information, can be used as variables in subsequent steps of your workflow, enabling dynamic and responsive automation processes based on the content of the received email.

Forms

Automations can also be started every time a form is filled out. The form can be hosted on a MESA URL or embedded within your site. Like email, the contents of the form will be turned into variables that can be used within your workflow to customize the actions and drive the logic.