First, create a SharePoint list with the following properties in your Office 365 environment:

Type = Custom List

Name = Purchasing Requests

Add the following columns to the list:

Material: Single line of text (rename the title column to Material), required

Plant: Single line of text, required

Quantity: Number, required

Delivery Date: Date only, required

Cost Center: Single line of text, required

Purchase Requisition ID: Single line of text

Then select the item Nintex Workflow under List -> Settings and choose Create new workflow. This creates a new list workflow.

First add the following three workflow actions in the Nintex Workflow Designer:

Assign task (from the User interaction group)

Create dictionary (From the Operations group)

Call HTTP Web Service (from the Integration group)

ECS-Nintex-Office365-1

Configure the assign task Action with the following properties:

  • Participant** = ApprovalManagers (group of approvers)
  • Task Title** = Approve Purchase Requisition
  • Related Item = Current Item

All other settings are optional. Save the settings with Save.

ECS-Nintex-Office365-2

Then configure the Create Dictionary Action:

The dictionary defines the header data for the Web service call. It is always a good idea to first test the Web service for functionality in a REST client. You can read more about this here.

The following information is required:

  • Authorization**: APIKEY [ECS Core API Key]
  • Accept: application/json
  • Content-Type: application/json

Save the dictionary in the workflow variable RequestHeader.

ECS-Nintex-Office365-4

Then configure the workflow action Call HTTP Web Service.

You must make the following entries:

  • Address**: Web service URL including input parameters. For the values of the input parameters, they add references to the columns of the SharePoint list.
  • Request Type: POST
  • RequestHeaders: Workflow Variable RequestHeader
  • Response Content: Workflow Variable ResponseContent
  • Response status code: Workflow Variable Result

ECS-Nintex-Office365-5

The workflow would then be basically ready for use, but for the present scenario of a purchase requisition creation, the workflow described in the SAP system can be written back to the SharePoint list. In the Web service, a return parameter ReqItemID is created, which is then output in the Web service result.

Add the following workflow actions to your workflow:

  • Retrieve element from a dictionary** (from the Operations group)
  • Define field in current element** (From Libraries and Lists group)

Optionally, you can also place the Log to History action between the two workflow actions.

ECS-Nintex-Office365-6

First configure the Retrieve an item from a dictionary Action.

  • Dictionary**: WF Variable ResponseContent
  • Item name or path**: result (Only the result part containing the document number is extracted from the dictionary)
  • Output: WF Variable RequestItemID

ECS-Nintex-Office365-8

Optionally, you can then write the variable RequestItemID to the log using the action Log to history list.

The workflow action Define field in current element is then used to define the document number stored in the WF variable RequestItemID. can be written back to the SharePoint list:

  • Field**: Purchase Requisition ID
  • value: WF Variable RequestItemID

ECS-Nintex-Office365-9

Save your settings and publish the workflow.