How to - Increase timeout value of a SharePoint workflow

I was recently working on an issue where customer had a workflow which used to fail and error out after the workflow would execute for some tasks. On deeper analysis I found that the workflow was creating 5000 tasks and it is then when the workflow errored out. On checking the Workflow and ULS traces I found the error message as (have to say least helpful):

<Error Message>

- Workflow Infrastructure 72fg High Error in persisting
workflow: System.Transactions.TransactionAbortedException: The transaction has
aborted. ---> System.TimeoutException: Transaction Timeout --- End of inner
exception stack trace --- at
System.Transactions.TransactionStateAborted.CreateAbortingClone(InternalTransaction
tx).
- System.Workflow.Runtime.Hosting Error: 0 : DefaultWorkflowCommitWorkBatchService
caught exception from commitWorkBatchCallback:
System.Transactions.TransactionAbortedException: The transaction has aborted. --->
System.TimeoutException: Transaction Timeout

</Error Message>

It somehow came in my mind that it has to be that the workflow was timing out. On googling I found a way to increase the time out value fo the workflow from the default value – 1 min to 30 mins. Do this, in the web.config file of the web application we need to set the default
value to something more ( in this case its set to 30 mins )
<configuration>
<system.transactions>
<defaultSettings timeout="00:30:00" />
</system.transactions>
</configuration>

 

And viola this worked.

Comments

  • Anonymous
    May 25, 2009
    PingBack from http://microsoft-sharepoint.simplynetdev.com/how-to-increase-timeout-value-of-a-sharepoint-workflow/

  • Anonymous
    July 04, 2011
    This does not work.  Please note, the system.transactions tag is not permitted in the web.config.

  • Anonymous
    February 08, 2012
    Clem, If this is not working what is the solution? Thanks!

  • Anonymous
    February 08, 2012
    Which version of SharePoitn are you trying? Is it Moss or SharePoint 2010.

  • Anonymous
    May 30, 2012
    Hi, I have the same problem but I didn't find this element in inetpub web.config or in web.config in ISAPI, LAYOUT so what is the ___location of this web.config? we have SP 2010 (we recently migrated from SP 2007 using DB attach method) Thanks in advance.

  • Anonymous
    July 01, 2013
    This does not work. The setting is not present in web.config file.

  • Anonymous
    September 19, 2013
    Guys, if the setting is not in the web.config you need to add it! Add it just above the </configuration> tag <system.transactions> <defaultSettings timeout="00:30:00" /> </system.transactions>