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>