Approve/Reject with Infopath instead of OOTB email link

Question

We are using the OOTB Approval workflow for some tasks that is kicked off when a user enters info on a custom InfoPath form and clicks submit. The user receives the OOTB email with instructions to 1. Review the task 2. Perform the activities for the task and then 3. Use the Open this Task button within Outlook to approve/reject the task.

When the user clicks to review the task, it opens our InfoPath form that was used to create the item so they can review it. Here, I would like to add buttons for Approving and Rejecting the item so that the user does not have to go back into Outlook and use the Open Task option.

I have looked at the OOTB InfoPath form that Outlook opens with approve/reject but the data connections appear to be related only to that form and I cannot seem to recreate them. I think I need to submit the Approve/Reject strings somehow to some list/data location but I'm not sure how to do this.

How can I add Approve/Reject buttons to my InfoPath form that will approve/reject an OOTB workflow task?

Answer 1

If you are using the task list just for approve/reject, I would suggest not to create the task at all. Add a field in the infopath form with option of Approve/Reject and based on its value you can just change the workflow status of the item as approve/reject.