How to spawn a Workflow Execution in PHP

Workflows can be started both synchronously and asynchronously. You can use typed or untyped workflows stubs available via Temporal\Client\WorkflowClient. To create workflow client:

use Temporal\Client\GRPC\ServiceClient;
use Temporal\Client\WorkflowClient;

$workflowClient = WorkflowClient::create(ServiceClient::create('localhost:7233'));

Synchronous start

A synchronous start initiates a Workflow and then waits for its completion. The started Workflow will not rely on the invocation process and will continue executing even if the waiting process crashes or stops.

Make sure to acquire workflow interface or class name you want to start. For example:

#[WorkflowInterface]
interface AccountTransferWorkflowInterface
{
    #[WorkflowMethod(name: "MoneyTransfer")]
    #[ReturnType('int')]
    public function transfer(
        string $fromAccountId,
        string $toAccountId,
        string $referenceId,
        int $amountCents
    );
}

To start such workflow in sync mode:

$accountTransfer = $workflowClient->newWorkflowStub(
    AccountTransferWorkflowInterface::class
);

$result = $accountTransfer->transfer(
    'fromID',
    'toID',
    'refID',
    1000
);

Asynchronous start

An asynchronous start initiates a Workflow execution and immediately returns to the caller without waiting for a result. This is the most common way to start Workflows in a live environment.

To start a Workflow asynchronously pass workflow stub instance and start parameters into WorkflowClient->start method.

$accountTransfer = $workflowClient->newWorkflowStub(
    AccountTransferWorkflowInterface::class
);

$run = $this->workflowClient->start($accountTransfer, 'fromID', 'toID', 'refID', 1000);

Once started you can receive workflow ID via WorkflowRun object returned by start method:

$run = $workflowClient->start($accountTransfer, 'fromID', 'toID', 'refID', 1000);

var_dump($run->getExecution()->getID());

Recurring start

You can start a Workflow Execution on a regular schedule with the CronSchedule option.