# My journey into "Sub flows"

**URL:** <https://discourse.nodered.org/t/my-journey-into-sub-flows/7754>\
**Category:** General\
**Created:** [8 February 2019 21:13 UTC](https://discourse.nodered.org/t/my-journey-into-sub-flows/7754 "2019-02-08T21:13:01Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 5

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**Author:** ![knolleary](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex026/user_avatar/discourse.nodered.org/knolleary/32/3_2.png) [@knolleary](https://discourse.nodered.org/u/knolleary)\
**Post date:** [8 February 2019 22:49 UTC](https://discourse.nodered.org/t/my-journey-into-sub-flows/7754/5 "2019-02-08T22:49:43Z")

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> [@Trying\_to\_learn](#):
>
> Am I missing anything about the comments and how you can not set separate ones for input and output?

If you double-click on any of the Input or Output nodes inside a subflow it will open the Edit Properties dialog (the same one if you click the 'edit properties' button in the toolbar.

As with other nodes, you can go to the 'Appearance' tab and set labels for the inputs and outputs.

 ![Local_Node-RED](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex026/uploads/nodered/original/2X/7/75da216e6aa18619633865667f80855c64994bd9.png)

These are the labels that appear when you hover the mouse over the input/output ports of the node in the main workspace.

![Local_Node-RED](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex026/uploads/nodered/original/2X/9/92ddf8ca2ee50f0db55732b22d3140cfae30cdf0.png)

You do not currently get to see these labels when editing the subflow itself - that isn't something I'd thought of but will look at adding as it makes sense to do so.

> [@Trying\_to\_learn](#):
>
> Oh, I also see that you can't use `node.status` in the sub nodes and see what is going on.  
> That is a bit annoying.

You _can_ use node.status() in nodes within the subflow. The status event can be handled by a Status node however the status event will _not_ appear against the subflow instance node - in otherwords, you won't get the text appearing below subflow instance node.

As @colin mentioned, we just released the [next beta of 0.20](https://discourse.nodered.org/t/node-red-0-20-0-beta-5-released/7739) which adds some new subflow capabilities, including better handling of status.

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