Todd, Bill: I’ve been following your exchange, tried what you are discussing, but have to report lack of success.
What I’m trying to do is simple and straight forward. I used a sequence of modules to process an image. Some of those modules needed to be new instances that I had to move before/after their usual place in the pixelpipe. I need the modules to be OFF by default so I can activate them as needed for an image I process as I work my way up the pixelpipe. That sequence of modules defines my ‘workflow’. Having that set handy would save me effort every time I process an image using the same 'workflow." I’d not need to create new instances, move them around, etc.
I’m concluding what I need and would like is not possible in darktable. That’s too bad. I’m surprised as what I’m doing seems not any extraordinary and likely what more experienced darktable mavens have already seen the need for/developed their own solution. In any case, after a couple days of banging my head against the wall and tearing my hair I’d like to take a break and focus on other things, with the realization there’s no path to efficiency as I hoped for so elbow grease is the only way out.