Advanced Workflow: Enabling Tricky Scenarios

Two things have happened which made me think I needed a second blog: My job has changed slightly so I've got a few non-workflow things to say now. I wanted a place where I didn't feel obligated to stick to work related topics. Let me introduce...

http://forums.microsoft.com/MSDN/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=488698&SiteID=1&mode=1 There was a great set of questions that showed up on the forum the other day and I've finally gotten around to answering them all. I was planning on posting the answers...

Windows Workflow Foundation (WF) ships with two out of box modes of passivation (also referred to as dehydration and unloading) of a workflow. Passivation is the process by which a workflow's state is saved to the database AND the workflow is removed...

QUESTION: Can I use DefaultWorkflowSchedulerService instead of ManualWorkflowSchedulerService in my IIS hosted WorkflowRuntime? ANSWER: Do so at your own risk. It's like swimming in an unguarded pool or skydiving ... Using the DefaultWorkflowSchedulerService...

Ever wonder why this.delayActivity1.TimeoutDuration sometimes doesn't change the timeout duration? How come this.callExternalMethodActivity1.ParameterBindings["(ReturnValue)"] isn't giving you the value you expect in some scenarios? How is it possible...

QUESTION: How do I get access to a transaction inside my workflow? ANSWER: First of all, this post has nothing to do with flowing a transaction into a workflow instance. That is a completely different topic which we might cover at some other time....

QUESTION: What happens to a workflow instance I've created but never started? ANSWER: Calling WorkflowRuntime.CreateWorkflow () will give you back a WorkflowInstance which, in essence, is a proxy to a runtime instance in the Created state. But what...

Here are a few tips and tricks for using the ReplicatorActivity successfully. It is a powerful activity which, when approached from the correct point of view, can be relatively easy to use. Definitions seed value - a value added to either of the...

QUESTION: Does a ParallelActivity start one thread for each branch? How many threads will it use for processing? ANSWER: The short answers are "no" and "1". If you've heard it before, then these answers make sense. If not, then read on for an explanation...

QUESTION: Can I return ActivityExecutionStatus.Faulting from a signal method to "fault" the activity? ANSWER: As a general rule only the current status and Closed are valid return values from any of the signal methods. Therefore: Execute () – Return...

QUESTION: How do I manage resources (like sockets) which are held by an activity? ANSWER: System. Workflow.ComponentModel.Activity has several overridable methods defined, but there is a newer subset of these methods which I like to refer to as "Lifetime...

Is there anything about Windows Workflow Foundation (WF) that you would like to know and feel is an appropriate topic for this blog? If so, please add a comment to this post. I will use the comments as seeds for future postings. Even if someone has already...

The purpose of this blog is to provide public answers to the Windows Workflow Foundation questions that I come across every now and again at work. These questions usually target a specific scenario but can be easily abstracted to a more general inquiry...