Introduction to WF 3.5 / Mettez vous à table avec Workflow Foundation 3.5

Maxime LAMURE — Sun, 29 Jun 2008 19:51:22 GMT

[English]

The new version of the .net framework (3.5) brings new features: C# 3, VB9, LINQ, extension methods etc. In WF, the main evolution comes with the integration of WCF (Windows Communication Foundation). It means:

Specific controls to call or export workflow activities in WCF
New hosting library
New WF templates in VS 2008

In this article (in French), I am explaining new WF functionalities in .net 3.5. I am illustrating that in implementing a service of recipes to generate chocolate cake’s one.

[Français]

La version 3.5 du .NET Framework apporte un grand nombre de nouveautés : C# 3, VB9, LINQ, méthodes d’extensions etc. Concernant WF, sa principale évolution tourne autour de l’intégration de WCF (Windows Communications Foundation). Cela se traduit par :

la présence de contrôles spécifiques pour exporter ou appeler un workflow en WCF,
Une librairie de hosting (hébergement de workflow) spécifique,
Des templates Visual Studio 2008.

A travers cet article, nous allons étudier les nouvelles fonctionnalités de WF présentes dans la version 3.5 du Framework. Afin de les illustrer, nous mettrons en place un service de recette de cuisine générant celle du gâteau au chocolat.

WF: How to add your own task in the workflow runtime engine batching mechanism ?

Maxime LAMURE — Sat, 23 Jun 2007 00:51:00 GMT

The goal of this post is to describe the mechanism to create and add your own service in the workflow runtime engine.

Situation: You would like that each time the SqlWorkflowPersistenceService is called by the workflow runtime, it call your own service, in a transactional scope (if your service or the persistence service failed, a rollback is apply).

1: You have to create your service:

Create a class (in a separate project) wich implements IPendingWork. Add reference of this project in the host and workflow project.

namespace TransactionalService
{
public class TransactionalService : IPendingWork
{
   void IPendingWork.Commit(System.Transactions.Transaction transaction, ICollection items)
   {
      foreach (MyExternalDataEventArgs request in items)
      {
         Console.WriteLine(request.Commande.Nom);
      }
   }

   bool IPendingWork.MustCommit(ICollection items)
   {
      return true;
   }

   void IPendingWork.Complete(bool succeeded, ICollection items)
   {
      Console.WriteLine(succeeded);
   }
  }
}

2: Add your service in the workflowruntime

In your Host:

…
workflowRuntime.AddService(new TransactionalService.TransactionalService());
workflowRuntime.StartRuntime();

3: add your pending work items to the current work batch

In your Workflow:

TransactionalService.TransactionalService service = new TransactionalService.TransactionalService(); //Or by the getService()

WorkflowEnvironment.WorkBatch.Add(service, MyArgs);

When the runtime engine batching will be executed, he will call all services which implements IPendingWork (SqlTrackingService, SqlWorkflowPersistenceService and you service):
1: MustCommit (check if you want the method Commit will be called) ,
2: if yes, he will call Commit method,
3: The complete method allow us to know the state of the process.

.net ready !!! : WF

Introduction to WF 3.5 / Mettez vous à table avec Workflow Foundation 3.5

WF: How to add your own task in the workflow runtime engine batching mechanism ?

1: You have to create your service:

2: Add your service in the workflowruntime

3: add your pending work items to the current work batch