Chapter 12. Advanced Workflow Programming

In Chapter 6, “Programming Workflow,” we discussed how Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 uses Windows Workflow Foundation (WF) to execute workflow instances defined by business users. We also looked at developing your own custom activities and how you can register them with the CRM server.

In this chapter, we’ll dig deeper into the workflow implementation within Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 to understand how the software stores workflow definitions within entities in CRM and how you can manipulate these definitions through the Microsoft Dynamics CRM Web services. Additionally, you will gain an understanding of workflow dependencies and how they affect workflow execution. Finally, we’ll explore how CRM uses Extensible Application Markup Language (XAML) and declarative workflows, as well as how you can register your own workflows to execute within CRM.