Workflow Foundation's SQL Persistence Service
In my last post on Workflow Foundation I introduced the workflow runtime and its default “in-memory” lifecycle. I also presented a lifecycle that saves and unloads idle workflows. This is the lifecycle used when a persistence service is added to the workflow runtime.
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Understanding the Lifecycle of a Workflow
In my last post I built a simple sequential workflow. I introduced all the details needed to use Visual Studio 2008, a few WF activities, and the workflow runtime to build and run a simple expense report approval workflow. In this post I want to step back from the mechanics of building workflows and look at the workflow runtime and the lifecycle of workflows when they are managed by the workflow runtime.
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Building Sequential Workflows
In this post I’ll continue where my last post left off by building a Sequential Workflow and discussing it in more detail. The sequential workflow built in this post will be simple and will use the Code Activity and the IfElse Activity. I’ll limit myself to these activities because they are intuitive to use. I’ll also show how to pass parameters to a workflow and how to execute a workflow using the workflow runtime.
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Using Visual Studio 2008 to Create Workflow Foundation Projects
This post introduces Visual Studio 2008 and shows how to use it as a tool for building workflows that utilize Windows Workflow Foundation (a component of the .NET Framework 3.0 and 3.5). I’ll start by describing the history of Visual Studio and the .NET Framework. Then I’ll introduce the workflow project templates and workflow items that Visual Studio 2008 provides for building workflows.
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What is Windows Workflow Foundation?
What seems like a simple question that can be answered in a few sentences is actually a little more involved. To understand Windows Workflow Foundation and why it is important you first need to understand “Business Processes” and how modern organizations use them to gain value. Since most business processes are manual, another concept to understand is Business Process Automation. Finally it is necessary to understanding “Models” and how they are used to depict and design business processes. This post will look into all of these concepts ...
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TechEd 2008 Notes
This year I supported the SOA and Business Process track of the TechEd 2008 Developer’s Conference. In addition to delivering our sessions all speakers were asked to spend 16 hours in the Learning Center answering questions and white boarding. Since my session was on building Human Workflows with Workflow Foundation I did my time in the Workflow Foundation booth. It was real interesting to listen to all the questions developers had and the challenges they face when using Workflow Foundation. Below I listed the three most asked questions.
Three most frequently asked Workflow Foundation questions:
1. What is Workflow Foundation?
2. When do I use Workflow Foundation?
3. What is the best way to migrate custom built workflows to Workflow Foundation?
With these questions in mind, I would like to start a new blog series that is based on Workflow Foundation. In my opinion, learning WF is the most important thing you can do today if you are interested in “Oslo” which is a forthcoming platform for services and business processes. I also think that some of the more interesting solutions that will get delivered via SaaS and Software plus Services will involve technologies that automate business processes.
So - my next post will start with Question #1 above – What is Workflow Foundation?
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Building Human Workflows with WF
Here is a link to the PowerPoint Presentation and the code demos for my TechEd 2008 talk on building human workflows. (Title and abstract are below.) If you have any questions on this topic feel free to post them here. I am interested in hearing about real world scenarios and real world problems that developers and architects are encountering.
SOA311 Building Human Workflows with WF State Machines - State Machine workflows are workflows that transition from State to State where a state is a well know step, stage, or status of a business process. State Machines can also be passed data via external events. A workflow that measures its status via human readable states and can be passed data via external events is a good tool for building Human workflows. This session shows techniques for using State Machines as Human workflows. Specifically, we investigate persistence services for durability, tracking services for workflow reports, and tools for interacting with a state machine from a user interface.
Keith
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VS2005 Version of my State Machine Sample
It looks like the code download which accompanies my article on State Machines was accidentally converted to Visual Studio 2008. My intent was to have this code download available in VS2005 format because I know that most of you have not had a chance to install VS2008.
So - I created and tested a VS2005 version of this code. It has been uploaded to this portal. You can find it here.
Let me know if there are any problems.
Keith
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Building State Machines with WF
MSDN Magazine has just published my article on State Machine workflows in their February 2008 issue. Today it became available online - you can read it here.
I would like to use this blog entry to support the article. If anything in the article did not make sense then please post a comment to this entry. I will make every effort to find the time to respond and provide a better description of anything that you found confusing.
Perhaps you are trying to adopt State Machine techniques to solve real world problems and are coming across real world issues. If this is the case definitely post a comment to this entry stating your problems. My current job at Microsoft is all about real world uses of Microsoft technology. If you tell me about your real world problems you will be educating me on what it is like to use State Machines in the wild. Hopefully I can return the favor by helping you through your problems.
Keith
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