Programming Windows Workflow Foundation: Practical WF Techniques and Examples using XAML and C#: A C# developer's guide to the features and programming interfaces of Windows Workflow Foundation (Paperback)

~ K. Scott Allen (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

A C# developer's guide to the features and programming interfaces of Windows Workflow Foundation

• Add event-driven workflow capabilities to your .NET applications.
• Highlights the libraries, services and internals programmers need to know
• Builds a practical "bug reporting" workflow solution example app

In Detail

Windows Workflow Foundation (WF) is a technology for defining, executing, and managing workflows. It is part of the .NET Framework 3.0 and will be available natively in the Windows Vista operating system.

Windows Workflow Foundation might be the most significant piece of middleware to arrive on the Windows platform since COM+ and the Distributed Transaction Coordinator. The difference is, not every application needs a distributed transaction, but nearly every application does have a workflow encoded inside it.

In this book, K Scott Allen, author of renowned .NET articles, provides you with all the information needed to develop successful products with Windows Workflow.

From the basics of how Windows Workflow can solve the difficult problems inherent in workflow solutions, through authoring workflows in code, learning about the base activity library in Windows Workflow and the different types of workflow provided, and on to building event-driven workflows using state machines, workflow communications, and finally rules and conditions in Windows Workflow, this book will give you the in-depth information you need. Throughout the book, an example "bug reporting" workflow system is developed, showcasing the technology and techniques used.

What you will learn from this book?

• Create an example "bug reporting" workflow solution using the techniques and skills gained from each chapter
• Understand what Windows WF is, and what it can do for you
• Learn about the runtime services available in Windows WF
• Author workflows with C#, and with XAML, the extensible application markup language
• Use the workflow compiler to better understand how WF uses code generation to produce classes from workflow markup
• Combine generated workflow code with our hand-written code to produce a workflow type
• Learn about the events fired by the workflow runtime during the life of a workflow instance
• Build workflows that accept parameters and communicate with a host process by invoking methods and listening for events
• Learn about each activity in the Windows WF base activity library; the control flow activities, communication activities, and transaction-oriented activities
• Learn about web service activities, rule-centric activities, and state activities
• Creating custom activities using both a compositional approach and a derivation approach
• Master the execution context, a vital ingredient for creating any robust activity
• Learn about the workflow runtime, workflow diagnostics, and the out-of-the-box services provided for WF by Microsoft.
• Using scheduling services, persistence services, and tracking services
• Select and configure the services needed for a wide variety of scenarios and environments
• Use local services for communication with a host process, and web service activities for communication across a network
• Uncover the queuing service used behind the scenes of a workflow to coordinate and deliver messages
• Create rules and conditions in Windows Workflow Foundation
• Understand the role of business rules in software development and see examples of how Windows WF's rules engine can take away some of the burden of rule development

Approach

Fast-paced and to-the-point, this book takes you through the important topics of Windows WF development with clear explanations and practical example code. The book's selection of topics is driven by what the working developer needs to know. It is neither a comprehensive reference to the whole WF architecture, nor a strategy guide to the complete application development lifecycle. It's just what you as a C# developer need to know to use WF in your applications.

Who this book is written for?

This book is for .NET developers who want to enhance their applications with flexible workflow capabilities using Microsoft Windows Workflow Foundation. The author assumes that you have read other texts on the overall architecture of WF and on WF application design strategies, and instead focuses on real-work implementation issues for C# developers.

About the Author

K. Scott Allen

K. Scott Allen is the Chief Software Architect for Medisolv, Inc and holds MCP and MCSD certifications. In 12 years of software development Scott has worked on everything from real time firmware in 8 bit embedded devices to highly scalable Internet applications connecting COM+ and J2EE components with web services. Living in Hagerstown, Maryland, Scott tries to play as much softball as possible during the summer. Scott is a cofounder of the site OdeToCode.com, a .NET developer resource built using the Community Starter Kit.

Product Details

• Paperback: 300 pages
• Publisher: Packt Publishing (December 22, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1904811213
• ISBN-13: 978-1904811213
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 7 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.5 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #805,079 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Reads like an Insider's Guide, February 4, 2007

By	Derek Strickland "Application Architect" (Clearwater, FL USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

The reader gets the feeling they are being led through a guided tour by a trusted collegue rather than a book. This volume is loadeed with little tidbits of information that the author likely had much more difficulty in discovering than you will if you read his book. Tired of WWF books that read like a marketing document? This book is definitely about the code. Whether WWF is for you or your project is your decision, but if you decide it is or you want to know more, this is a great place for a seasoned technologist to quickly acquire perspective on this emerging technology.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars If I could write like this..., March 20, 2007

By	Jesse Liberty "Silverlight Geek" (MA USA) - See all my reviews

Every once in a while an author is able to take a subject that others struggle with but fail to make understandable, and succeeds in making so crystal clear that it seems obvious. Allen brilliantly illuminates Windows Workflow, and his book is required reading.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A very practical book that will get you going in WF fast, April 25, 2007

By	Microsoft Coder (San Diego, CA) - See all my reviews

I have been working with WF for quite a while and one of the hardest things about this technology is getting your hands around everything it can do. Scott has done a great job of walking you through the technology in a manner that enables you to not only grasp the concepts but also get some code up and running quickly. The progression of the book was well thought out getting you started on creating workflows [Chapter 2] and then progressing through sequential workflows [Chapter 3], base activities [Chapter 4], custom activities [Chapter 5], hosting workflows [Chapter 6], State Machine Workflows [Chapter 7], workflow communication [Chapter 8] and finally rules and conditions [Chapter 9]. The thing that I like about this approach is typically in most projects you will have a team of varying roles and skills and the book in my view caters to this by tackling WF development from the perspective of a workflow developer (Chapters 1,2,3,4,7,9) early on in the book and then moving to a host developer (Chapters 5,6,8) for the final half of the book. You will notice I grouped chapters 7 and 9 in with the first half of the book since I feel these topics are very workflow developer centric and the introduction to the local communication service in chapter 3 should give you enough information to tackle these topics earlier than they are presented.

This book is a fast paced book that is designed to get you up and running quickly but at the same time is not so huge that you can't get through it quickly. It's size (233 pages) limits what you can cover but I think Scott does a good job of presenting the topics in a detailed enough manner that you can then dive into the SDK if you need to go deeper and know what you are looking for when you do. The book has all of code online at Packt Publishing which makes it easy to follow along as you read the book. I would recommend this book to someone who is new to WF and needs a book that can quickly guide them through getting started with the technology.