CODEWITHSUNDEEP
pluginsworkflowdynamics-crm
AmiNadimi
AmiNadimi

Reputation: 5715

Custom WorkFlows vs Plug-ins in MS CRM

I used a lot of Plug-in code to implement business logic in CRM but now I've came up with this feature called Custom Workflow Activity. now i wonder When to use these custom workflows over Plug-ins ?

Upvotes: 2

Views: 5659

Answers (3)

Prashant Parkale
Prashant Parkale

Reputation: 1

Many of the developers or MS CRM beginners get confused in some scenarios whether to go with Workflows or to go with Plugins, as both can be used and has ability to perform specific task at server side.

Plugins and workflows have some significant differences like limitations in event messages, Triggering points.

You can refer the below link for complete understanding of differences-

https://mscrm16tech.com/.../workflows-vs-plugins-in-ms-crm/

Upvotes: 0

AmiNadimi
AmiNadimi

Reputation: 5715

I went deep into the subject myself and found interesting things i want to share, So here is the complete list of compare :

  • Plug-in's only fire on data change like updating or creating records but custom workflows take part inside a process ( workflow, dialog, ... )

    As a result , workflows not only can be triggered on data change, but on demand at anytime at any point inside their process. As you might have already understood, It is the real flexibility needed for implementing complicated business logic.

  • Plug-ins won't accept arguments or passed-data, But custom workflows make it possible by using InArgument properties like below :

    [Input("Case")]     //label of the field shown in workflow
[ReferenceTarget("incident")]     //if using EntityReference, must point the type
public InArgument<EntityReference> yourArg { get; set; } //almost every data type is supported

  • Workflows can be simply used and manipulated by business users.

  • Custom Workflows are absolutely reusable. with one register you have a piece of business logic that can be used in several situations. in some cases you might even happen to write a code which can be used upon many different entities.

  • So far you know that custom workflow is more reliable than plug-in , but the point that makes a plugin's take over custom workflow is when you are validating data changes and eventually need to revert those changes . of course this is possible in Custom Workflows but it's much more easier to add a plugin than workflow.

  • and bare in mind that plugins run faster! (as i tested it myself)

  • However profiling workflows in CRM is still bugged out !

Upvotes: 2

Jordi
Jordi

Reputation: 1470

Code Activities are custom steps which can be inserted into one or many different workflows. Kind of "plugins" but used to be inserted in workflows.

Workflows give you more feedback because they are represented visually in CRM, so non technical people can see the status of a workflow, and the steps which were executed since the start. Workflows are also executed in the Asynchronous service so they run asynchronously, plugins run synchronously, inside the application pool.

So workflows are also better for long running processes.

With that being said, plugins are still helpful when:

  • You need to have an immediate response, because they are triggered and executed inside CRM's application pool and,
  • You need to run anything inside the transaction, so they can abort it by raising an exception.

Example: you have an integration with a 3rd party service, where a record can't be created in CRM unless something is validated on the other side. Another example is concurrency: the auto-number plugin is a plugin because it needs to lock the database in the transaction, otherwise multiple concurrent threads could create duplicate IDs.

So, the answer, like always is: It depends. :)

Upvotes: 3

Related Questions