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If you are interested in learning more about building custom activities, the .NET Framework 3.5

SDK documentation provides a number of interesting examples, including the construction of a

“Send E-mail Activity.” For more details, simply browse the Custom Activities samples found under

the WF Samples node of the provided documentation (see Figure 26-29).

Figure 26-29.

The .NET Framework 3.5 SDK documentation provides numerous workflow examples.

Summary

Windows Workflow Foundation (WF) is an API that was released with .NET 3.0. In essence, WF

allows you to model an application’s internal business processes directly within the application

itself. Beyond simply modeling the overall workflow, however, WF provides a complete runtime

engine and several services that round out this API’s overall functionality (transaction services, per-

sistence and tracking services, etc.). While this introductory chapter did not examine these services

in any great detail, do remember that a production-level WF application will most certainly make

use of these facilities.

When building a workflow-enabled application, Visual Studio 2008 provides several designer

tools, including a workflow designer, configuration using the Properties window, and (most impor-

tant) the Windows Workflow Toolbox. Here, you will find numerous built-in 

activities that constitute

the overall composition of a particular workflow. Once you have modeled your workflow, you are

then able to execute the workflow instance using the WorkflowRuntime type, using your host of

choice.

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