Working with the Policy Activity and Rule Sets
The Policy activity can be very useful when you have to run a set of rules at a certain point in your workflow.
Assume you have a workflow that receives an incoming sales item describing the cost of the item and the
number of items bought (e.g., 100 books at $20.00 each). Now assume you have a set of rules that will adjust
the total cost based on how many books were bought. If the number of books is greater than 40, the order
receives a discount. Also assume if the sale is greater than 50 books, the order receives a shipping discount.
These two rules could be accounted for in a ‘hardcoded’ way using a Code activity. As an alternative, you
could define a single Policy activity, which declaratively defines a ‘rule set’ to account for each rule.
Once a Policy activity has been placed on your WF designer, you are able to set the RuleSetReference
property to create your rule set. To do so, you will make use of the same RuleSet editor, which works
similarly to the Rule Condition editor. Your upcoming lab will walk you through the details of building a rule
set.
Like a Rule Condition, a RuleSet can be very useful in that your conditional logic is not hardcoded within
your assembly but via a *.rules file. Again, this allows for the possibility of changing rules on the fly without
recompiling your code base.
Lab Exercise: Working with Declarative Rule Conditions
The Policy activity can be very useful when you have to run a set of rules at a certain point in your workflow.
Assume you have a workflow that receives an incoming sales item describing the cost of the item and the
number of items bought (e.g., 100 books at $20.00 each). Now assume you have a set of rules that will adjust
the total cost based on how many books were bought. If the number of books is greater than 40, the order
receives a discount. Also assume if the sale is greater than 50 books, the order receives a shipping discount.
These two rules could be accounted for in a ‘hardcoded’ way using a Code activity. As an alternative, you
could define a single Policy activity, which declaratively defines a ‘rule set’ to account for each rule.
Once a Policy activity has been placed on your WF designer, you are able to set the RuleSetReference
property to create your rule set. To do so, you will make use of the same RuleSet editor, which works
similarly to the Rule Condition editor. Your upcoming lab will walk you through the details of building a rule
set.
Like a Rule Condition, a RuleSet can be very useful in that your conditional logic is not hardcoded within
your assembly but via a *.rules file. Again, this allows for the possibility of changing rules on the fly without
recompiling your code base.
Lab Exercise: Working with Declarative Rule Conditions
Working with the Policy Activity and Rule Sets
Table of Contents
Copyright (c) 2008. Intertech, Inc. All Rights Reserved. This information is to be used exclusively as an
online learning aid. Any attempts to copy, reproduce, or use for training is strictly prohibited.
online learning aid. Any attempts to copy, reproduce, or use for training is strictly prohibited.
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