Dynamics CRM 2016 Plugin Global Variables

Question

I am simply incrementing a static global variable in a Dynamics CRM 2016 plugin and it shows strange random pattern as shown below. Why does it show strange behavior and pattern?

Below is the code I am using.

 public class MyPlugin : IPlugin
{
    private static int count = 0;

    public void Execute(IServiceProvider serviceProvider)
    {

        try
        {
          if (_objContext.InputParameters.Contains("Target") &&     _objContext.InputParameters["Target"] is Entity)
            {
                WriteLog("Count value before increament: " + count,  service);
                count = count + 1;
                WriteLog("Count value after increament: "+count, service);
             }
         }
     }
  }

Why does it show strange behavior and pattern? That's the question. — Abdul Ghaffar, Feb 26 '16 at 04:40
You should update your question to include an actual question, not create a comment with your question — Daryl, Feb 26 '16 at 04:55
If you can add a little bit more as to what you expected, or why what you see is unexpected, I'll be happy to reopen this question. — Daryl, Feb 29 '16 at 16:22

Daryl · Answer 1 · 2017-05-15T01:31:01.497

From the looks of it, you have two Application webservers that are currently hosting your CRM instance (or these are async plugins, in which case, you have two async servers servicing your CRM instance) Each server has it's own local version of MyPlugin.count, which is why you're seeing the strange behavior.

App Domains in CRM are a little bit simpler for unsandboxed plugins, it's one per Crm Web Server. Sandboxed plugins are a bit trickier. Each registration step of the plugin, has its own unique domain. This requires the CRM Database (or something else external to CRM) in order to keep these values in sync.

I have created an auto-numbering solution that does do just that using the Version feature new in CRM 2015 that allows for optimistic updates. But unfortunetly, Microsoft has a bug where the Version # is null for sandboxed plugins, so it will only work in an on-prem environment, until the bug is resolved.

Update: The bug has been resolved.

Even it shows the same odd behavior on CRM 2016 online orgs. Plus my plugin is synch. — Abdul Ghaffar, Feb 26 '16 at 07:03

score 5 · Answer 2 · answered Feb 25 '16 at 07:41

5

As MS says in MSDN:

For improved performance, Microsoft Dynamics CRM caches plug-in instances. The plug-in's Execute method should be written to be stateless because the constructor is not called for every invocation of the plug-in. Also, multiple system threads could execute the plug-in at the same time. All per invocation state information is stored in the context, so you should not use global variables or attempt to store any data in member variables for use during the next plug-in invocation...

https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/gg328263.aspx

Simply said do not use local variables in plugins. If you're looking for autonumbering only than use an approach similar to this https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/custom-auto-numbering-6-quick-steps-ms-dynamics-crm-eran-fuks

answered Feb 25 '16 at 07:41

Scarlaxx

835
1
6
13

Would the auto numbering approach work for multi user scenario? Like multiple users working on same counter? – Abdul Ghaffar Feb 25 '16 at 09:40
We use it this way with no problems so far. just instead of a workflow we call the incrementation in an after-create plugin. – Scarlaxx Feb 25 '16 at 12:59
Will the auto-number-workflow approach lock the database so that no one else can make a request to it? If no, then the solution will be pretty good but you might get the same value if you are unlucky. – Rickard N Feb 25 '16 at 15:07

Dynamics CRM 2016 Plugin Global Variables

2 Answers2

Linked