Custom Workflow Activity not showing design surface

Brian Kuhn — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 16:18:17 GMT

I have created a SharePoint project that contains a custom workflow activity (not sandboxed, but inheriting from Activity). The project deploys a custon .ACTIONS file that describes the rule designer and parameters. I also add my assembly as an authorized type to the SP web.config after I do a deployment.

I am able to build, deploy, and locate the custom activity when creating a site workflow, but after selecting the activity there is nothing displayed in the designer. From what I have read this is usally due to a malformed ACTIONS defintion, but I am at a loss as to what i am doing wrong.

Any assitance or things I can try would be apprecaited, I am disappointed in the lack of feedback from the SharePoint designer on what is wrong. To clarify, I can select the custom activity, but the Rule Designer Sentence is not displayed in the workflow step and thus I cannot specify the input parameter(s).

.ACTIONS definition:

Custom Activity class:

using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
using System.Net;
using System.Text;
using System.Workflow.ComponentModel.Compiler;
using System.Workflow.ComponentModel.Serialization;
using System.Workflow.ComponentModel;
using System.Workflow.ComponentModel.Design;
using System.Workflow.Runtime;
using System.Workflow.Activities;
using System.Workflow.Activities.Rules;

using Microsoft.SharePoint;
using Microsoft.SharePoint.Workflow;
using Microsoft.SharePoint.WorkflowActions;

namespace Hanford.SharePoint.Idms
{
    /// <summary>
    ///
    /// </summary>
    public class UploadToIdmsActivity : Activity
    {
        //=======================================================================================================
        // Public Properties
        //=======================================================================================================
        #region __Context
        /// <summary>
        ///
        /// </summary>
        public WorkflowContext __Context
        {
            get { return (WorkflowContext)GetValue(__ContextProperty); }
            set { SetValue(__ContextProperty, value); }
        }

        /// <summary>
        ///
        /// </summary>
        public static readonly DependencyProperty __ContextProperty =
            DependencyProperty.Register("__Context", typeof(WorkflowContext), typeof(UploadToIdmsActivity));
        #endregion

        #region __ListId
        /// <summary>
        ///
        /// </summary>
        public string __ListId
        {
            get { return (string)GetValue(__ListIdProperty); }
            set { SetValue(__ListIdProperty, value); }
        }

        /// <summary>
        ///
        /// </summary>
        public static readonly DependencyProperty __ListIdProperty =
            DependencyProperty.Register("__ListId", typeof(string), typeof(UploadToIdmsActivity));
        #endregion

        #region __ListItem
        /// <summary>
        ///
        /// </summary>
        public int __ListItem
        {
            get { return (int)GetValue(__ListItemProperty); }
            set { SetValue(__ListItemProperty, value); }
        }

        /// <summary>
        ///
        /// </summary>
        public static readonly DependencyProperty __ListItemProperty =
            DependencyProperty.Register("__ListItem", typeof(int), typeof(UploadToIdmsActivity));
        #endregion

        #region Address
        /// <summary>
        ///
        /// </summary>
        public string Address
        {
            get { return (string)GetValue(AddressProperty); }
            set { SetValue(AddressProperty, value); }
        }

        /// <summary>
        ///
        /// </summary>
        public static readonly DependencyProperty AddressProperty =
            DependencyProperty.Register("Address", typeof(string), typeof(UploadToIdmsActivity));
        #endregion

        #region Response
        /// <summary>
        ///
        /// </summary>
        public object Response
        {
            get { return GetValue(ResponseProperty); }
            set { SetValue(ResponseProperty, value); }
        }

        /// <summary>
        ///
        /// </summary>
        public static readonly DependencyProperty ResponseProperty =
            DependencyProperty.Register("Response", typeof(object), typeof(UploadToIdmsActivity));
        #endregion

        //=======================================================================================================
        // Protected Methods
        //=======================================================================================================
        #region Execute(ActivityExecutionContext executionContext)
        /// <summary>
        ///
        /// </summary>
        /// <param name="executionContext"></param>
        /// <returns></returns>
        protected override ActivityExecutionStatus Execute(ActivityExecutionContext executionContext)
        {
            SPSecurity.RunWithElevatedPrivileges(
                delegate()
                {
                    using(WebClient webClient = new WebClient())
                    {
                        webClient.UseDefaultCredentials                     = true;
                        webClient.Headers[HttpRequestHeader.ContentType]    = "text/xml; charset=utf-8";

                        Activity parent = executionContext.Activity;
                        while (parent.Parent != null)
                        {
                            parent = parent.Parent;
                        }

Response = webClient.DownloadString(Address);

                        if (Response != null)
                        {
                            ISharePointService spService = (ISharePointService)executionContext.GetService(typeof(ISharePointService));
                            spService.LogToHistoryList(this.WorkflowInstanceId, SPWorkflowHistoryEventType.WorkflowComment, -1, TimeSpan.MinValue, "Information",
                                Response.ToString(), String.Empty);
                        }
                    }
                }
            );

            return ActivityExecutionStatus.Closed;
        }
        #endregion

        #region HandleFault(ActivityExecutionContext executionContext, Exception exception)
        /// <summary>
        ///
        /// </summary>
        /// <param name="executionContext"></param>
        /// <param name="exception"></param>
        /// <returns></returns>
        protected override ActivityExecutionStatus HandleFault(ActivityExecutionContext executionContext, Exception exception)
        {
            string errorMessage = string.Format("Error calling Upload to IDMS. {0}", exception.Message);

            SPSecurity.RunWithElevatedPrivileges(delegate()
            {
                ISharePointService spService = (ISharePointService)executionContext.GetService(typeof(ISharePointService));
                spService.LogToHistoryList(this.WorkflowInstanceId, SPWorkflowHistoryEventType.WorkflowError, -1, TimeSpan.MinValue, "Error",
                    errorMessage, String.Empty);
            });

            return base.HandleFault(executionContext, exception);
        }
        #endregion
    }
}

Authorized Type configuration: