List of changes in plugin development in CRM 4.0 and CRM 2011

There are not much changes in terms of plugins. there are few changes like instead of using DynamicEntity class we have to use the Entity class. the five major changes are :

1. The IPlugin now resides in Microsoft.Xrm.Sdk namespace instead of Microsoft.Crm.Sdk

public class ClassName : Microsoft.Crm.Sdk.IPlugin
public class ClassName : Microsoft.Xrm.Sdk.IPlugin

2. The Execute method signature of the IPlugin interface has changed, it now expects an IServiceProvider instead of the IPluginExecutionContext.

public void Execute(IPluginExecutionContext context)
public void Execute(IServiceProvider serviceProvider)

3. To get a reference to the IPluginExecutionContext you now need to call the GetService method of the IServiceProvider interface.

public void Execute(IPluginExecutionContext context)
Microsoft.Xrm.Sdk.IPluginExecutionContext context =(Microsoft.Xrm.Sdk.IPluginExecutionContext)
    serviceProvider.GetService(typeof(Microsoft.Xrm.Sdk.IPluginExecutionContext));

4. ICrmService has been changed to IOrganizationService.

ICrmService sdk = context.CreateCrmService(true);
IOrganizationServiceFactory factory = (IOrganizationServiceFactory)serviceProvider.GetService(typeof(IOrganizationServiceFactory));
IOrganizationService sdk = factory.CreateOrganizationService(context.UserId);

5. DynamicEntity has been changed to Entity.

• Properties property of DynamicEntity no longer exists



• Getting and Setting values no longer use *Property classes,

eg: no more KeyProperty, StringProperty…etc, simply do int value = (int)entity[“schema_name”];

if (context.InputParameters.Properties.Contains("Target") &&
    context.InputParameters.Properties["Target"] is DynamicEntity)
if (context.InputParameters.Contains("Target") &&
    context.InputParameters["Target"] is Entity)

hats off to the original contribution by Gayan Perera

Happy Coding