Dynamics CRM - access property within a workflow on newly created entity

Question

I'm creating a Dynamics CRM workflow assembly to be executed when a new Note is created on another record of any type. I need to be able to access a property Prop1 on that newly created Note entity to accomplish other tasks.

Previously I've only accessed values that were input from a field or from the user, but never on a property of a newly created entity. Any guidance would be appreciated.

UPDATE: This is regarding CRM 4.0.

More information while I wait: Ultimately, this workflow assembly will create an email that contains a link to the parent entity of the newly created Note record. The property I need to get is the AnnotationId. Once the Note record is created, I will be retrieving the ObjectId and ObjectTypeCode based on the AnnotationId of the newly created Note. (In case you were curious)

Answer 1

Ok so if your using 4.0 custom workflows and not 3.0 callouts, you should add a workflow assembly, and use the Context service and executing context of your workflow to pull the values from the new note.

See the example below on how to access a record using the context service and the ID of your current context of execution (that should be your note)

    /// <summary>
    /// The Execute method is called by the workflow runtime to execute an activity.
    /// </summary>
    /// <param name="executionContext"> The context for the activity</param>
    /// <returns></returns>
    protected override ActivityExecutionStatus Execute(ActivityExecutionContext executionContext)
    {

        // Get the context service.
        IContextService contextService = (IContextService)executionContext.GetService(typeof(IContextService));
        IWorkflowContext context = contextService.Context;

        // Use the context service to create an instance of CrmService.
        ICrmService crmService = context.CreateCrmService(true);
        BusinessEntity newNote = GetNote(crmService, context.PrimaryEntityId);

        string noteAttrib;

         noteAttrib = newNote.Properties.Contains("AnnotationId") ? ((Lookup)newNote.Properties["annotationid"]).name.ToString() : null;

        return ActivityExecutionStatus.Closed;
    }

GetNotes method would be a standard query for notes by Id through a CRM service call, here is an example slightly modified from MSDN to return a note:

private BusinessEntity getNote(ICrmService service, guid noteid)
{
  // Create the column set object that indicates the fields to be retrieved.
  ColumnSet cols = new ColumnSet();

  // Set the columns to retrieve, you can use allColumns but its good practice to specify:
  cols.Attributes = new string [] {"name"};

  // Create the target object for the request.
  TargetRetrieveAnnotation target = new TargetRetrieveAnnotation();

  // Set the properties of the target object.
  // EntityId is the GUID of the record being retrieved.
  target.EntityId = noteid;

  // Create the request object.
  RetrieveRequest retrieve = new RetrieveRequest();

  // Set the properties of the request object.
  retrieve.Target = target;
  retrieve.ColumnSet = cols;

  // Execute the request.
  RetrieveResponse retrieved = (RetrieveResponse)service.Execute(retrieve);
  return RetrieveResponse;
}