Retrieve Multiple Entities

The Retrieve Multiple Entities activity is used to retrieve entity records from the Microsoft Dynamics CRM server that match the specified query criteria.

General

In the General tab, you can establish a connection to the Microsoft Dynamics CRM server, and specify the type of entity records you want to retrieve.

The following table lists the configurations in the General tab of the Retrieve Multiple Entities activity:

Field Module Property? Description
Name No Specify the name of the activity in the process definition.
Dynamics CRM Connection Yes Specify a shared connection resource.

Click the icon to select a Dynamics CRM connection. If no matching Dynamics CRM connections are found, click Create Shared Resource in the Select DynamicscrmResource Resource Template dialog to create one. See Creating a Dynamics CRM Connection for more details.

Dynamics CRM Entity No Specify the type of the entity record you want to retrieve.

Click Fetch Entity to open the Entity Selection Dialog that contains all the available entities. Select an entity from the list and click OK. The selected entity is automatically specified in this field.

After selecting the entity, click Build Schema to open the Attributes Selection Dialog that contains all the available attributes associated with the entity. Select the attributes you want and click OK. The selected attributes are displayed in the Input tab or Output tab.

Retrieve Mode No Specify the retrieve mode. Select Simple or FetchXML.
  • In simple mode, you can specify Searchoperator and select the attributes to be displayed in both the Input and Output tab.
  • In FetchXML mode, you can only select the attributes displayed in the Output tab.
Use Pagination No
Specify whether or not to use pagination feature while retrieving multiple records.
Note: The Use Pagination check box is visible only when Retrieve Mode is Simple. It is not available for FetchXML mode.

Description

In the Description tab, enter a short description for the Retrieve Multiple Entities activity.

Input

The input of this activity varies depending on the entity and attributes selected when configuring the General tab.

The following table lists the possible input elements in the Input tab of the Retrieve Multiple Entities activity:

Input Item Data Type Description
pagenumber Integer Specify the number of pages to be returned in the Output tab.
pagesize Integer Specify the maximum number of entity records to be returned on each page.
pagingcookie String Specify the value of paging cookie. The paging cookie is a performance feature that makes paging in the application faster for very large datasets.
attributes String Each attribute is associated with values and search operators. See the Microsoft Dynamics CRM documentation for more details about how to use the condition operators.
The following field is displayed in FetchXML mode.
FetchXML String Specify the retrieve criteria in XML format.
Note:
  • The format of the XML string must conform to the FetchXML syntax. See the Microsoft Dynamics CRM documentation for more details about the FetchXML query specification and usage.
  • Paging cookie is not supported in FetchXML mode.

Output

The output of this activity varies depending on the entity and attributes selected when configuring the General tab.

The following table lists the possible output elements in the Output tab of the Retrieve Multiple Entities activity:

Output Item Data Type Description
pagenumber Integer The name to be displayed as the label for the activity in the process.
pagesize Integer The maximum number of entity records that are returned on each page.
pagingcookie String The value of paging cookie.
Note: Paging cookie is only supported in simple mode.
totalcount Integer The total number of entity records that have been retrieved.
hasMoreRecords Boolean
A flag that indicates if there are more records to retrieve for the selected query after the current record.
Note: This element is only supported in simple mode when Use Pagination is selected.

Fault

The error code and error message of the Retrieve Multiple activity are displayed in the Fault tab. See Error Codes for a more detailed explanation of errors.

The following table lists error schema elements in the Fault tab of the Retrieve Multiple Entities activity:

Error Schema Element Data Type Description
message String The error message returned by the plug-in.
messageCode String The error code returned by the plug-in.