Rebuilding environments from source (ALM) - diffs in CDS workflows

[pcole]

Microsofts ALM best practices state that you should be able to rebuild your environment from source.  i.e.  

1. Export solution from CDS, unpack solution.zip with solutionpackager /action:extract, then check into source control
2. Completely reset environment (via admin portal or DevOps pipeline) 
3. Install any dependent managed solutions
4. Extract from source control, pack solution with solutionpackager, then import into source control.

This works fine.  However when the next export and solutionpackager extract is done there's a number of diffs present - Mainly for CDS workflows, where GUIDs within the XAML change.

How can this be prevented?

[BenediktB]

Hej pcole,

what exactly do you mean with "CDS workflows"? Are those custom workflows you created and are therefore included in your solution or are you talking about standard OOB workflows?

//Benedikt

[pcole]

Apologies, perhaps I should have been more clear, my issue is with Classic Workflows, created in the old Solution Explorer (not flows)

[BenediktB]

No worries. I got that.

I just wonder if you are referring to classic Workflows you created or some that come with dynamics.

[pcole]

These are classic (sync) workflows that we created.

[MattB-MSFT]

Depending on how your workflow is built,  if its referencing specific records in CDS, it does that by ID,  thus you will see those ID's change from export to export.. 

Can you share a snipet of whats changing to help answer your question?

[EricRegnier]

Hi @pcole ,

Unfortunately this is by design and cannot be prevented. As the previous user stated, within a classic workflow, there can be many references to data such as the Owner of the Workflow which would change if the deployment user/account is different or records GUIDs within workflow steps (e.g. assign a record to a Team/User) that might differ between the different environments. Also components that might change frequently are security roles for child business units as they are rebuilt upon solution import. 

Hope this clarifies!