How to know if the code is inside TransactionScope?

Question

What is the best way to know if the code block is inside TransactionScope?
Is Transaction.Current a realiable way to do it or there are any subtleties?
Is it possible to access internal ContextData.CurrentData.CurrentScope (in System.Transactions) with reflection? If yes, how?

Thank you in advance.

Answer 1

Transaction.Current should be reliable; I've just checked, at this works fine with suppressed transactions, too:

Console.WriteLine(Transaction.Current != null); // false
using (TransactionScope tran = new TransactionScope())
{
    Console.WriteLine(Transaction.Current != null); // true
    using (TransactionScope tran2 = new TransactionScope(
          TransactionScopeOption.Suppress))
    {
        Console.WriteLine(Transaction.Current != null); // false
    }
    Console.WriteLine(Transaction.Current != null); // true
}
Console.WriteLine(Transaction.Current != null); // false

Answer 2

Here is more reliable way (as I said, Transaction.Current can be set manually and it doesn't always mean we are really in TransactionScope). It's also possible to get this information with reflection, but emiting IL works 100 times faster than reflection.

private Func<TransactionScope> _getCurrentScopeDelegate;

bool IsInsideTransactionScope
{
  get
  {
    if (_getCurrentScopeDelegate == null)
    {
      _getCurrentScopeDelegate = CreateGetCurrentScopeDelegate();
    }

    TransactionScope ts = _getCurrentScopeDelegate();
    return ts != null;
  }
}

private Func<TransactionScope> CreateGetCurrentScopeDelegate()
{
  DynamicMethod getCurrentScopeDM = new DynamicMethod(
    "GetCurrentScope",
    typeof(TransactionScope),
    null,
    this.GetType(),
    true);

  Type t = typeof(Transaction).Assembly.GetType("System.Transactions.ContextData");
  MethodInfo getCurrentContextDataMI = t.GetProperty(
    "CurrentData", 
    BindingFlags.NonPublic | BindingFlags.Static)
    .GetGetMethod(true);

  FieldInfo currentScopeFI = t.GetField("CurrentScope", BindingFlags.NonPublic | BindingFlags.Instance);

  ILGenerator gen = getCurrentScopeDM.GetILGenerator();
  gen.Emit(OpCodes.Call, getCurrentContextDataMI);
  gen.Emit(OpCodes.Ldfld, currentScopeFI);
  gen.Emit(OpCodes.Ret);

  return (Func<TransactionScope>)getCurrentScopeDM.CreateDelegate(typeof(Func<TransactionScope>));
}

[Test]
public void IsInsideTransactionScopeTest()
{
  Assert.IsFalse(IsInsideTransactionScope);
  using (new TransactionScope())
  {
    Assert.IsTrue(IsInsideTransactionScope);
  }
  Assert.IsFalse(IsInsideTransactionScope);
}