I've managed to write code that inserts a value into a picklist field from my c# web application.  However, it is VERY clunky and I still can't figure out how to keep from losing some of the field properties.

First, it seems a little silly to have to programmatically recreate the entire picklist field just so I can update it with one new value in the picklistValues property.  Also, I have to do a describeSObject and then step through all the fields looking for the right field name.  Isn't there a way to just grab the metadata for a field directly?  I've seen code like the following, but....

Schema.DescribeFieldResult f = Schema.sObjectType.Account.fields.MyFieldName__c;

 ...but, I don't seem to have the Schema namespace/library at my disposal from the C# environment.  Is there ANY way to get DescribeFieldResult functionality in C#?

So I loop through the fields in the object, find the one I want, step through each of the picklist values and recreate them in a new array.  Then I add my new entry to the picklist values array and save it to the picklistValues property.  I can update the field and the new value does in fact show up in Salesforce.... but...

...another problem is that I end up losing the Picklist.Description and Picklist.Sorted properties because the Field object that I'm reading from doesn't have that information.

Well, enough words from me, here is the code.  This works, but you lose the Description and Sorted settings each time.  I post it in hopes that it helps someone and that perhaps someone can help us figure out the rest.

public void InsertPicklistValue(string objectName, string picklistFieldName, string valueToInsert) { try { // Load describe info for the object. DescribeSObjectResult descSObjectRslt = c_sfEnterprise.describeSObject(objectName); if (descSObjectRslt != null) { Field[] fields = descSObjectRslt.fields; foreach (Field field in fields) { if (field.name == picklistFieldName) { // Get the array of existing picklist entries. PicklistEntry[] picklistEntries = field.picklistValues; // We have to recreate the entire list of existing picklist values... List<PicklistValue> pVals = new List<PicklistValue>(); PicklistValue pVal; foreach (PicklistEntry picklistEntry in picklistEntries) { pVal = new PicklistValue(); pVal.@default = picklistEntry.defaultValue; if (picklistEntry.label != null) pVal.fullName = picklistEntry.label; else pVal.fullName = picklistEntry.value; pVals.Add(pVal); } // Add the NEW value... pVal = new PicklistValue(); pVal.fullName = valueToInsert; pVals.Add(pVal); // Now that we have the values, we need to save them to a new picklist. Picklist pList = new Picklist(); pList.picklistValues = pVals.ToArray(); //pList.sorted = how can we get this from the existing field? CustomField picklistField = new CustomField(); picklistField.fullName = objectName + "." + picklistFieldName; picklistField.label = field.label; picklistField.type = FieldType.Picklist; picklistField.picklist = pList; picklistField.inlineHelpText = field.inlineHelpText; //picklistField.description = how/where can we get this? // Update the existing picklist. UpdateMetadata updatedMetadata = new UpdateMetadata(); updatedMetadata.currentName = objectName + "." + picklistFieldName; updatedMetadata.metadata = picklistField; AsyncResult result = update(new UpdateMetadata[] { updatedMetadata })[0]; while (!result.done) { System.Threading.Thread.Sleep(result.secondsToWait * 1000); result = checkStatus(new string[] { result.id })[0]; } if (result.state == AsyncRequestState.Error) Console.WriteLine("Error {0}\n{1}", result.statusCode, result.message); else Console.WriteLine("Picklist updated successfully"); break; } } } } catch (Exception ex) { System.Diagnostics.Debug.WriteLine("\nFailed to get " + objectName + " description, error message was: \n " + ex); } }

Anyone?  Bueller?