Our customers have often asked us for detailed auditing of data changes in their CRM.  In the past, the only way to accomplish an audit trail was using custom code or 3rd party database audit tools.  Irrespective of whether or not you feel an application such as a CRM needs broad-based auditing capabilities (after all, you can lock things down pretty tightly via role-based security), there are times when it sure would be nice to be able to see who changed a record and when.  Knowing which throat to choke is important :)

The much rejuvenated workflow engine in CRM 4.0 now provides you with the engine to create your own audit tracker.  In previous versions, the workflow could only 'catch' record additions and record re-assignments.  in CRM 4.0, the workflow engine can catch adds, updates, and deletes.  So the engine is there, just waiting for you to write the workflow rule that will make use of it.

The Microsoft Dynamics CRM Team Blog (a great resource by the way) has an article that steps you though creating a simple auditing feature.  Check it out here.

Dave