Dynamics 365: Learn in doing

What's a Data Entity (really)? A Data Entity is a business‑friendly view over one or more normalized tables (e.g., CustTable , addresses, contacts), packaged so you can import/export, integrate, and evolve with less pain when the underlying schema changes. Think: one door, many rooms behind it . Entities can also be exposed as OData (for APIs) and used by the Data Management Framework (DMF) for bulk import/export. Heads‑up: F&O does not allow direct T‑SQL against the prod DB. Entities (and BYOD) exist to keep you safe and supported. When should I create my own entity? You need a clean shape for integration—not ten joins. You plan to expose an API (OData) for a specific business concept. You want DMF import/export (files, recurring jobs, mapping) without writing plumbing. Step‑by‑step: Create an entity for Item Serial Numbers Example scenario: Export/import item serial numbers from the InventSerial table (and related bits) via one entity. Create a project in Visual Stu...

If you have installed Ax 2012 Data migration framework on top of Microsoft Dynamics Ax 2012 R2 Final Release (Application version: 6.2.158.0), you might find a strange behavior. The retail module goes missing in the Navigation pane in Ax 2012. The below figure illustrates what does I mean by saying missing nodes in Navigation bar. And to identify the reason behind this, lets go to the Ax Development workspace and compare the Main menu under AOT\Menus. So as seen in the above figure, the DMF installation clearly overwrites the MainMenu (fpk). This is the reason for the Retail & Payroll menus missing in the Navigation bar, also Fixed assets (Russia). Solution:  And to have the actual menus back, just overwrite the MainMenu (in usr or var layer) by adding the menu items back to the MainMenu. This should bring back the missing menu items. Here, I only added "Retail" to the MainMenu (usr). And thus comparision only shows Retail added in user layer. Hope th...

There is a known issue/error which pops up when we perform   CIL compile after installing the DMF beta 2.0.   The Error pops up is "CustomerTransaction_CustTrans macro doesn't exist.” If you look into the class where error is thrown you will notice that in the new method of Class CustomerTransaction_CustTrans, the macro specified will be missing. Even if you try to compile forward from 'AifDocument'. You will notice similar error. Is this because of the new Ax2012 Data Migration Framework (Beta2) installation? Yes. This issue is related to DMF installation. The DMF axmodel seems to overwrite the macro "DataContainerTypes".   In the below screenshot, code in Blue belongs to actual SYS model (comes with proper installation of Dynamics Ax 2012 latest version) . And FPK layer (code from DMF installation) overwrites the blue code. And caused the above mentioned error. The solution would be to compare the macro with FPK and SYS layer and ...

This topic explains in detail and illustrates a simple example of migration of data using the Ax 2012 Data migration framework. Before you begin, your environment must include the following components: A running version of Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012, along with Ax 2012 Data migration framework installed and running. Access to demo files which are copied to Program files during installation of Ax 2012 Data migration framework. (typically under path: "<root>/Program Files/Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 Data Migration Framework Client Components (Beta)/DemoFiles") After the successful installation of Ax2012 DMF, there will be a new module 'Data migration framework' in the Ax module list with Area page as shown below. For an End-to-End scenario of Data Migration, the flow would be some thing like: Setup of Data migration framework Data migration framework parameters (form) --> to provide share folder path Source data fomats (form) -->...

Now that we have installed, troubleshooted and verified that installation of AX 2012 Data Migration Framework is completed successfully, lets move towards One Important best practise suggested by Microsoft. Microsoft states in DMFs user guide that: “Because the staging environment is highly normalized and may require significant processing bandwidth, we recommend that you increase the Maximum buffer size setting for your environment while you migrate data. Use the Server configuration utility to set the value.” If you want to take this advice of Microsoft, the below steps show how to do that. Launch the server configuration utility (Start menu > Administrative Tools > Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 Server Configuration) , Click Manage > Create configuration... And in the opened dailog, fill Configuration name with any desired string as shown: And click ok. Now in the new configuraiton, Go to the database tuning tab, and change the buffer size from 48, to ...

#Issue 1: Error with Windows Installer package Setup will not install the Data Migration Framework service on a 64-bit computer without Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 installed and running. The installation fails with the error "There is a problem with this Windows Installer package. A program required for this installation to complete could not be run. Contact your support personnel or package vendor." Resolution Install the Microsoft Windows SDK for Windows 7 and .NET Framework 4 from http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=8279 . On the Installation Options page, select the following options, and then complete the installation. Under .NET Development, select Tools. Under Redistributable Packages, select Microsoft Visual C++ 2010. Open a command prompt with Run as administrator rights. Depending on which version of SQL Server is in your environment, run one of the following commands. For SQL Server 2012, run Command <System Drive>\Progra...

This topic describes how to install the Data Migration Framework for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012, Beta 2 version. Before you begin, your environment must include the following components: A running version of Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 that has been configured for your business. A running version of Microsoft SQL Server Integration Services that is running the same version of SQL Server that is hosting the Microsoft Dynamics AX business and model store database. Important: Because the staging environment is highly normalized and may require significant processing bandwidth, we recommend that you increase the Maximum buffer size setting for your environment while you migrate data. Use the Server configuration utility to set the value . Data Migration Framework components should be installed on: (You must run the installer locally on each computer) computers running Integration Services, on a computer running an Application Object Server (AOS) instance, and on a...