Living In Tech

Welcome to the wonderful world of Microsoft's Power Platform! As the digital landscape keeps evolving, so do the ways we can create and manage applications for our businesses. If you're looking to power up your business, you've come to the right place! We'll dive into the whimsical world of Power Apps, Model-Driven Apps, and Power Portals, helping you pick the right tool for the job. So, grab a cup of coffee, get comfy, and let's get started! 😃 Power Apps: Your DIY App Builder Power Apps is a low-code, drag-and-drop application builder that enables users to create custom applications for their organization without needing any fancy coding skills (1). If you're a non-developer with a brilliant app idea, Power Apps is your new best friend. It's a game changer for business users who can create mobile and desktop apps for managing data, automating processes, and connecting to various services. When to use Power Apps: You need a custom application but don't

 Hey there, code wranglers! Are you ready to dive deep into the fascinating world of Microsoft Dynamics 365? Today, we're going to explore the differences between Early Binding and Late Binding, two popular programming techniques that you can use to make the most out of this powerful platform. We'll compare examples, performance metrics, and development times, and we'll even sprinkle in some references for those of you hungry for more information. So let's saddle up and get started! Early Binding - A Swift Ride: Early Binding is like a well-trained horse that knows exactly where it's going. With Early Binding, you'll be working with strongly-typed classes generated from the CRM metadata. This means you'll have access to IntelliSense, making it easy to spot errors during development and reducing the time it takes to write code. Let's take a look at an example of Early Binding in action: using Microsoft.Xrm.Sdk; using Microsoft.Xrm.Sdk.Client; usi

Embarking on the Microsoft Dynamics 365 customization journey offers numerous opportunities to enhance your business processes. However, deciding between the available options, such as Plugins and Azure Functions, can be challenging. This engaging post will serve as your trusty guide, helping you choose the best option for your Dynamics 365 customization needs! The Two Customization Pathfinders: Plugin and Azure Function The Agile Plugin 🏃‍♂️ Reference: Microsoft Docs - Write a plug-in Plugins are like the swift trail runners of the Dynamics 365 customization world. They're the go-to choice for quick, real-time (synchronous), or background (asynchronous) operations that occur within the platform. They can intercept events and modify data before it's saved or displayed to the user. Choose Plugins when: You need real-time processing (synchronous) or background processing (asynchronous). You want to ensure data integrity. You need tight integration with Dynamics 365. Plugins mig

Hey there, tech enthusiasts! Today, we're diving into the magical realm of Microsoft business solutions, where two powerful forces come together to save the day. That's right; we're talking about Microsoft Dynamics 365 and DataVerse. You might be wondering, "What's the difference between these two superhero-esque solutions?" Well, buckle up, because we're about to take a fantastic voyage to find out! Section 1: Microsoft Dynamics 365 - The Multifaceted Hero Microsoft Dynamics 365 is like the Swiss Army knife of business applications. It's a suite of intelligent, interconnected, cloud-based apps that cover various aspects of your business - from sales and marketing to finance and operations. These apps are designed to work together seamlessly, helping you manage every aspect of your business more efficiently. Some of the most popular apps include: Dynamics 365 Sales - Your secret weapon for building better customer relationships!  [1] Dynamics 365 Marke

 FINALLY, Microsoft has pushed an update to the Report Authoring Extension for Dynamics 365 to allow for use of Visual Studio 2019.  This update went live on 12/18/2020 and can be found here .  Installing won't be straight forward into Visual Studio 2019, even if you install everything when you first installed it.  This is because SSDT (SQL Server Data Tools) is installed but, SSAS, SSIS and SSRS are all separate modules for SSDT that you have to install separately.  While you should be fine with just installing SSRS to make this work, I would recommend just installing all 3 parts.   All of these can be found in Microsoft documentation .  In the "Install SSDT with Visual Studio 2019" section, you will see a link to the marketplace where you can download the extensions and install them.  Once that is done, download the Report Authoring Extension and run the installer.  That is it, you can now work on SSRS within Visual Studio 2019 for Microsoft Dynamics.

 Recently for a client I was given the requirement that they needed to update a custom field on activity records whether it was a completed record or not.  The problem when a record is completed, it is in read only status and users can't update the record easily, with minimal clicks.  To solve this business requirement, I wrote two JavaScript libraries. 1) UnlockFieldsOnLoad - This is the function you should list any field that you want to unlock if the record is in complete (read only status).  This function should run on load of the form and will unlock the fields so they can be updated. 2)  OnChangeUnlockedFields - This function is what will do the save when the field(s) are updated.  What it does it check to see if the record is in a read only status.  If if it is, it will make the record active again.  After it makes the record activate again, it will write the change to the database, change the status back to the original status and save that change. function UnlockFieldsOn