The Dynamics GP Blogster

I am starting a weekly section called From the Newsgroups intended to bring some of the most intriguing questions and informative responses from the online technical community. To keep things relatively anonymous, no names will be given out... just the questions and the responses. The series open with a question posted on the Partner Online Technical Community forum regarding FRx XBRL capabilities: " I have a client who is working on converting FRx statements to the XBRL format. With service pack 11, we are able to use the 2009 taxonomies, which is great. She needs to submit her statements in XBRL format. There are a few questions that I cannot answer for her and am hoping someone can point me in the right direction. 1. XBRL format will not include calculated columns; XML format will. Is this a limitation of XBRL or FRx? 2. If FRx, can we use XML and then convert to XBRL? Can we export to Excel and convert to XBRL from there? 3. Any suggestions on the best way to view what the r...

It sounds like some word out of Captain Kirk's vocabulary, but for Dexterity developers Hyperspace is a well known property that allows a Dexterity-based application to run the change script for a push button, i.e., a lookup button, without moving the focus from the currently-selected field. For example, you won't want the 'Customer Number' field on the Customer Maintenance window to execute it's change script before you have selected a customer from the Customer Lookup window as the lookup button is clicked... that's what Hyperspace does, it prevents such situations by keeping the focus on the 'Customer Number' field until a customer ID is returned from the lookup window into the field. The problem is, this property is locked down for push button controls added with Modifier, and while you cannot edit the push button change script with Modifier, you may still want to trigger off such controls with Dexterity code. This is pretty common for customizatio...

The excitement around Microsoft Dynamics GP 2010 could not be any higher. Traffic on my site has doubled since I began releasing information about the upcoming version, which is currently being beta tested by a number of partners and have even seen a customer gone live as reported by Inside Microsoft Dynamics GP . For past articles, click on the following links: Microsoft Dynamics GP 2010 - Navigation Enhancements Microsoft Dynamics GP 2010 - Security Enhancements However, none of these application enhancements could have been possible without the hard work of the Microsoft Dexterity team, which brought the following enhancements of their own to version 11.0 of Dexterity : IDE Enhancements Enhancements to Report Writer - While a number of you still dredge the fact that there is still Report Writer, the bottom line is I believe there will be Report Writer for a while. There's simply too much code tied to Report Writer and way too many reports in the system to simply replace them a...

After the Microsoft Dynamics GP 2010 Security Enhancements mentioned in my previous article, I wanted touch base on some of the enhancements to the overall navigation experience. One of the first things that jump out right at you when you get to the desktop is the new Microsoft Dynamics Online Connect feature. Think of this feature as your window to the Dynamics Community. That's correct! Behind that window there are hundreds of thousands of other Dynamics GP users just like you. The problem? The Connect link seems to be down since sometimes yesterday, as of the date and time of publishing of this article. By the way, you can find the Connect site link (also known as the GP Role Center site) in the HomePage.xml file stored in your temp folder (%temp%). You also have the ability to now view reminders as visual cues and multiple metrics on the page. I have to play more around with this feature as I was not quite sure I was able to get all metrics to be displayed at once. The Navig...

This article opens the series on the new features and enhancements available in Microsoft Dynamics GP 2010. I will start out with something dear to the heart of systems administrators and that's security. So let's take a look at the first set of enhancements that have been introduced to the new release. Automatic Login Now you have the option to log on to Microsoft Dynamics GP and a default -- favorite if you will -- company automatically. In order for the login to take place automatically, the system administrator must mark the Enable Remember User field in the System Preferences window. You will notice a new checkmark on the Welcome to Microsoft Dynamics GP window to Remember user and password . And you will also notice a checkmark on the Company Login window to Remember this company . As mentioned before, having the ability to access these new enhancements is a system wide administrative option set via the System Preferences window - MSDGP > Tools > Setup > Sys...

Folks, if you haven't been keeping up lately with the news, there's lot of buzz going on in the Community about the upcoming release of Microsoft Dynamics GP 2010 (Get used to it! GP "11" was just the codename). The Microsoft Dynamics GP Product Management and Marketing team kicked it off big with an exclusive Parner webcast which I attended, demonstrating some of the key features and messaging to be delivered to existing and prospective customers. Can you believe they were more than 500 partners signed on at once? As I mentioned couple days ago , I got a hold of the Beta version minutes after the link was available and could not wait to install it to start playing around with the new features, but before I start blogging about these, here are a few sources you will want to start checking for Microsoft Dynamics GP 2010 information: Start Getting Up to Speed on Microsoft Dynamics GP 2010 @ Inside Microsoft Dynamics GP It is a GREAT Day! @ Inside Microsoft Dynamics...

Well, I really don't want to make you envious of my fortune (but at the same time I do!) as I just got a hold of the Beta release of Microsoft Dynamics GP 2010, thanks to the folks at Microsoft and some of the perks that come along with being a Microsoft MVP . For now, I cannot disclose anything about the Beta release due to NDA restrictions, but I am already exploring the new features and enhancements to existing modules. I don't know when the NDA period will be over, but sure can't wait to start blogging about these new features. If you are a customer reading this and you are still running older releases of GP (9.0 or prior), well let me say that NOW is the time to begin planning your upgrade. Why? Well, you pay for a maintenance plan, don't you? In addition, this is the biggest release EVER! The economy is slowly turning around and you want to have all the tools at your disposal for when things are at peak: better inquiries, better BI capabilities from within GP, bet...

Ever wanted to give users the ability to limit source records dynamically? How about being able to filter records from in a source query by a date range? Well, I encoutered this situation working on my current project. Out of the box, Integration Manager offers the ability to retrieve records and set static filters to source records. However, in many cases users may want to dynamically (at runtime) establish a date range or any other range parameter for the records, then have these ranges applied to the source query. This is possible by using some old fashioned VBScript with Integration Manager. Consider the following records: DOCUMENT_DATE JOURNAL_NUMBER ACCOUNT_NUMBER DEBIT_AMOUNT CREDIT_AMOUNT 12/01/2009 100 000-1200-00 100.00 0.00 12/01/2009 100 000-6620-00 0.00 100.00 12/15/2009 200 000-1201-00 22.50 0.00 12/15/2009 200 000-6630-00 0.00 22.50 01/06/2010 300 000-1200-00 120.00 0.00 01/06/2010 300 000-6620-00 0.00 120.00 01/20/2010 400 000-1201-00 52.50 0.00 01/20/2010...

A few days aback I came across a Partner Forum question where the partner was attempting to add an Extender field to a Report Writer report, not without his share set of challenges. In their infinite wisdom, the folks at eOne added a trigger to the rw_TableHeaderString Report Writer function which allows them to expose data to Report Writer without having to create alternate versions of a report in their application. In turn, with a few steps outlined in the Extender manual, users can invoke the rw_TableHeaderString as a user-defined function in a string calculated field to retrieve the piece of data needed from an Extender table by passing in the Window ID, the key fields, and the position of the field to retrieve on the Extender window. This is an example from such call: Calculated Field: EXTENDER_KEY Expression Type: Calculated Result Type: String Expression: STRIP( SOP_HDR_WORK.SOP Number ) Calculated Field: (C) AdditionalShippingInfo Expression Type: Calculated Result Type: Strin...

For those of you looking to create Business Alert events for Extender tables and data, follow these instructions provided by Microsoft's Dawn Langlie from the Partner Online Technical Community. " In order to add Extender tables so you can see them in Business Alerts, first go to Tools-Utilities-System-Business Alerts. Here is where you will select the tables. Pick "eXtender" as the Product and Pick "Project" for the series. If you are interested triggering off eXtender windows, the tables you will want to insert are the Extender Window Field Dates, Extender Window Field Strings, Extender Window Field Times and Extender Window Field Numbers. Then click the process button in the lower right corner. This will move the tables in the Tables Available for Alerts section. Then create your business alert by going to Tools-Setup-System-Business Alerts. Choose to create a new alert. Select your Database and give the Business Alert a name. In "Select Tables...

"2010 will be a milestone year for Microsoft Dynamics GP..." Microsoft Dynamics GP has a new Nostradamus in MVP Mark Polino . Mark looks into his crystal ball and predicts the fortune of Microsoft Dynamics GP 11, BI, Management Reporter and FRx, and the Microsoft Dynamics GP Community as a whole in his latest MSDynamicsWorld article ... heck, the guy even talks politics! Don't miss out on this great article. Until next post! MG.- Mariano Gomez, MVP Maximum Global Business, LLC http://www.maximumglobalbusiness.com/

I am currently building some customizations for a customer of mine in the aerospace industry. My customer required a library of trigonometric functions that could be used to extend their Dexterity integrating applications. To solve this problem, we turned to .NET to create COM interop assembly. The idea was to take advantage of the standard Math class methods available with the System namespace - System.Math . The following is an excerpt of the code we created: TrigonometricFunctions.cs //Created by Mariano Gomez, MVP using System; using System.Collections.Generic; using System.Text; using System.Runtime.InteropServices; namespace TrigonometricFunctions { public class TrigonometricFunctions { [GuidAttribute("8268A95E-6FCB-4FB2-88A1-1E38F49F4FB8"), ClassInterface(ClassInterfaceType.AutoDual)] public class TrigFn { // dx in degrees public double fSin(double dx) { double angle = Math.PI * dx / 1...

"No, this is not the Chris Tucker and Jackie Chan movie..." One of my goals for this year is to become technically and functionally skilled in Microsoft Dynamics GP CRM. However, I never expected this to happen so quickly and abruptly as it did some 3 weeks ago with a " weekender-all nighter-gotta-get-it-done-by-Monday " project I worked on with my business partner. I collected some of the best practices and experiences from that project and put them together in my new MSDynamicsWorld article . Until next post! MG.- Mariano Gomez, MVP Maximum Global Business, LLC http://www.maximumglobalbusiness.com/

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This is becoming a new year's habit -- in a very pleasant way! Victoria Yudin has now been crowned with the Microsoft Most Valuable Professional award for the 6th straight year. Keep in mind that the MVP award program has been in place for only 14 years, so quite an accomplishment for Victoria. The truth is the Dynamics GP community has quite a bit to thank Victoria for... how about a whopping 3,450 contributions to the Microsoft Dynamics GP public newsgroup for starters. Insider's note about Victoria: she was originally born in Moscow, Russia and move to the US when she was only 10 years old. She is an avid reader and enjoys video games in her free time. She also has a tremendous sense of humor. Until next post! MG.- Mariano Gomez, MVP Maximum Global Business, LLC http://www.maximumglobalbusiness.com/

As if Post Through wasn't hard enough to understand for the core financial and distribution modules (take a look at my previous article Why my transactions don't post through GL even when I have the flag selected? ) here comes Manufacturing. Take a look at these comments from Microsoft's Becky Berginski: " Within Microsoft Dynamics GP there is a place to setup your modules posting options. However, there is not an option specifically for Manufacturing. Manufacturing looks at the Inventory and General Ledger options to determine the MFG posting options. If the transactions you enter in Manufacturing post adjustments to Inventory then the system looks at the settings for your Inventory module. (i.e. To determine if it is stops in GL or posts through GL.) If the transactions don't update inventory (i.e. closing MO), but GL adjustments are made then it looks at your GL settings to determine how it posts. Go to Tools Setup Posting Posting. Review the settings for both I...

A fairly popular New Year's eve tradition is to define a list of resolutions for the incoming year. These resolutions become goals that you try very hard to achieve throughout the year in course. Comes year-end, you evaluate what happened, you praise the hits, and complain about the missed resolutions. You slip some of those unachieved goals into next year's resolutions, and the cycle starts all over again. The one issue I see with New Year's resolutions is, a lot of us tend to just set way too many! The consequence? Lots of frustrations at the end of the year. So, with this in mind I have adopted a new strategy: have one single New Year's resolution that will drive a number of other initiatives. So here is my one single New Year's resolution: increase readership to this site and all other outlets where you can find The Dynamics GP Blogster . So here is where you come in! In order to accomplish this one goal and all initiatives that derive from it I need your help: ...