Power Platform & Dynamics CE

Key Columns in Dataverse (Entities Reimagined) play a vital role in ensuring data integrity, uniqueness, and efficient record management within the Microsoft Power Platform. In Dataverse, every table (previously known as an entity) includes a Primary Key that uniquely identifies each record, typically represented by a GUID, and a Primary Name Column, which provides a human-readable name for display in views and lookups. Developers can also define Alternate Keys, which allow external systems to identify and update records using natural business data—such as an email address, employee ID, or product code—rather than system-generated IDs. This feature is especially useful for integrations, upsert operations, and data migrations, as it simplifies record matching and reduces duplication. By leveraging these key columns effectively, Dataverse ensures consistency across related data, enhances performance, and provides developers with a flexible foundation for building scalable and reliable bu...

Data is essential to the business world, but data communication is equally important, as accurate data conveys important information about the business process and those data can be useful and effective, even giving it an advantage in business competitiveness. That's why business believes in data communication with accuracy. The communication between a computer and a software application is called Messaging . Messaging is a method of communication between software components or applications. Although there are many types of communication support by Microsoft Dataverse, event driven is important. In the previous article ( Webhook: A Unidirectional Business Event ), I talked about webhook, which communicate on an event basis. In the article, I am going to describe about Azure Service Bus. Microsoft Azure Service Bus is a cloud based Messaging as a Service  (MaaS) platform. When I started learning about Azure Service Bus, the first question that came to my mind. What is the use of thi...

API considers an excellent and efficient way to create communication between homogeneous, heterogeneous or legacy systems. It runs over HTTP, so it performs fast and smoothly, but in communication services , a new mechanism is introduced known as Webhooks. Generally Webhooks notify receivers about events by making requests to receiver endpoints. WebHook is a lightweight HTTP pattern for connecting Web APIs and services with a Publish/Subscribe model. Generally, WebHooks are called reverse API, but that doesn't mean it works in reverse mode. This means that the sender does not need to have the request initiated at the sending end. WebHooks are a way for one app to have real-time information for other apps. Comparison between API and WebHooks: Webhooks is a lightweight HTTP pattern for connecting Web APIs and services with a publish/subscribe model.  WebHook is a lightweight HTTP pattern for connecting Web APIs and services with a publish/subscribe model. It involves only one way com...

Database generally refers to organized and structural databases that improve data storage and access performance, but E. F. Cod was given a new concept called relational database in 1970s. In the continuous journey of databases, object oriented, NoSQL, graphs and other new database concepts are added. Nowadays, Microsoft Dataverse defines a new definition of database that lets users design their own data model without writing single code. Microsoft Dataverse is cloud based managed service which provides  data service and app platform. Microsoft Dataverse is a combination of several Azure services, being exposed through the API layer which makes it easy to request data, but also allows it to be managed through the API layer. It is easy to manage and secure data with rich metadata, logic and validation layer with multiple productivity tools. All components  created in Dataverse are held as Metadata. This means the components are discoverable and the properties for components are...

With 2021 release wave 2, Dataverse Search uses as global search option for all users in the model-driven Apps in the production environment on any device which is previously known as Relevance Search. During the exploration about this feature, I feel that this feature works like Windrose. It sounds differently but Yes, it works like That The Compass who guides the Captain Jack Sparrow. Windrose doesn't point to North, It points to the thing you want most in this world. Dataverse Search is your way to search through your data in the Dataverse environment. It is always challenging to develop a search feature that helps smoothly, consistently and rapidly. Application developers focus on developing a search feature that is generally designated into three distinct categories: 1. transactional, 2. navigational, and 3. informational. In my view, Dataverse Search comes under all three categories. Dataverse Search provides fast and comprehensive search results in a single list sorted by re...

Spending quality time with Custom Process Actions (which is shared in the Demystify of  Demystify of Custom Process Action articl e), it is given an insight about the action and it's a really awesome feature that I usually miss during solution design. Custom Process Actions are the declarative way to design a solution with many different behavior business logic (JavaScript, workflow, and custom code).  It allows creating custom messages that extend the capabilities of defining new domain specific functionality to combine multiple message requests into a single request. I am going to share few facts about Custom Process Action or Custom Action which will be helpful to design a CRM Solution. It allows for creating new message that can be called from web service. Custom Process Action will continue to provide a no code way to declaratively define synchronous business logic. Custom Process Actions have been synchronous real time workflow and therefore not suitable to be converted ...

During a technical conversation with a colleague of mine, he asked about the actual behavior and uses of this functionality, but I was unable to explain the feature and found it to be the most mysterious and least used by me, so I Decided to reveal the custom process action and share it with everyone. After a long and marathon studies, I succeed to get some knowledge about it. Microsoft categorize it as Automation feature and named "Action" which is generally known as Custom Process Action or Custom Action.  This component is kept with workflow and it is defined by a XAML window workflow foundation document which is transported as part of a solution, but it can't edit or update by workflow designer. The Action means a series of commands that can be organized as a business process. Actions behave like workflows, but there are some features that make it different from workflows. Custom Process Action does not have a trigger. This is usually triggered by a workflow, business...

Alternate key is not a new concept, it is available in the database which considers it as an alternative of primary key. Normally, a primary key is only one column in a table, but columns that can be replaced to a primary but not a primary key are called alternate keys. Whereas, primary key does not hold null values ​​and maintain uniqueness, but in alternate keys, it contains null values ​​with uniqueness. Primary key is already implemented in all Microsoft Dataverse records, it maintains uniqueness by unique identifiers defined as GUIDs, but Microsoft also provides a alternate key to integrate with an external data store, we might be able to add a column to the external tables to contain a reference to the unique identifier in Dataverse. With alternate keys, we can define column in Customer Engagement table to correspond to unique identifier  or unique combination of columns used by the external data store. Common Requirements: Link records from external system to Dataverse witho...

We have discussed about Change tracking in the previous article . It has given information about the behavior and its usefulness. As is known, change tracking is used for the purpose of synchronizing the data by identifying the data changes that have occurred since the last data synchronization. It provides the efficient and reliable mechanism to determine what records had changed in Dataverse. Before the read the changes for a table, make sure that the change tracking feature is enabled in that table. Either developers can change from Table UI or programmatically by setting the ChangeTrackingEnabled property to True. Delta links: According to the OData 4.0 documentation, delta links are "opaque, service-generated links that the client uses to retrieve subsequent changes to a result". Microsoft has built this standard into change tracking in Dataverse to provide a common, standard method for interfacing with change data as it occurs over time. After issuing a change tracking ...

Data is fuel in the business world and companies always try to maintain data accuracy and integrity. Data synchronization is the essential process of establishing consistency between data from a source to a target data storage. Such data has a huge impact on sales, decision making and customer retention. Example read leads from csv files and write to CRM or find new accounts in ERP system and insert/update  into CRM. Data synchronization means maintaining consistency between the source and the target. Microsoft Dataverse provides several mechanisms for synchronizing and integrating data. Change tracking is one of them. Such a mechanism is available in SQL Server and other databases. Microsoft Dataverse is a special type of database that provides the capability of business automation and database features. Change Tracking is used for the purpose of keeping data synchronized by identifying the data changes that have taken place since the last data synchronization was performed. By de...

Function App is the beautiful concept of Azure Service App where developers need to focus on the code or business logic and it also provides the ability to develop those code in multiple languages. If we analyze it carefully, we will find that it facilitates the separation of concerns along with the essence of the infrastructure. In Azure Functions, a function app provides execution context for different functions. The most important fact is that it provides logical unit which can work according to events or scheduler. In the Microsoft Dataverse, Plugin is mechanism where developers can wire their custom code. those custom code runs under the event framework to run the specific events. Plugin is a .NET assembly that we can upload to the Microsoft Dataverse and can be registered to specific events within event framework. Function app can't be replace the plugin, but it can assist to offload the burden of custom code. Let us discuss about the features of both mechanisms to leverage a...

Microsoft Dataverse is a tremendous product in the cloud market as it provides a business database with many features of applications that can consume software as a service (SaaS). We have already discussed about many features regarding this product, but it also integrates easily with external systems. Azure Bus Service provides the ability to work as asynchronous with the message broker and also facilitates to develop listener applications that can receive these events and processes as per the business requirements. Microsoft Dataverse events trigger the execution of a remote code component called the listener. These integrations are intended to provide an easy way to use additional extensibility outside the Dataverse platform. An Azure Solution Listener application that can read and process Microsoft Dataverse messages posted to the Azure Service Bus. A message queue is a store of messages on a service bus endpoint and a queue listener is an application that reads and processes these...

Cloud computing is a revolutionary concept in modern technologies and Azure is the dominant player in the cloud markets. Azure provides cloud-computing systems and applications and is hosted in a Microsoft data center. Customers do not need to invest in any infrastructure or IT services for their environment. Azure provides a set of tools and application programming interfaces (APIs) to design applications and support the cloud computing platform offered by Microsoft. Service endpoint is cloud concept which enables private IP addresses in the VNet to reach the endpoint of an azure service without needing a public IP address on the VNet. An endpoint is one end of a communication channel the touch points of the communications. Microsoft provides service endpoint to connect with external systems and application with Dynamics 365 customer engagement. Developers can register plugins with Microsoft Dynamics 365 CE that can pass runtime message data, known as the execution context, to one or ...

A plugin is a special mechanism to enhance the behavior of the Microsoft Dataverse platform. A plugin is a .NET assembly that can upload to the Microsoft Dataverse platform, but developers use a plugin registration tool to upload custom business logic and wire it up with the appropriate events (steps). The concept of plugin allows us to add  a new feature by new DLL. This plugin  works under within the event framework. A plugin is .NET assembly that can be used to intercept the events generated from the CRM system to perform a variety of actions. To register a plugin, we need to follow the below steps: Develop a plugin event handler as a DLL assembly Sign and compile the DLL Assembly. Register the plugin DLL assembly in Microsoft Dataverse using the Plugin Registration Tool. Register the steps of the implemented event handlers for required events using the Plugin Registration Tool. An event, in a computing context, is an action or occurrence that can be identified by a pr...

The great power of Microsoft Dataverse is extensibility which makes it more user and business friendly. Extensible code allows us to add new feature by adding new business logic. Makes the implementation of the REST API in the Dataverse more flexible and extensible. Automation of business logic and integration with other systems are driven by Events. The event framework provides the capability to register custom code to be run in response of specific event : Microsoft To take advantage of the Events Framework in the Microsoft Dataverse, we need to understand about the available events and their processes. Data operations with events adds more efficiencies for developers to use resources to make sense of business operations, but this needs to be understood about time limits and constraints, as some processes are short-lived and impactful enough for applications which could be caused of poor performance for applications. To use of Dataverse Custom API, developers can create the custom ev...