Code samples published to GitHub

An official JO-RO Consulting LLC GitHub Organization page has been set up and I will be moving all of my code samples there as open source contributions.

https://github.com/JOROCONSULTING

The parseXpos code sample has already been published and I will be publishing more in the future including the code to add a color bar per company that I haven't shared yet.

SSRS Reports now support the compare tool in Dynamics AX 2012 R2 CU7

As others have already reported CU7 (KB2885603) for Dynamics AX 2012 R2 has been released. I wanted to point out one new feature I haven't seen announced elsewhere. You can now use the compare tool in AX to view changes to SSRS reports between layers. See the screenshots below for an example of the change.

Microsoft Dynamics Lifecycle Services

Microsoft recently launched a new Lifecycle Services site to help partners and customers manage and optimize their Dynamics AX implementations.
https://lifecycleservices.dynamics.com/

From the TechNet description:
Microsoft Dynamics Lifecycle Services provides a cloud-based collaborative workspace that customers and their partners can use to manage Microsoft Dynamics AX projects from pre-sales to implementation and operations. Based on the phase of your project and the industry vertical, the site provides checklists and tools that you can use to help you manage the project. It also provides a dashboard so that you have a single place to get up-to-date project information.
Lifecycle Services is available to customers and partners as part of their support plans. You can access it with your CustomerSource or PartnerSource credentials. Go to the site.

Certifications

After working in the industry for over a decade I finally took a Microsoft certification. A few weeks ago I took and passed the Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 Development test. I've been reading through some of the E-Learning material and highly recommend anyone working with AX go over this training.

 

Dynamics AX Inventory cube now present in AX 2012 R2

It was recently brought to my attention that Microsoft Dynamics AX finally ships with an inventory value cube out of the box in version 2012 R2. You can find details on the measures available in the cube here, which even includes some KPI's for inventory turns and other indicators. I'm looking forward to cracking this open and comparing it to the home grown inventory cube I built on AX 2009. The primary issue is that you can't simply look at inventtrans records because those statuses are updated over time as postings occur.

Other cubes added in AX 2012 R2 include Budget control, Budget plan (my team worked on this), Profit tax, and Retail. 

AX 2012 Cubes	AX 2012 R2 Cubes
Accounts payable cube (VendCube) for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 and Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 Feature Pack	Accounts payable cube (VendCube) for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 R2
Accounts receivable cube (CustCube) for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 and Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 Feature Pack	Accounts receivable cube (CustCube) for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 R2
	Budget control cube (BudgetControlCube) for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 R2
	Budget plan cube (BudgetPlanCube) for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 R2
Environmental sustainability cube (EMSCube) for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 and Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 Feature Pack	Environmental sustainability cube (EMSCube) for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 R2
Expense management cube (TrvCube) for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 and Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 Feature Pack	Expense management cube (TrvCube) for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 R2
General ledger cube (LedgerCube) for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 and Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 Feature Pack	General ledger cube (LedgerCube) for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 R2
	Invent value cube (InventValueCube) for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 R2
Production cube (ProdCube) for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 and Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 Feature Pack	Production cube (ProdCube) for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 R2
	Profit tax totals cube (RTax25OLAP) for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 R2
Project accounting cube (ProjCube) for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 and Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 Feature Pack	Project accounting cube (ProjCube) for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 R2
Purchase cube (PurchCube) for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 and Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 Feature Pack	Purchase cube (PurchCube) for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 R2
	Retail cube (RetailCube) for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 R2
Customer relationship management cube (smmCube) for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 and Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 Feature Pack	Sales and marketing cube (smmSalesMarketingCube) for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 R2
Sales cube (SalesCube) for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 and Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 Feature Pack	Sales cube (SalesCube) for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 R2
Workflow cube (WorkflowCube) for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 and Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 Feature Pack	Workflow cube (WorkflowCube) for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 R2

Using Record Info and the importance of field groups on a form

I've often wondered about the Best Practice check in AX that requires all fields to be in a field group and why that is there. I assumed it was some sort of encouragement to use field groups on forms and reports, but today it occurred to me that there is another very valuable tool that uses this information (there are probably many others as well).

If you have the appropriate permissions in Dynamics AX you can right click on any field on a form, select record info, and then select "Show all fields" to open a new form which displays all of the fields in the table and their values regardless of if the field is on the form or not. This is useful for some power users if they are interested in knowing when a record was created or when it was last modified for instance.



Show all Fields

 

I shared this functionality with a user this week, but it wasn't until today that I realized how this form organizes fields into groups based on field groups to help the user find them. So in the future take some time and consideration when creating field groups or adding fields to groups so that users can find these more easily on the Record info screen.

Slow Inventory Reports

A user over on the AXUG Community recently posted a question about poor performance on the standard AX Inventory reports, specifically Physical Inventory by Dimension. It turns out the fix ended up being to clear the records in two tables in the database that are used only for building this report. Normally the records are created, the report run, and then the records are deleted. However if the process is cancelled the records can be left behind. Multiple users reported the same issue.

If you are having this issue or even minor performance issues with these reports, look into deleting all of the records in the InventSumDateTable and InventSumDateTrans tables via SQL.

If you haven't joined the AXUG Community forum yet go check it out. It's a great free resource for users.