NTBuddy

Windows Server 2008

As an MSDN subscriber I'm fortunate enough to use the newest version of the Windows Server. The Windows Server 2008 is truly a great operating system and is really what Vista should've been from the start. I'm able to have the visual effects of Vista, the reliability of Windows Server and the transfer rates on my USB 7200rpm drives is more than double what it was running Windows Server 2003.

Did I mention that my Windows Server is running on a laptop? I have to use server as my operating system as I develop for SharePoint (WSS and MOSS) and needs to be a server within my development environment. Couple this with the

 
As another nice bonus the Microsoft Zune I've had can now actually work on my machine in it's x64 configuration as well. Since Monday when I received the installation I feel much more productive and will post the tweaks I've done to turn the server into a functional workstation for SharePoint development. 

Advanced Find: Find Notes with Attachments

One problem I had recently was to find all the documents that existed in the CRM system that were on the notes. The solution to the problem was to use an Advanced Find to solve the problem. To achieve the results I've used Dynamics CRM 4 but this will work with Dynamics CRM 3 as well. The reason I had to do this was that CRM isn't really the best for storing a large amount of documents. For that Microsoft SharePoint Services (WSS) or Microsoft Office SharePoint Server (MOSS) is better suited to do.

1. Start your web browser and navigate to your CRM website 
2. Click on the Advanced Find button
3. On "Look for" change the entity to Notes
4. Choose "File Name" from the criteria and set the search value to "Contains Data"
   
5. Next (this is a Dynamics CRM 4 feature) I clicked on Edit Columns and added "Account Name (regarding)" so that I can see the account the record is tied to. Now for this query I was only wanting the account name but didn't want to filter on just the account name so that if the item was in an Opportunity I could also see the account the document belonged to.
6. Next I clicked the Find button to see my information and was happy to see the documents that are in the system with the account name listed.
   
   

Dynamics CRM 4 Tasks

 One item of great interest is that of Tasks. Before phone call type activities set for future dates wouldn't appear in Outlook. This was due to Outlook not having a task that was specific to a phone call.

 Here I'm within the web client and choose to Insert a phone call activity.

Next I setup the phone call with a  future date and the basic information that I needed.

The last item was to load the Outlook client and wait for synchronization to complete and opened the task from the Outlook 2007 task pane.

As you can see you have the same information as what you have in the web browser client and at the top of the screen  that the call is from "[CRM] Phone call regarding: ". This is a huge benefit as you know will be able to use the Outlook client for a lot more functionality.

Dynamics CRM 4 Form Assistant

I've had five clients that have Dynamics CRM 3 installed and have wanted to not only turn-off the Form Assistant but they want to control it on a form by form basis. There were ways unsupported or via JScript that could handle this for 2003 but wasn't really part of the core product.  Well, with Dynamics CRM 4 all of this has changed. To change for any entity, including custom entities do the following (note: you must have System Customizer rights or higher to do this):

1. Start your web browser and navigate to the CRM server and log onto the system with a user with sufficient rights
2. Settings
3. Customization
4. Customize Entities
5. Double-click on the form you wish to turn on/off the Form Assistant
1. The Form Assistant is enabled by default
   
2. The Form Assistant is not expanded by default
   
6. Click on "Forms and Views"
7. Double-click on Form
8. Double-click on "Form Properties"
9. Turn on/off the features you want
   
   
10. OK
11. Save and Close
12. Click on Actions on the Actions menu
13. Choose Publish to publish the changes to the system
14. Save and Close
    

Dynamics CRM 4 Outlook Repair

One of, if not the biggest complaint of the Outlook client for Dynamics CRM is that the Outlook client has "issues".  The great thing about Dynamics CRM 4 is it allows you to repair without the help of your IT department and can be done with a standard user account. To achieve this you would do the following steps:

1. Start
2. Programs 
3. Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0
4. Choose "Diagnostics" from the menu
   
5. Click "Run Diagnostics"
   
   
6. At the conclusion of the diagnostics you will be informed of any problems that may have been found.
   
   
7. If you have any errors you can click "Fix All" to repair the errors.
   
8. Click Close to close the diagnostics Window.

You'll notice that there were two items that couldn't be repaired.

1. The first that I need 1 gig of memory on my system. In this case it's a virtual PC and I only allocated 768Meg of space but if this was my desktop or laptop I would purchase more memory to get a minimum of one gift of memory and preferably 2Gig of memory. 
2. The second being that I have synching of a LOT of information between my Outlook client and the CRM system. By reducing the items I'm synching to the items that I need to sync the diagnostics are informing me that I would be improving the overall functionality and speed of my Outlook client which would be a good thing to do to eliminate the sluggish performance I was experiencing.
   

SharePoint Documents opening with the same window

One common item that comes up on new SharePoint installations is that the documents for many applications open in the  browser window instead of opening within the application itself. This works but you don't always have the full functionality of the application you're trying to run. To get SharePoint to open in a new window when a document is clicked we have two types of applications to think about. The first being the type that integrates in with Windows and the other that handles the settings within the application itself. As an application of each Microsoft Office (Excel, Word, and PowerPoint) utilize Windows for the connection method and Adobe Acrobat Reader uses configuration settings within it's application.I will outline the process for both application types and will use Adobe Acrobat Reader as the same for the application settings that will typically be found in most organizations. The applications that handle this themselves will each have a browser add-in installed as well to catch the file type prior to Microsoft Windows from opening the file type.

Windows

1. Load Microsoft Windows Explorer (start | run | explorer.exe | click on OK)
2. Click on the Tools menu
3. Click on Folder Options...
4. Select the File Types tab
5. Highlight the file extension you want to edit (for Microsoft Word it would be .doc and .docx)
6. Click on Advanced
7. You will want to Browse in same window to be unchecked.
   
1. Note: Some also like to uncheck Confirm open after download as this eliminates a screen prompt for end users.
2. 
   
8. OK
9. Repeat steps 4 through 8 as necessary for each file type you wish to have open within a new window.
   
10. OK
11. Close Windows Explorer

Application

1. Start
2. Programs (All Programs)
3. Click on the Adobe Acrobat Reader link
4. Click on the Edit menu
5. Click on the Preferences... menu choice
6. Scroll down to where it says Internet
7. Uncheck Display PDF in browser
1. 
   
8. OK
9. Exit Adobe Acrobat Reader
10. Finally close all your open Microsoft Internet Explorer windows ass the change won't take affect until Microsoft Internet Explorer is restarted.
    

Column Views

 One key addition with Microsoft Dynamics CRM  4 (aka Titan) is the ability to do views. Unlike previous versions though you can display related entities as well in the view. This allows you to show one entity like Opportunities and in the view show a phone number of the associated Account/Contact.

How to Export CRM Customizations

The reason that one exports the customizations is so that you can revert back from any accidents that might happen or that you want to revert back to a previous version. Reverting back should be done first in a test environment to make certain that the backup is correct.

Additionally, for the advanced users out there it can sometimes be more efficient to make changes by using the backup  then using the actual interface but is not recommended except for those that are extremely confident in the Dynamics CRM XML structure as a wrong change  can cause serious problems with your system.

1. Start Microsoft Internet Explorer
2. Log into Microsoft Dynamics CRM as a user that has a minimum of System Customizer rights
3. Settings
4. Customization 
5. Click on "Export Customizations"
6. Click on "Export All Customizations"
7. Click on Save
8. For the file name it defaults to customizations.xml which isn't good for archiving multiple days unless you're saving into a system that will automatically version  control the document (e.g. something like SharePoint (WSS/MOSS)).
   
1. I typically have two naming conventions
1. For the FIRST export
1. 20071128-customizations-v00.xml
   
2. For every other export
1. 20071128-customizations-v01.xml
2. The naming convention is this that is above is this
1. 2007 is the year (4-digit year)
2. 11 is the month (if this would be a single digit [e.g. 7] I enter 07
3. 28 is the day (if this would be a single digit day [e.g. 7] I enter 07
4. Then I use a dash and keep the word customizations and end with a dash
5. The last is the version number
6. v00 is always the FIRST (clean) export from the system that has no customizations in it
7. v01 is the first export of the day, v02 would be the second export of the day, and each day I always start with v01 and always end the day
3. As with anything there are exceptions to the rule. The one exception is if you're fortunate enough to have multiple CRM servers available to you that when you export you should export with either the  machine/client name after the date (e.g. 20071128-ServerName-customizations-v01.xml).

How to change the Lead "Status Reason"

 A common request by clients is how to add reasons for why leads were qualified, disqualified and lost. Below are the steps to complete this.

1. Start Microsoft Internet Explorer
2. Load your Microsoft Dynamics CRM website and log in with a minimum of "System Customizer"  credentials
3. Click on Settings
4. click on Customization
5. Click on Customize Entities (Note: It's recommended to export your settings BEFORE doing this)
   
6. Double-click on Lead
7. Click on Attributes
8. Scroll down and double-click on "Status Reason"
   
9. Change the "State" to the desired choice (Open, Qualified, or Disqualified). Do not delete from the list. If you don't want say "Lost" any more to show don't delete it as it may already have been used and the number that is assigned can't ever be re-used. Rather you can rename existing ones.

Update CRM Licensing

On some installations of Dynamics CRM you will see on the Start | Microsoft CRM that the Licensing information is missing. Even though this is missing you can still access it by doing the following:

1. Start
2. Run
3. Type in "C:\Program Files\Microsoft CRM\Tools\DMSNAPIN.msc" (with the quotes)
4. Press OK
   

This will load the same MMC you would get through the Start menu option above. I've found this to happen if you start out with the trial version of Small Business Server.