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Make Common Queries Available For Everyone By Saving Them To Office365

February 11, 2014
Business Intelligence, Dynamics AX, Excel, Office 365, PowerQuery
1 Comment

Queries are like mining for gold, because everyone is searching for the motherload of data that is hidden within Dynamics AX, and once they find it, they mine it until it dries out and they have to start prospecting again.  Also, the secret maps to that data are hidden away, usually on someone’s own personal hard drive, and are rarely shared with other prospectors.  Office 365 and Power Query changes that because it allows you to share any of your queries with everyone within the organization, allowing everyone including the non-technical users that would never create a query.

No more claim jumping, there is enough data out there for everyone to mine.

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Publish Queries As OData Document Sources For Users To Query In Excel

February 10, 2014
Dynamics AX, Excel, PowerQuery
4 Comments

If you want to publish out data to the users so that they can create their own reports, or run their own analysis, there is in a simple and secure way built into Dynamics AX.  You can register your queries as Document Data Sources and then they automatically become available through the OData service within Dynamics AX.  Additionally, all of the default security that you put in place around the data will be respected by the service because you are using Dynamics AX to create the query.

No more ODBC connections, or even worse… unsecured Access databases.

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Create Projects In Dynamics AX Directly From Microsoft Project

February 4, 2014
Dynamics AX, Project, Project Management
12 Comments

Every one knows that you can now edit your Dynamics AX projects directly in Microsoft Project, but the integration gets even cooler then that.  If you have an existing project plan that you want to turn into a new project, then you can create it directly from Microsoft Project itself.

This is a super easy way to migrate all of your old projects over to Dynamics AX.

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Use Word Templates to Generate Standard Customer Correspondence

January 13, 2014
Dynamics AX, Word
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Tip Of The Day - Use Word Templates to Generate CorrespondenceYou probably have already used the Dynamics AX add-in within Excel to access data, but don’t forget that you can also do something similar within Word as well in order to create templates that will merge in data directly from Dynamics AX with the push of a button.  But it doesn’t stop there, you can then save the Word templates back to a template library and Dynamics AX will make it available to everyone through the client itself.

This is a great way to create lightweight reports or commonly used templates for correspondence that you have instant access to.

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Use Lync to Track People Down Directly From Dynamics AX

December 5, 2013
Dynamics AX, Lync
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Use Lync to Track People Down Directly From Dynamics AX

Use Lync to Track People Down Directly From Dynamics AX

Lync is a great way to communicate with all of the people that you work with since you can easily see if people are available, and then instantly start an instant message, voice call, or a video conferencing session.  It is also fully integrated with Dynamics AX, allowing you to start Lync communications without even having to search for the person within Lync.

This is a great tool for the users because they can instantly connect with other people in the company, especially when you are researching a problem, or want to ask questions about something that was entered into Dynamics AX by someone else.  All you have to do is click and call.

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Create Reports Directly Off the Dynamics AX Cubes Through Excel

December 3, 2013
Business Intelligence, Dynamics AX, Excel, Office
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Create Reports directly off the Dynamics AX Cubes through Excel

Create Reports directly off the Dynamics AX Cubes through Excel

Excel is probably the number one reporting tool because it is on everyone’s computer, and also because it is so easy to manipulate the data and create your own analysis, charts and tables.  In the past though, the more technical users have had a slight advantage over the general users because they knew the secret table combinations that allowed them to piece data together directly from the database, giving them better insight and reports, whilst the less technical users had to resort to cutting and pasting data, or transcribing pieces of information from other reports into Excel which made their reports tedious to build and also prone to errors.

Those days are over though because Dynamics AX comes pre-delivered with a set of reporting cubes that have already simplified and summarized the data from you and you can connect to it directly from Excel.  This makes reporting so much easier for everyone, and also makes sure that everyone has the same results when they create their reports.

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Exporting Data to Your Client Version of Excel When Using Remote Desktop

November 27, 2013
Dynamics AX, Excel, Office
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Exporting Data to your client version of Excel when using Remote Desktop

Exporting Data to your client version of Excel when using Remote Desktop

Just because you are using a remote desktop to access Dynamics AX, doesn’t mean that you have to do everything there.  One example of this is that you can choose to export data to your local version of Excel rather than to the version of Office that may be running on your remote desktop.  All you need is to change one of the options within the Dynamics AX client.

This allows you to work with the exported data after you are disconnected from the remote desktop, it allows you to use any additional extensions that you may have installed on your local machine within Excel, and most importantly saves you the hassle of having to cut and paste the worksheet from the remote desktop over to your local machine.

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Export to Excel when there is no Ribbon Bar

November 21, 2013
Dynamics AX, Excel, Office
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Export to Excel when there is no Ribbon Bar

Export to Excel when there is no Ribbon Bar

Not all of the forms within Dynamics AX have the ribbon bar enabled with the Export to Excel icon handy for you to use when you want to gram a copy of the data, but that doesn’t mean that there is no way to quickly get your data moved over to a linked worksheet.

All you need to do is select the Export to Microsoft Excel menu item from the Files menu, or for those of you that love shortcut keys, just press CTRL+T and Dynamics AX will create an Excel Workbook with all of the data from the form populated in it.

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Add Additional Dynamics AX Fields to Worksheets After Exporting to Excel

November 14, 2013
Dynamics AX, Excel
4 Comments
Add additional Dynamics AX fields to worksheets after exporting to Excel

Add additional Dynamics AX fields to worksheets after exporting to Excel

Exporting to Excel from Dynamics AX is probably one of the most used features for all of the do-it-yourselfers out there because once the data is in Excel you can create your own reports, dashboards, and analysis in a tool that we are all very familiar with.

But just because Dynamics AX exports the fields that are showing on the form does not mean that you have to settle for that data.  Using the Dynamics AX Add-In for Excel, you can see all of the fields that are available within the table or query from Excel and add in new columns on the fly, making your Excel queries even more useful.

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Synchronize Dynamics AX with Microsoft Outlook

November 13, 2013
Dynamics AX, Office, Outlook
8 Comments
Synchronize Dynamics AX with Microsoft Outlook

Synchronize Dynamics AX with Microsoft Outlook

Although we would like to be sitting in front of Dynamics AX all the time, it’s usually just not the case because we’re travelling, or just away from our desks.  All that time, people may be setting up meetings for you, assigning critical tasks, or updating contact information that maybe you will need.

You don’t have to miss a beat though because you can set up your Dynamics AX client so that it synchronizes with Microsoft Outlook, and then all of the tasks, appointments, and contacts that you use will travel with you on your laptop, tablet, and even your phone.

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