Implementing Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Finance and Operations Apps

Learn best practices, architecture, tools, techniques, and more, 2nd Edition

JJ Yadav, Sandeep Shukla, Rahul Mohta, Yogesh Kasat

• Publisher: Packt Publishing
• Year: 2020
• Edition: 2
• eBook ISBN:
  9781789954142
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Project Management
• Index: Business

Harness the power of Finance and Operations apps, and discover all you need for their implementation

Key Features

• Manage and plan different Dynamics configurations, designs, and products
• Learn how to manage projects for pre-sales and implementation using Microsoft Dynamics Lifecycle Services (LCS)
• Discover various integration planning techniques, tools, and frameworks such as PowerApps and Power Automate

Book Description

Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Finance and Operations is a modern cloud ERP platform that adopts a mobile-first approach suitable for medium-to-large enterprises. This book covers the entire implementation process of Dynamics 365 Finance and Operation Apps, including post-implementation and business transformation.

The updated second edition starts with an introduction to Microsoft Dynamics 365, describing different apps and tools under it. You will learn about different implementation methodologies such as Waterfall and Agile, for your projects. We will cover various application components and architectures of Dynamics such as requirements processing, development, reports and analytics, and integration. With the help of tips, techniques, and best practices, you'll explore strategies for managing configurations and data migrations. As you read further, you'll discover development tools and processes in Dynamics for building customized solutions in Dynamics. The book will also demonstrate analytics and financial reporting options such as Power BI and Cortana Intelligence. Finally, you'll learn the importance of testing and explore various automated testing strategies.

By the end of this book, you will have gained the necessary knowledge to implement Microsoft business solutions with Dynamics 365 for Finance and Operations Apps.

What you will learn

• Understand the architecture of Dynamics 365 for Finance and Operations Apps
• Implement Dynamics with confidence to manage finances in your business
• Get up to speed with different methodologies and support cycles of the Microsoft Dynamics architecture
• Explore best practices to analyze the requirements of your business
• Understand the technique of data migration from legacy systems
• Leverage the capabilities of Power BI to make informed business decisions
• Manage all your upgrades through One Version service updates

Who this book is for

This book is for consultants, technical managers, project managers, or solution architects who are looking to implement Microsoft Dynamics 365 Finance and Operations apps in their business. A basic understanding of the enterprise resource planning (ERP) implementation process and software lifecycle is expected.

Integration Technologies, Planning, and Design

To get the most benefit out of an ERP system, it needs to be integrated with other enterprise systems in the organization. Integration with other systems enables accuracy and timely updates when it comes to business data, which is very important for business success and growth. The differences between the architecture and age of integrated systems often make integration difficult and challenging. It is vital to ensure that the technical analysts and developers in your project are familiar with integration technologies in Dynamics 365 Finance and Operations, so that they can develop the best integration solution possible for any given integration needs.

This chapter is about understanding the integration architecture and the concepts and technologies available in Dynamics 365 for Finance and Operations.

The following topics will be covered in this chapter:

• Basic web integration concepts
• Learning about the integration architecture
• Integration concepts in Finance and Operations
• Integration scenarios and planning
• Integration design and development
• Best practices and recommendations

Basic web integration concepts

To understand the integration concepts in Dynamics 365 for Finance and Operations, it is important to know about the basic web integration concepts. In this section, we will learn about basic web concepts such as RESTful APIs, SOAP, OData, JSON, OAuth, and the event-driven architecture pattern.

RESTful APIs

REpresentational State Transfer (REST) is an architecture style that relies on six guiding constraints: stateless, client-server, cacheable, layered system, code on demand (optional), and uniform interface. Web service APIs that adhere to the REST architecture are called RESTful APIs.

Many modern internet applications, such as Microsoft Azure, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google, PayPal, and Amazon, use the RESTful architecture style in their APIs, which allows easy integration over the HTTP communication protocol. The primary reason RESTful APIs are useful in cloud and web applications is that the calls are stateless. This means each request or interaction is independent. Nothing has to be saved that has to be remembered by the next request, and any request can be directed to any instance of a component.

A RESTful API explicitly takes advantage of HTTP methodologies. They use GET to retrieve a resource, PUT to update a resource, POST to create that resource, and DELETE to remove it. A resource can be an object, file, or a table row in a database. HTTP-based RESTful APIs are defined by the following key aspects:

• Base URL: Such as http://YourWebApplicationAPIURL/
• Media type: Such as application/JSON and application/XML
• Standard HTTP methods: Such as GET, PUT, POST, and DELETE

SOAP APIs

The Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP) is a specification for exchanging structured information for web service implementation. SOAP uses XML as a message format and relies on application layer protocols, such as HTTP, TCP, and SMTP, for message transmission and negotiation. SOAP defines a message format based on the envelope, header, and body. All request and response messages must be serialized in this message format.

The following diagram shows the structure of a SOAP message:

A SOAP message always starts with an envelope that contains the mandatory SOAP header block and SOAP body block. The SOAP header contains the application-related information, such as message ID and soap action. The SOAP body block contains the actual message intended for the recipient.

SOAP versus REST

There is always a discussion among integration experts with regards to which one is better: SOAP or REST. How do they compare? The following list highlights some of the comparisons between SOAP and REST:

• SOAP is a protocol, while REST is an architectural style.
• SOAP defines standards to be strictly followed, while REST doesn't define too many standards.
• SOAP requires more bandwidth and resources than REST.
• SOAP defines its own security; RESTful web services inherit security measures from the underlying transport layer.
• SOAP permits the XML data format only; REST permits different data formats, such as plain text, HTML, XML, and JSON.

In summary, REST is lighter and simpler for integration, especially with cloud web applications.

JSON message format

JavaScript Object Notation (JSON) is a lightweight data-interchange format. JSON is self-describing and easy for humans to read and write. It is the most commonly used data format on the web and for RESTful web services.

The following is a simple example of the JSON format describing customer group data containing two customer groups with customer group IDs of 10 and 20, with the additional Description and PaymentTermId fields:

{
 "CustomerGroupId":"10",
 "Description":"Wholesales customers",
 "PaymentTermId":"Net30"
},
{
 "CustomerGroupId":"20",
 "Description":"Retail customers",
 "PaymentTermId":"Receipt"
}

Another little complex example of the JSON data format describing personal details is shown here. The following example represents personal details, including address, phone number, and children and spouse details:

{
 "firstName": "John",
 "lastName": "Smith",
 "isAlive": true,
 "age": 25,
 "address": {
 "streetAddress": "21 2nd Street",
 "city": "New York",
 "state": "NY",
 "postalCode": "10021-3100"
 },
 "phoneNumbers": [
 {
 "type": "home",
 "number": "212 555-1234"
 },
 {
 "type": "office",
 "number": "646 555-4567"
 },
 {
 "type": "mobile",
 "number": "123 456-7890"
 }
 ],
 "children": [],
 "spouse": null
}

As we mentioned earlier, this is easily readable by humans, and at the same time, lighter and easy to parse by a computer program. These characteristics make JSON the preferred data type for web and cloud applications.

OData protocol

OData stands for Open Data Pro...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Copyright and Credits
• Dedication
• About Packt
• Contributors
• Preface
• Introduction to Dynamics 365 Finance and Operations
• Methodology and Initiation
• Lifecycle Services (LCS) and Tools
• Architecture, Deployment, and Environments
• Requirements and Process Analysis
• Configuration and Data Management
• Solution Planning and Design
• Integration Technologies, Planning, and Design
• Customization and Extension
• Analytics, Business Intelligence, and Reporting
• Testing and Training
• Managing Go-Live and Post Go-Live
• One Version Service Updates
• Other Books You May Enjoy