ArcherPoint Dynamics NAV Developer Digest - vol 202
The NAV community, including the ArcherPoint technical staff, is made up of developers, project managers, and consultants who are constantly communicating, with the common goal of sharing helpful information with one another to help customers be more successful.
As they run into issues and questions, find the answers, and make new discoveries, they post them on blogs, forums, social media…so everyone can benefit. We in Marketing watch these interactions and never cease to be amazed by the creativity, dedication, and brainpower we’re so fortunate to have in this community—so we thought, wouldn’t it be great to share this great information with everyone who might not have the time to check out the multitude of resources out there? So, the ArcherPoint Microsoft Dynamics NAV Developer Digest was born. Each week, we present a collection of thoughts and findings from NAV experts and devotees around the world. We hope these insights will benefit you, too.
Converting an ISV Add-On to an Extension for Dynamics NAV
NAV Bits and Bytes is sharing the experience of converting an ISV solution to a Dynamics NAV Extension, walking through each step and sharing trials along the way. Join us on this journey via blogs:
- The Txt2AL Conversion Tool for reference
- Converting an ISV Solution: The Beginning
- Converting an ISV Solution: Update 1
Dynamics NAV Documents in GitHub Repository
Bill Warnke shares, “Saw this looking for documentation on ERROR. Microsoft is doing all of their NAV docs in a Git repo with Markdown files. Any issues in the documentation can be addressed with a GitHub issue. Pretty cool.”
ERROR Function Documentation
Developer and IT-Pro Content for Dynamics 365 Business Central Repository
Windows Command Line Tools for Developers
Michael Heydasch shares, “From Rich Turner of Microsoft, dated 20 June 2018: “This is the first of a series of posts in which we’ll explore all things command-line – from the origins of the command-line and the evolution of the terminal, to what we’re doing to overhaul and modernize the Windows Console & command-line in future Windows releases.” Have *always* loved the command-line and derided the mouse! (Lamenting my lack of commitment to learning Powershell).”
Check out the Windows Command-Line Backgrounder post from Rich.
Microsoft Makes It Official: Do Not Add Inline Comments to Extension Code
Jon Long notes, “Good news. Microsoft is making it official! Inline documentation is useless in extensions.
From the How to Develop an Extension post, ‘Do not add inline comments to your code. Such comments are helpful as internal documentation, but they will cause the extension to fail when you build the extension package.’
As we transition our C/AL customers to AL, we will have a lot of inline comments to strip. I wonder if we should evaluate whether we should continue this practice in our legacy customers (i.e., pre-extensions). Or, will the in-line comments and documentation in the documentation trigger help us isolate our extensions into relatively independent, manageable extensions?”
Matt Traxinger notes, “In other words, your source control solution should be the final arbiter of what changed from version to version of an object. Plus, you can easily generate a delta file to see those differences on one screen most likely instead of plain text searching code and hoping nothing was missed by a manual documentation process.”
Jon then provides an update, “*UPDATE* – This may just apply to Extensions V1, but, it’s hard to say based on lack of where Microsoft states things as fact.”
If you are interested in NAV development, be sure to see our collection of NAV Development Blogs.
Read the “How To” blogs from ArcherPoint for practical advice on using Microsoft Dynamics NAV, and contact ArcherPoint if you need assistance with Dynamics NAV.