Intelligent docking stations: The future of hybrid devices?

Early this week I watched Ubuntu’s teaser on what they have prepared for hybrid phone/tablets/desktops and I said to myself (and I am sure that many others did as well) “this is exactly what I have been looking for, but so far no one managed to deliver”. Read more >>

Dynamics CRM 2011: Diving into the sales pipeline – Polaris Addendum

With the release of Dynamics CRM 2011 Update Rollup 12 (UR12, also known as Polaris), Microsoft introduced a lot of new features such as cross-browser support and new forms based on the modern interface (formally known as Metro).

One particular new feature has been driving a lot of traffic to this site, and people emailing me asking for advice: the sales pipeline editor. This new feature allow system customisers to specify the stages within the sales process the steps within through the use of an online editor. Unfortunately, this editor lacks the flexibility and features required to customise a sales process like I have I have discussed in my Diving into the sales pipeline series for Dynamics CRM 2011. The purpose of this post is to serve as an addendum for the series when considering the Polaris update.

Microsoft Account and the EU Data Protection Directive: The long and winding road

— With contributions by Geoff Coupe

Microsoft has recently announced that they will now accept migrating XBOX Live accounts from one country to another. While the XBOX community rejoice in celebration, I look back and reflect on my assiduous journey to have my account migrated, and wonder if my case along with the case of a fellow friend and others who joined our cause, has contributed to this outcome. Read more >>

Dynamics CRM: Workflows revisited

In the third post of my Diving into the sales pipeline series, we covered the creation of workflows to handle the different stages (i.e.: pipeline phases) of the sales process. If you followed the series from the beginning, you would recall that in that example, we did not want users to be able to jump back and forth through the pipeline phases. For example, a user with an opportunity located in the first pipeline phase shouldn’t be able to jump forward without first passing through the second stage, or be able to move backwards in the sales process.

There are a number of reasons why I stuck with this requirement. First, the whole article series is based on the real requirements of one of my past clients, and the client strictly required users not to be able to move back or jump steps forward. Second, this requirement introduced a nice JScript (the bonus JScript in the second post of the series) which handles the hiding of options within an option set based on conditionals. There is a third reason, however. I must say that I was quite comfortable with such “inflexible” requirement: It made my job easier, and thus easier to document it in order to share it as part of the sales pipeline trilogy of articles.

There is a degree of mea culpa here. In the third post of the series, which covers workflow design, I asserted that the online workflow designer for Dynamics CRM doesn’t handle jumping back and forth through workflow stages, like the GOTO statement found in many programming languages. Although this statement is correct if we considering an orthodox view of what “GOTO” means from the mindset of a developer, it doesn’t mean that we couldn’t achieve similar results using the online workflow designer for Dynamics CRM. In this post I will be explaining how we can achieve such results using the online workflow designer. Read more >>

Dynamics CRM: Disabling the selection of contacts for opportunities all the way

I recently got a requirement for a Dynamics CRM implementation that all recorded sales should follow the B2B (business to business) and therefore, opportunities should only able to be related to accounts, and not contacts as well.

This is a common scenario which can be easily covered with some simple JScript in the opportunity form. However I found out that in some circumstances, an opportunity could still be created for a contact, thus violating the requirement and even worse, breaking some of the implemented processes and business logic. Here is how I fixed this issue.

Dynamics CRM: The importance of the Address entity

Earlier this year I wrote an article about considerations when customising address fields. I was happy with the reception the article got, as it sparked some interesting discussions not only with some of my clients, but also with fellow Dynamics CRM consultants.

Today I would like to expand further on that discussion and talk about an often neglected entity in Dynamics CRM: The Address entity and its importance in every single Dynamics CRM deployment out there (yes, including yours).

Dynamics CRM: Set Title Case for a text field using JScript; but only once

Today I had to work on a interesting JScript for Dynamics CRM. When creating a new Contact record, the text values within the fields for First Name, Middle Name and Last Name should have a Title Case enforced to them. For example, if a user types “JOhN” in the First Name field, the case should be automatically corrected to “John”.

To make things more interesting, here is the second part of the requirement: After a case correction has been performed in a field, it shouldn’t be performed again. So if the user now proceeds to type “JOHN” in the First Name field after the first case correction, the system should leave the case as it is.

Now, I am not saying that I agree with this requirement, but it is a requirement nonetheless. I make no secret that I am far from having the JScript knowledge I aspire for, so this was a good exercise for me and I hope the community can benefit from it.

The entertainment industry’s war on consumers

The consumer preview of Windows 8 is around the corner, and I’ve been reflecting about it’s Windows Store, the consumerisation of IT and how it affects us as consumers. I’m afraid I see dark times ahead of us.

Sure that downloading content from the comfort of your home is a convenient concept. But corporations are luring consumers to become cattle in a battery farm, where they milk consumers for their money to pay for services, but consumers hold no right to any goods. As consumers we don’t own anything but the limited right to consume content provided by these companies. So when we buy a song or a book, we don’t own a copy of the song or the book, but the limited right to play the song and read the book. If the corporation wishes to do so, they can pull out our right to such content. Read more >>

Warning EU Citizens: Avoid getting a Windows Phone (or Xbox Live for that matter)

One of the fundamental basis of the European Union is the principle of four freedoms: freedom of movement of people, goods capitals and services. As Europeans, we can freely move around member states and live in as legal residents.

However, if you’re planning to get a Windows Phone, prepare to have your rights as an EU citizen challenged by Microsoft. Read more >>

Dynamics CRM: JScript vs workflow – Caveats

JScripts in Dynamics CRM are a powerful feature to enhance the user interface in Dynamics CRM. We can use JScripts to perform calculations and validate fields in forms in order to introduce a better user experience. However, JScripts are a client-side based, and only work with the desktop-based (main) forms. In other words, if the user is accessing Dynamics CRM through a mobile device displaying the mobile forms, or using a 3rd party client for a tablet device, the JScripts will not be loaded at all. Workflows on the other hand are server-based, and they will execute no matter which device and client is used to access Dynamics CRM.

This often raises the question of JScript versus workflows when customising Dynamics CRM, particularly when designing a sales pipeline workflow. In this posts I explain how to combine the usage of both JScript and workflows in order to get the best of both worlds, and the most out of Dynamics CRM.