It’s exciting times for web developers.  Many of the hoops we used to have to jump through are being eliminated as more browsers support more of the HTML5 spec and more people are using modern browsers.  One of the things that has me excited...

DISCLAIMER: This post is not official guidance from Microsoft.  It’s the thoughts and opinion of one guy who has been spending a fair amount of time talking to customers and partners about what I’ve been calling the “Design for Online” principles...

I’ve created a presentation version of my CRM Online myth busters post.  The goal of the deck is the same as the post, which is to share common misconceptions I run into about CRM Online when speaking with folks.  The presentation is geared...

Example scenarios: “I have a a field in an entity.  After deploying a managed solution to production, we decided we don’t need that field any longer.  I removed it from my development environment.  When I deploy an updated version of managed...

GOAL: Simplify referencing JavaScript libraries from CRM forms for code-centric developer types like me. I have always been a fan of “code beside” JavaScript files that contain all my main code for a corresponding HTML page.  For example, if I have...

“I am building a solution using CRM 2011, but I need to migrate a significant amount of data from an existing system.  The Import Data wizard in the CRM 211 UI doesn’t meet my needs due to the amount of data and the logic necessary to transform the...

“Can I get the the integration the Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 List Component for Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010 provides to work with SharePoint Online when my CRM 2011 deployment is OnPrem (i.e. installed inside my organizations private network or...

NOTE: This is a copy/paste/minor tweak of an email invite I got from someone on my team. REGISTER TODAY: http://dkdt.me/K0bBK6 The Microsoft Dynamics® CRM User Group (CRMUG) has monthly open forum discussions of Dynamics CRM issues facing Public Sector...

I have a had a number of people about how to effectively use the Solutions capability of CRM 2011.  It has reminded me of great recorded webcast I found out about through conversation I had in an internal email discussion: Effective Use of Solutions...

Scenario: “We, conceptually, have two ‘apps’ within a single Dynamics CRM organization.  The ‘apps’ share a common set of entities such as Contacts.  We want to control which ‘apps’ show up in the Dynamics CRM navigation Area for a given user...

Using FetchXML is necessary in many situations with CRM 2011.  Using FetchXML becomes even more necessary if you are taking a “design for online” approach to solution building.  I’m a big believer that everyone should approach solution design...

DISCMLAIMER: Parts of this blog post contain my opinion and don’t necessarily reflect the opinion of my employer, nor is it an official endorsement by Microsoft of any of the tools / technologies I mention. I’ve been in my new role, focusing on Dynamics...

This post is somewhat of a placeholder.  I have some work to do to get everything in order to create a post/video.  However, I wanted to provide you some insight into what I am planning for this post and some links for those of you who might...

The Windows Azure Service Bus Relay enables applications hosted anywhere with an internet connection to securely call back to applications hosted in your own datacenter behind a firewall.  The CRM 2011 SDK offers documentation on how to use the Windows...

I have spent some time lately working with both potential CRM Online customers and partners who were unaware of the what’s really possible when you combine CRM Online with Windows Azure.  I primarily work with customers/partners building “enterprise...

I get asked this once or twice a month.    “Does CRM 2011 allow me to configure cascading dropdowns out of the box?” There is no “out of the box” way to do this using point and click customization through the CRM UI.  I find that when...

I blogged about this handy community tool before.  See here .  I just noticed that there’s an update version, as of 3-21-2012, with some new features.  From the Release Notes: Now supports mult-forms and explicitly setting which attributes...

A while back, I wrote a post called Building an editable grid for CRM 2011 .   The goal of the post was to give you the necessary knowledge to know how to write the code to build an editable grid.  Since then, someone introduced me to jqGrid...

I just discovered two TechNet Wiki’s that are indispensible: Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 Resources Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 Development Resources Add these two to your favorites/bookmarks.  This is the best running list of resources for Dynamics...

http://dkdt.me/ycgdJJ   This my newest favorite tool for Dynamics CRM development!!! It’s a tool that creates a ViewModel-esque class for a given form.  As the text on the home page says: “The JS Model Generator will go and grab the Form XML...

I love it when something becomes community driven!  A few months ago, I blogged about Script# & Dynamics CRM 2011 .  Since then, I‘ve been working on a little side project to make it easier to get started.  As with most side projects...

Minification is a popular technique in web development. The benefits are equally as applicable to Dynamics CRM 2011 JavaScript and CSS web resources. My minifier of choice is the Microsoft Ajax Minifier because it integrates well with the Visual Studio...

So I made the leap.  I am using the Windows 8 Consumer Preview as my primary laptop.  Given that I use a number of Hyper-V VMs, I am really diggin the Client Hyper-V feature of Windows 8.  No more reboot, boot to my Win2k8R2 base OS, spin...

I’ve run into a number of customers/partners who want to customize or replace the out of the box help in CRM 2011.  The guidance in the SDK is to host your custom help documentation in your own web site and surface in the CRM UI from the Get Started...

Yesterday, I delivered a presentation with this title to the CRMUG US Public Sector SIG.  This deck is basically a set of things that I either wondered myself or have been asked by customers since shifting my focus from pure app dev to building solutions...