UK Microsoft Dynamics Support Team Blog : CRM 3.0

Identify and kill SQL processes causing CPU shortage

ukdynsupport — Fri, 08 May 2009 12:58:00 GMT

There might be cases in which the SQL processes running against the MSCRM database, start using all available CPU resources causing bad performance and downtimes. Using the following script it is easy to identify which processes are running in the SQL instance and, take reactive actions.

-- THIS SCRIPT HAS TO BE USED IN CASE THE SQL SERVER CPU REMAINS CONSTANTLY AT 100%

-- IT ALLOWS TO INTERCEPT (AND KILL IF NECESSARY) THE PROCESS CAUSING THE PROBLEM

-- CHANGE THE CONTEXT TO MASTER AND LIST ALL THE PROCESSES RUNNING

-- AGAINST THE CRM DATABASE SORTING BY CPU UTILIZATION.

-- REMEMBER TO CHANGE THE DATABASE NAME ACCORDING TO THE NAME OF THE CRM DATABASE

USE Master

-- RETRIEVE THE DATABASE ID FOR THE MSCRM DATABASE

DECLARE @DATABASE_ID INT

SET @DATABASE_ID = DB_ID(N'OrganizationName_MSCRM');

SELECT ST.TEXT,

SP.*

FROM DBO.SYSPROCESSES SP

CROSS APPLY SYS.DM_EXEC_SQL_TEXT(SP.SQL_HANDLE) ST

WHERE SP.DBID = @DATABASE_ID

ORDER BY CPU DESC

-- ONCE YOU IDENTIFY THE PROCESS, IF IS POSSIBLE, KILL IT. TO KILL THE PROCESS IDENTIFY ITS

-- SPID AND USE THE KILL COMMAND (REMEMBER TO REMOVE "<" AND ">")

KILL <SPID>

Carlo Gallazzi | Business Systems Architect | Microsoft Dynamics CRM

Compare XML Customization files tool

ukdynsupport — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 18:17:00 GMT

Users often wonder how to compare XML customization files.
XML compare tools we can see are not specially targeted to compare our CRM XML Customization file.

We now have a special tool to do this which can be downloaded from Here

You can easily compare your customizations against the out of the box RTM Schema.

It will show you easily:

- The changes attributes, entities

- The new attributes

- The attributes removed.
- The differences within FormXML

In order to get the tool, you need to do this:

1°) Download the EXE, unpack it.
2°) Inside the unzipped folders you’ll get a solution file (.SLN) double click on it, this will open the project in Visual Studio.

3°) Build the project.

4°) Go to %YouFolder%\microsoft.crm.isv.customizationcomparer.setup\Debug or Retail, there you will have SETUP.EXE.

5°) Run the setup, it will install the tool by default here: C:\Program Files\Microsoft CRM Tools\CRM Customization Comparison Utility

6°) Run CRM Customization Comparison Utility.exe from the above specified folder.

More info: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd442453.aspx

Kind regards,

Olga Beatty.

Standard Rate of VAT for Microsoft Dynamics Customers

ukdynsupport — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 17:50:00 GMT

In November 2008 the Chancellor stated that the standard rate of UK VAT will drop from 17.5% to 15% on 1st December 2008, until end of Year 2009.

The guidance documentation for partners and customers is now up and live and up on our public facing website.

The standard rate of VAT will affect customers using the following Microsoft software products:

Microsoft Dynamics AX, Microsoft Dynamics GP, Microsoft Dynamics NAV, Microsoft Dynamics RMS

Microsoft Dynamics CRM*1, Microsoft Dynamics SL*2, Older versions of Microsoft Axapta, Great Plains and Navision*3

Please click this Link for the page.

Best Regards

Kevin Tunstall BSc

Microsoft Dynamics CRM Support Engineer

Support for Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 on Windows Server 2008

ukdynsupport — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 20:20:34 GMT

Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 is compatible with Windows Server 2008 based computers, however there are some known issues at this stage.

We have published a Knowledge Base article that detail all the issues, including any workarounds that might be available.

This article can be accessed here or by searching for KB950100 on our support pages, and will be updated frequently with any new information.

It is also worth mentioning that Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0 can be installed in a Windows 2008 domain, however the computer where you install Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0 must be running Windows Server 2003 or Windows Server 2000.

Regards,

Iain McDonald.

Microsoft Dynamics CRM Technical Lead.

EMEA Customer Support & Services - SMS&P

All you need to know about SQL Server build numbers:

ukdynsupport — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 20:04:16 GMT

If you are using the SQL Server database option with any of the Microsoft Dynamics products you will know that the SQL Server engine is a critical component of the overall Dynamics solution. Many of the issues we work on can be traced back to the behaviour of SQL Server rather than anything specific to the Dynamics product. Therefore, the version and build number of SQL Server deployed at your customer site can be just as important as the Dynamics product version details. The easiest way to establish the SQL Server build number is to simply run the following TSQL statement and include the result with any Service Request placed with Microsoft: SELECT @@VERSION.

The result will look something like this:

In fact, the only part we need to know from the above information is the number in bold, ie: 9.00.3200.00. Including this detail when opening a service request can expedite the response significantly. We can tell a lot from this build number; see below for the corresponding SQL version information for all major releases of SQL Server going back to version 7.0:

Please note that the above is a simple list of all the major builds of SQL Server since version 7.0 and does not show what builds are supported for each Dynamics product and version. Such details will be the subject of future blogs and can be found in product documentation and Knowledge Base articles in the meantime.

See the following KB article for more details about recent SQL Server version history: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/937137/en-us

I hope you find the above information helpful.

Best regards,

Gerard Conroy
Microsoft Dynamics NAV Support Engineer