Microsoft Business Solutions Small Business Manager is Great Plains Dexterity based application and successor and small business market niche version of Microsoft Great Plains. Microsoft Great Plains itself has variety of customization and integration tools: Integration Manager, VBA/Modifier, Great Plains Dexterity, SQL Server stored procedures to name a few. By one reason or another MBS decided to restrict Small Business Manager and do not provide VBA/Modifier, restricted Great Plains ReportWriter version and didn't include Great Plains Dexterity IDE installer on SBM CD.
Here we would like to give you your options and tools available in your disposition. If you are developer who is asked: how do we customize Microsoft Small Business Manager ? read this and you will have the clues on where to look further.
1. Great Plains Dexterity ? this is proprietary programming language and technology, designed back to earlier 1990th with the goal to build platform independent graphical accounting package ? Great Plains Dynamics. Dexterity itself is written in C (following popular those days hope ? that C will provide platform independence). You can install Dexterity from Great Plains 7.5 /8.0 CD #2. In case of Small Business Manager ? you need to call to MBS Partners, such as Alba Spectrum Technologies/ Obviously it requires a lot of learning / training, but it allows your custom piece be seamlessly integrated with Great Plains interface. Nowadays, however ? and this is a good thing ? most of Great Plains installations are moved to SQL Server ? so you can use Dexterity for custom forms drawing only and make the buttons run SQL stored procedures.
2. Crystal Reports. Great Plains has its own ReportWriter, but its functionality is limited ? you can't do cross modules reports (you can't link Sales and Purchasing tables in one report, for example). So ? you use Crystal. The GP tables structure is in Tools->Resource Description->Tables ? and you are in control. Feel free to create views and stored procs directly in the companies databases ? it doesn't hurt the Dexterity engine
3. Direct web publishing from Great Plains SQL databases, using Visual Studio.net and your language of choice (VB.Net, C#, J#, etc). Plus you probably want to have several SQL stored procs.
4. eConnect ? this tool is type of SDK with VB.net samples. It allows you to feed data into Great Plains and was primarily created for eCommerce developers.
5. SQL queries - as a developer you have unlimited potential in using SQL queries, because the database in MS SQL Server. Be careful, it is kind of surgery - you can easily delete all your customers, by executing: DELETE RM00101
Happy customizing! if you want us to do the job - give us a call 1-866-528-0577! help@albaspectrum.com
Andrew Karasev is Chief Technology Officer in Alba Spectrum Technologies ? USA nationwide Great Plains, Microsoft CRM customization company, serving Chicago, California, Arizona, Texas, Florida, Georgia, New York and having locations in multiple states and internationally (http://www.albaspectrum.com), he is Dexterity, SQL, C#.Net, Crystal Reports and Microsoft CRM SDK developer.
Lincoln Stretch rentals Alsip ..Corporate ERP/MRP selection might be tough one, especially considering very... Read More
In the Clinton era the status quo was simple: you... Read More
Enabling Chinese input is quick and easy, there are only... Read More
This article is the third of a series of articles... Read More
It's not very often I get excited about a software... Read More
Looks like Microsoft Great Plains becomes more and more popular,... Read More
So let's begin crunching down these 300 images using Adobe... Read More
MSN messenger is a pretty cool invention. I mean I'm... Read More
When making a decision to buy any piece of software... Read More
User interfaces and accessibility are some of the most important... Read More
With the advent of 'Service Pack 2' for Windows XP... Read More
Lotus Notes Domino is very efficient in electronic document workflow... Read More
Have you ever noticed that when you look at your... Read More
SOFTWARE PIRACY We regularly hear reports... Read More
When you visit department stores and see that majority of... Read More
Usually workflow & messaging is realized in CRM and then... Read More
I have always had a tendency to focus on the... Read More
Disclaimer: All the thoughts expressed are my views only! Your... Read More
If you have Great Plains Dynamics/eEnterprise (version 6.0 or earlier)... Read More
Trying to figure out a stream in banning one email... Read More
Find out why Spyware Removal from computers is important and... Read More
Great Plains Integration Manager scripting and translation - overview for... Read More
This tutorial covers OLAP solutions used by Data warehouses and... Read More
Ad-Aware and Spybot are probably the two most well known... Read More
There are two major WYSIWYG(What You See Is What You... Read More
Western Springs shuttle limo ..If you have Microsoft Great Plains and support it for... Read More
Looks like Microsoft Great Plains becomes more and more popular,... Read More
I like my software simple. If it's too complex or... Read More
Bill of Lading is required report for Logistics and Freight... Read More
Stop the Runaway MouseWhat's the "runaway mouse?" You've seen it...you... Read More
In the previous ISDN article, we looked at how and... Read More
Accounts payable is just one area of office management where... Read More
Is your PC is slow and wimpy? Then you need... Read More
This article is for advanced Microsoft CRM SDK C# developers.... Read More
Current Microsoft Business Solutions Great Plains has more that 10... Read More
When you own a small business, time is money. And... Read More
Well, even if the combination might look very unusual, we... Read More
The software giants don't do everything and don't always produce... Read More
Programming Help for BeginnersWe write programs to instruct computers. When... Read More
Anyone who has ever used Microsoft Word knows that it... Read More
What is Interactive Mapping?Interactive mapping is a visual display medium... Read More
Need software to record your voice, streaming audio or musical... Read More
This article is for advanced Microsoft CRM SDK C# developers.... Read More
The research in the field of Natural Language Processing usually... Read More
Microsoft PowerPoint has dramatically changed the way in which academic... Read More
Microsoft Business Solutions Great Plains, former Great Plains Software Dynamics... Read More
It???s easy to understand why you might be drawn to... Read More
Fleet Maintenance Management is a critical position in any company... Read More
Writing software manuals is boring, isn't it? We often think:... Read More
Each Industry and market niche has business specific and unique... Read More
Software |