Dynamics
Microsoft Dynamics |
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Microsoft Dynamics is a line of enterprise resource planning (ERP) and customer relationship management (CRM) software applications.
Dynamics can benefit from tight integration with Resco platform, gaining access to powerful and fully customizable mobile applications that can work with the data of your Dynamics organization, even offline.
Note | Microsoft product names are changing rapidly. When talking about "Dynamics," we are referring to:
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Integration schemas
Getting started
To start using Resco for Dynamics, you have to add Woodford to your Dynamics server. See Installing Woodford on Dynamics for further instructions.
To verify that the Resco solution was installed successfully, and to manage the solution, go to Settings > Solutions and search for "Woodford".
Resco functions on Dynamics
By installing Woodford, you can now access additional tools from your Dynamics server. In the list of published apps, search for Resco Suite:
You can then access the different Resco features:
- Woodford: Customization and configuration of Resco mobile application directly from your web browser.
- Questionnaire Designer: Questionnaire building and customization tool.
- Dashboard: Visualize and evaluate data collected from the questionnaires.
- Schedule Board: Assign appointments to users.
- Result Viewer
- Location Tracking: View and analyze the position of mobile users.
- Mobile Reports: Create and manage your custom mobile reports.
- Mobile Auditing Map: View transactions across records and users on a map.
- Mobile Auditing Records: View a chronological list of transactions across records and users.
- Sync Dashboard: Monitor synchronization details of your users and devices.
Woodford registration and first publish
- When you start Woodford for the first time, you have to register. The information provided is later used for licensing.
- When you publish an app project for the first time, this is when your Resco trial actually starts.
App projects
App projects are customized versions of Resco mobile application dedicated to a particular set of users. Or more precisely, the application remains the same, but each project may have a different set of data and functions available. For example, your mobile sales team may need easy access for showcasing products and creating up new orders, field technicians may need instructions that guide them through the process of a maintenance inspection, and their managers can be interested in seeing the aggregated data or monitor the location of their staff on a map in real time.
Resco on Dynamics comes with a set of default project templates designed for concrete scenarios (for example, mobile sales or inspections) and these can be further customized using the Woodford tool, or you can design your own app project from scratch.
Microsoft Dataverse
Resco is also compatible with Microsoft Dataverse, formerly known as Common Data Service (CDS). Most of the default app projects shipped with Woodford are tailor-made for Dynamics Sales or Field Service. However, the Inspector app project is fully compatible with a plain Dataverse organization without any Dynamics extras.
Mobile apps
Resco offers several mobile apps that understand app projects and allow you to work with your Dynamics data. To get started, download any of the app and connect to Dynamics. If you're not sure which app to download, get the classic Resco Mobile CRM.
OAuth2 authentication
To increase security, Microsoft has deprecated older authentication methods in favor of multi-factor authentication (the final deadline was April 2022).[1] This impacts how app users sign in to Resco mobile apps and also external projects and location tracking.
Resco mobile apps
Before you can use the OAuth2 authentication method to connect Resco Mobile CRM with Dynamics 365/CRM Online, the app must first be added to the Microsoft Azure Active Directory. Azure Active Directory is used to verify that the application is permitted to access the business data stored in the Dynamics 365/CRM Online tenant. To grant global consent for all users to access the data, use the following link. However, you need to be a Global Administrator of your tenant to issue a global consent. It’s not enough to have only a System Administrator role in Dynamics 365/CRM Online.
Additionally, all app users that connect to their Resco mobile apps as Standard User must switch to OAuth2 instead.
See this blog post for more information. Blog
External projects, location tracking
The deprecations of Microsoft impact how external projects and location tracking authenticate. Instead of legacy login using WS-Trust, all customers must switch to OAuth using ROPC flow. [1] (Multi-factor authentication is not suitable for this use case.)
However, in order to use OAuth, users must grant their consent. There are two types of consent:
- individual consent for a particular user
- admin consent (organization-wide)
For external projects and location services, individual user consent is sufficient.
- For external projects, consent is required for the common user account used for authentication and licensing.
- For location tracking, consent is required for the account used when you register your organization for location tracking.
Consents can be further limited by scopes. In these cases, consent is only required to access Dynamics. The scope is https://{hostname}/user_impersonation
, for example, https://resco.crm4.dynamics.com/user_impersonation
. As {hostname}, use the hostname of your Dynamics instance.
There are several ways how consent can be granted:
- You can synchronize your Resco Mobile CRM app with this account. However, this will grant consent with more scopes than required for the external users or location tracking scenarios.
- A simpler way is to open the following link in a web browser, log in, and grant consent in that way. Go to
https://login.microsoftonline.com/common/oauth2/v2.0/authorize?client_id=a116bf70-75fe-41c2-9f9f-7f3d0faff4bb&response_type=code&redirect_uri=https%3A%2F%2Flogin.microsoftonline.com%2Fcommon%2Foauth2%2Fnativeclient&scope=https%3A%2F%2F{hostname}%2Fuser_impersonation&prompt=consent
. Make sure to replace the {hostname} with your Dynamics hostname. Some organizations don't allow individual user consent; in that case, you must log in as a global admin and grant consent on behalf of your organization.
- There's also a direct link for admin consent. In this case, you have to log in as a global admin. As your tenant ID, use either domain name or GUID; and also use the correct Dynamics hostname:
https://login.microsoftonline.com/{tenantID}/v2.0/adminconsent?client_id=a116bf70-75fe-41c2-9f9f-7f3d0faff4bb&response_type=code&redirect_uri=https%3A%2F%2Flogin.microsoftonline.com%2Fcommon%2Foauth2%2Fnativeclient&scope=https%3A%2F%2F{hostname}%2Fuser_impersonation
.
- It is also possible to grant consent using Microsoft Graph web API. If you are curious about this method, contact Resco support.
Virtual tables
Virtual tables (also known as virtual entities) enable the integration of data residing in external systems by seamlessly representing that data as tables in Microsoft Dataverse, without replication of data and often without custom coding(Microsoft documentation).
Since release 16.0, virtual entities can also be used in Resco mobile apps, both online and offline. By default, they use full sync, but if you select a proper Modified On Field, you can enable different sync strategies. They remain read-only.
File columns
In release 16.0, we have added basic support for File columns. To learn more about this feature in Dataverse, see Microsoft documentation.
- What is supported in Resco
- File and Filename fields are visible in Woodford. You can enable them in your projects.
- File field - This field must be enabled. When added to a form, this field is represented as a lookup with a label and a clickable filename.
- Filename field - This field is optional. When disabled and the File field is added to a form, the "Unknown" is displayed on the form instead of filename. Disabling this field can improve database footprint and sync times for very large entities, but generally, we recommend enabling this field.
- File fields are read-only. It is not possible to modify or upload files using Resco mobile apps.
- You can use standard document operations such as print, export, and email.
- File fields are not part of the synchronization process. The file is downloaded and cached when a user opens the field on the form. The next time the file is opened, it is loaded from local storage. When the file changes on the server, it is redownloaded when the user opens the field. This behavior is the same in both offline and online modes. This means a working internet connection is required when accessing the file for the first time.
- What is not supported
- Views - You cannot open the file from a view using commands (there is no OpenAttachment command). It can only be opened from form.
- Media tab - You cannot use the media tab to show files inline on the form (e.g., signature).
- Mobile reports - You cannot use files to store mobile reports or as a source for report images.
- Questionnaires - you cannot use files as storage for binary questions (image, signature).
- Form rules - It is impossible to access or modify file contents using form rules.
- Resco JavaScript Bridge - it is not possible to get file content via JS bridge. You can access the raw values of both the File field and the Filename field. As a workaround, it is possible to use a file identifier (guid) in the File field to construct the download URL and download the content manually.
See also
- Upgrading Microsoft Dynamics: Resco-specific instructions for upgrading to a newer version of Dynamics
- Resco CRM sync: Connect an organization on Resco Cloud and with a Dynamics organization. Synchronize data and metadata.
- List of app permissions
- Resco for Dynamics 365: Official product page