Getting Started with Dynamics NAV 2013 Application Development: Using this tutorial will take you deeper into Dynamics NAV from a developer's viewpoint, and allow you to unlock its full potential. The book covers developing an application from start to finish in logical, illuminating steps.

Prior to Dynamics NAV 2009, the Development Environment was actually the primary end user interface before Microsoft revamped the user interface that we now call the RTC.

One of the greatest technological breakthroughs with the original Navision (the name before it was called Dynamics NAV) was that the application-programming objects, the user interface, and the database all resided together in one file! Back in the late 1990s and early 2000s, no other software came close to having a design as efficient as this. This was the main menu for Navision Financials Version 2.0:

We're now more than a decade past 2000, and technology has changed quite a bit. Dynamics NAV has kept up to date with the latest technology that has the best impact for businesses. However, most of these improvements and updates are in the backend. This is an important reason why Dynamics NAV has never faded away. There were a couple of user interface improvements that largely look and feel very...

As mentioned in the beginning of this chapter, one of the key user interface design considerations for Dynamics NAV is consistency. The consistent user interface is designed to make it easier for existing users to teach new hires how to use Dynamics NAV. This will allow the company to gain productivity from new hires more efficiently.

Additionally, the design concepts of Dynamics NAV fit in with the "look and feel" of other Microsoft products. Users familiar with using Windows will find it comfortable to use Dynamics NAV.

Microsoft is serious about this consistency, and even published a guideline for third-party developers that wish to create add-ons for Dynamics NAV. So even if you purchase any add-ons along with your solution, you can safely assume that the user will not notice that they're not using base Dynamics NAV. To learn a little more about the User Experience Guideline, go to the following site:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/jj128065(v...

The first type of page you'll see in Dynamics NAV is the list page. You can see this by clicking on the Customers tab shown here:

The list page displays a number of records—as many as the screen allows—in a particular table. The list page is typically used for searching for a particular record that you want to work with.

On most list pages, if there is relevant data associated with the particular record, you'll find it to the right of the list page. These "frames" of information are called FactBoxes.

FactBoxes allow the user quick access to the information without having to bring up any additional icon. The nice thing about FactBoxes is that they are customizable and reusable if you're creating a new page related to, in this case, the customer table.

Typically, numbers are shown in the FactBoxes. If you want further details on, for instance, the outstanding sales orders for a particular customer, all you need to do is click on that number and a new list page will be...

On most list pages that you'll encounter, there will most likely be more fields than what's displayed on the screen. In addition, there will most likely be more of those little information boxes to the right of the list screen (called FactBoxes).

To access the customization menu, click on the icons as shown in the following screenshot:

From this screen, you can customize the columns, FactBoxes to the right, and the Ribbons on the top. Go ahead and click on Customize This Page... to bring up the customization options.

The customization options that you will see are as follows:

On any of the list-type pages, you will be able to filter a specific value to generate a specific list of data. The filter option is usually located on the top-right corner of the screen.

The area that the first arrow is pointing to in the preceding screenshot is where the user can click to select the field to filter. Any field that's displayed on the page can be selected for filtering.

The area that the second arrow is pointing to is where the user can enter the filtering criteria. The values that are entered can be specific or wild cards. The value is also dependent on the data type, so this means that if you're filtering on the date value, you must enter data in the date format; if you're filtering an integer value, you will not be able to enter decimals. Here's the format that you can enter filters in:

The card page gives you greater detail on a particular record. The card page is mainly used to insert, delete, or modify a record. This is just as with the list page described previously; on the right side of the card you'll see the FactBoxes related to this particular record. You can click on the numbers in the FactBoxes to bring up the list page to see how the number was derived.

Good real estate is scarce, especially if that real estate is your screen. The Dynamics NAV product team at Microsoft understands that everyone wants everything displayed on their screens. However, your screen is only so big. You can increase your screen resolution, but your eyes may hurt. In order to organize the large amount of data Dynamics NAV can capture on a single card page, data is grouped using FastTabs.

If you expand the FastTabs, you'll see the relevant information related to the respective FastTab. In our case, since we're looking at the customer card, the Communication FastTab...

To access the customization screen on the card page, the steps are the same as accessing it from the list page.

What is missing from the card page customization is the ability to choose which columns to hide and display. The reason for this is that the card page does not have columns; they have fields that are predefined by the NAV developer.

The last page that we need to pay attention to is the document page. An example of the document page is the Sales Orders page. Go back to the home page and click on Sales Orders; then double-click on a sales order to see an example of a document page.

The usual layout is consistent to that of a card page. You have the FactBoxes to the right and the FastTabs to group the data. One thing unique to the document page is the lines within the page, which are called subpages.

This allows for the entry of detailed information in respect to the header record. In this case, since we're looking at the sales order page, the header is where the sales order number is generated. This is where we put the customer number, the customer purchase order number, and the shipping location for the order. Lines is where we put which items and services the customer will be ordering from us.

You will typically find the document page on any order screen (purchase and sales), a few master...

There are a lot of other types of pages in the RTC, but it really just boils down to the three types that I have listed previously. These three terms are all that's necessary for you to speak intelligently with a Dynamics NAV consultant when talking about modifications that you need. If you need to know the proper naming convention for the different types of pages, they can be found on this link: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/jj651618(v=nav.70).aspx.

I would encourage you to click around the RTC environment and get used to the "look and feel". As I've mentioned earlier, there's no way to become an awesome developer if you cannot find where you need to go. Being lost is not awesome.

There are also some simple walkthroughs that will take you through some of the modules. I highly recommend these walkthroughs as they will help you understand more about the capabilities of Dynamics NAV. They will also help you understand what is provided out of...

The Development Environment is the place where any code and any of the visual aspects of Dynamics NAV are programmed and designed. The look and feel of the Developer Environment is distinctly different from the Windows Client.

All the programming and visual design elements of the Development Environment are located in objects accessed through a screen called Object Designer . An object represents things like a single table that stores data, or a report that presents data as a sales order or invoice. Objects are explained in more depth later. If Object Designer is not already open when you start the Development Environment, go to Tools | Object Designer.

There are seven types of objects in Dynamics NAV. They are:

In this chapter, we've described the differences between the Windows Client and the Development Environment. The WC is the main interface where the end users enter and retrieve data for their day-to-day operations. The Development Environment is the main interface where the Dynamics NAV developers make changes to the interface, to the table structure, and to the RTC.

Understanding how to navigate within the interface will help us as we go through the development of the application because we will know exactly where to go to make these changes appear for the end users. In addition, being familiar with the interface allows us to "copy and paste" similar functions that we want to replicate.

If you would like more information on the Dynamics NAV Windows Client user interface design, and on the different pages that are available, visit this site:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/jj128065(v=nav.70).aspx

In the next chapter, we will take a closer look at the data structure of Dynamics...