San Diego

If you live in San Diego or know that area well, please contact me mbelugin@gmail.com

Это тоже не стоит транслировать на акфорум :)

Mental framework

Review of the book “Managing your supply chain using Microsoft dynamics ax 2009”

After about 5 years of Ax development I’ve recognized that the model of Dynamics Ax functionality which I have in my brain is like photosynth – some areas, I worked with, covered by consistent pictures, but others are represented by random shots without high level overview.

The majority of existing materials about Ax – like trainings, documentation, so on, use “hands on” approach – little introduction and very detailed description using screenshots, particular sequences of steps in term of buttons, etc.

So I feel that there is a gap between short intros of documentation and very detailed contents (for example Russian docs contains of 2 volumes >1000 pages each).

That’s why I was very interested when Dr. Scott Hamilton sent me kindly the book, which was written to give “mental framework for putting together the details” learned from various sources . So below are my impressions.

The book contains 426 pages, and most of them are text description of Ax functionality: no screenshots, no concrete steps – just text, tables and business process flowcharts. Thus, the information density is quite high.

The book consists of 15 chapters, each dedicated for some functional area. All chapters are in scope of SCM (you can see TOC at Amazon). Each chapter contain description of a functional area, case studies and executive summary.

New features of Ax2009 (such as sites and purchase requisition) are reflected.

What I like about the book

• The book met my expectations about abstraction level it have no redundant details, which can be obtained from products docs and training, and contains enough for making mental model of SCM modules.
• There are lots of tables showing how ax behavior depends on parameter combinations – it helps to understand the space of different implementation scenarios.
  
• As I mentioned before the most important features of ax2009 are described

What can be done better

• Some case studies are very brief – I’d prefer to include more detailed business scenarios and more implementation details. (But maybe I should read some book about common business practice instead – could you recommend me such a book?)

Overall impression

I’d buy the book if I haven’t one. I recommend it for everybody who want to have a consistent view of Ax SCM functionality.

PS. there is also a new book by Dr. Hamilton - Managing Lean Manufacturing using Microsoft Dynamics AX 2009

AxForm.info for English-speakers

AxForum.info is the one of the largest Russian communities related to Dynamics systems.

Though it has a section in English there are lots of info in Russian there. Some of English speakers read the forum via online translators.

If you have and idea how to make AxForum.info more suitable for English-speaking people, please post to that thread

Bulgaria

Does anybody from bulgaria reading this blog? Please, contact me mbelugin@gmail.com

вот это не надо транслировать на аксфорум :)

Search for C#

It is obvious for somebody, but it can help somebody novice.

Since version 4 Dyanmics Ax requires .NET framework installation, so you can rely on the fact that .NET FW exists. There is also constantly improving intargetion of .NET in X++, so you can use .NET framework as a huga library of various utilities. For example, Ax uses System.Text.RegularExpression for checking e-mail format.

So sometimes, you can search the internet for code snippet, performing some task, you need, but if you type "http .net" you can get lots of irrelevant results since .net is an often part of web page address. Type "http C#" instead and you probably get what you want.

SQL Server 2008 R2 what's new

Interesting announce of new features in SQL Server 2008 R2

PowerShell + Ax

Just added a small article to axaptapedia about administering Ax with PowerShell.

AxPath plugin for Tabax which works with Ax3, Ax4, Ax2009

Now you can download AxPath.dll (with sources) which works with Ax 3, Ax 4, Ax 2009. Previously it worked only if Ax3 was installed.

Ivan fixed it to work with Ax2009, now I have extended it to probe registry keys for Ax2009, Ax4, Ax3 (in that particular order) and work with the version found first.

If you do not know what AxPath and Tabax are - look at http://axaptapedia.com/AxPath, http://axaptapedia.com/Tabax

AxPath plugin originated by AndyD from http://axforum.info

First experiments with XRefs and MSAGL

Tryng to get more visual represenation of cross references using MSAGL (Microsoft Automatic Graph Layout)

This is only calls inside Tax class. Methods which are called from external places are merked with ">". Methods ahich are called from descendats - with "*"

view complete xps

Simple job generates .dot file from xrefs which can be read my MSAGL.

There is also well known graph layout package - graphviz. (.dot it it's native format)

I am not MVP anymore

Since I am MS FTE (GDL EE SDE) @ KHBP

Ax 2009 can be downloaded from MSDN

here

Sidax & Tabax for Ax2009

Here are first betas for the utilities that works under Ax2009. Tabax now can works with forms outside main Ax window.

download

How to hide Content Pane in Ax 2009

Here is a small job, which hides content pane in Dynamics Ax 2009. Content pane can be useful for end users, but when you develop something in can be irritating to see it oon top of all windows every time you click on menu item. So here is a small solution. I plan to add this feature to the future Tabax for Ax 2009

static void TEST_HideContentFrame(Args _args)
{
    #WinApi
    HWND contentPane =  WinApi::findWindowEx(
          WinAPI::findWindowEx(infolog.hWnd(), 0, 'MDIClient', ''), 
          0, 
          'ContentFrame',
          ''
    );
;
    if (contentPane)
        WinApi::ShowWindow(contentPane, #SW_HIDE);
}

https://community.dynamics.com

 

Here is announce:

Within the next few weeks you will begin to see the Microsoft Dynamics Community pages located at http://www.microsoft.com/dynamics/community, moving to a new location at https://community.dynamics.com. We are making this move in an effort to streamline the accessibility of all Microsoft Dynamics communities and make the user experience of interacting with community experts and your peers much easier. The newsgroups as you see them today will still be intact, but the web pages which you use today to access them will be different. Plus you'll see more streamlined content and future functionality additions, such as networking tools!

 

To get a jump start on the transition, I would encourage you to register on the new site TODAY – once you do, you can begin to interact with our non-technical role based communities which reside there today for Finanse, Sales & Marketing, and Customer Service professionals.

 

--

Liz Hallen

Online Community Product Manager

Book review: “Quality Assurance for Dynamics AX-Based ERP Solutions”

As some other bloggers, I have received the book for review. Here are my impressions…

This book is written about several aspects of quality assurance in Dynamics Ax implementation projects. I think the main focus is on customizations development because most topics related to it.

Quality in the following areas is covered by the book:

• Code
  
• User interface
  
• Security
  
• Performance
  
• Organizational
  

Detail level differs from topic to topic: for example code topics contain introductory material and detailed BP rules, user interface topic consists of very concrete checklists and security aspects are showed almost only as general word about trustworthy computing. The book is not very thick (~150 pages), but contains information only in textual form (text, tables, lists), so information density is higher than in most modern books filled with screenshots and code samples.

My overall impression - good enough as introductory book. It can be useful if you are:

• Novice developer and want to have overview about what quality in dynamics ax means
  
• Some kind of manager who want to build a development process with focus on quality (you can borrow some rules and checklists)
  
• Some other non-developer who wants to have overall outline about quality in Ax
  

I think, there are some topics, which should be covered by the future books of such direction, but haven't been covered by this book:

• Administration issuer
  
• Functional setup issues
  

Other topics (such as end-user training) which are parts of real implementation projects but haven't been represented in the book

Sidax 0.4 b 6 will show you what groups can access selected main menu items

download (85K)

What's new:

• multiple selection of main menu items


• new item named "Show access" in the main menu item's context menu. If you choose this item all groups which have access to that item will be output to infolog

BeauSQL -- SQL beautifier

Download: binaries, sources



The purpose is to make SQL traces code more structured and core readable.

This tool consists of two parts:

• DLL, which is written in Haskell - a very interesting functional programming language, and it do actual work of parsing and pretty printing


• Small class in Ax which is a thin wrapper for the DLL and button to place in SQL trace form.

This is the first version, it is very experimantal and tested under Ax 3 only.

PS. Some code was stealed from cs4 tool for BAAN

How to manage rights by code

Some times ago I nedd to copy 8 security groups and remove access to some menu items in these new copies. I wrote a job for that purpose and now I've placed it to axaptapedia here.

Google Desktop Calendar Gadget update

Just added half-transparent dates from previous and next monthes

download (81K)

Brainbench results

Brainbench is a site dedicated for online testing. There are some free tests which I have done some time ago. My transcript id is 6941773

Using Mantis web service in Ax 3.0 via MSSOAP COM object

Just added a small example to Axaptapedia

Tweaking google desktop gadgets

Google Desktop has a calendar gadget. But it use american style: week begins with sunday and there are only english letters in title. Here in Russia week starts with monday. So I was interested to localize that gadget. And it was easy. SDK contains designer and good examples, and gadgets are only combination of XML and javascript, so they can be hacked by anyone who knows that technologies. If you are interested in localizing that gadget to your language, or have any ideas of integrating google desktop gadget technology with Ax - just reply to this post.



download this gadget

Trace Parser small bug

Trace Parser is a new tool for profiling Dynamics Ax code. Unlike profiler, which makes execution of the code about 30 times slower, TraceParser takes extremely low resources - 4% according to Alexey Eremenko blog)

But since it is in the "beta" stage, there are some problems with usability and stability.

For example, when I run the "trace summary" menu item on my trace I've got an exception. It seems (thanks to reflector) the cause is in SqlTimeBreakDown function in SQL server Trace Parser database.

When I add condition to exclude division by zero, it results in empty
grid instead of exception.

This is the fix:

if @SQLTime>0  -- <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< the fix
               begin
               INSERT INTO @BreakdownInformation
               SELECT (sum(PrepDuration) * 100)/@SQLTime [% of time in SQL Prep],(
sum(BindDuration) * 100)/@SQLTime [% of time in SQL Bind],
(sum(RowFetchDuration) * 100)/@SQLTime [% of time in SQL Row Fetch],
(sum(ExecuteDuration) * 100)/@SQLTime [% of time in SQL Execution]
                               from SqlQueryInstance
                               WHERE traceId = @Traceid AND sessionid = @sessionid
       end  -- <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< the fix
               RETURN

Syntax highlighting of X++ code in your blog or site

1. Download highlight.js archive
2. Unpack archive and place it on your site
3. Аdd the following lines at start your html

<script type="text/javascript" src="highlight.js"></script>
 <script type="text/javascript">
   initHighlightingOnLoad('axapta');
 </script>

(or, add html/javascript block with that content in the blogger.com template editor. If you use blogger, you should replace path to the script with full path to site where you uploaded the script like "http://belugin.info/highlight.js")

4. Attach the sample.css stylesheet to your page or add it's contents to the "style" tag of your blogger template

5. Post your code snippets like this:

<pre><code class="Axapta">
// your code here
</code></pre>

PS. You can also use export.html from the archive and skip all steps except 4 - just paste a generated code to your page

osliving.com - directory of opensorce software

look here

Blogroll

Just added a blogroll to the right bottom of my blog template. This blogroll is generated by Google Reader and represents all blogs in english I have subscribed to.

How to setup Ax 4 on a computer which does not belong to any domain

Just published the recipe @axaptapedia

It works with Ax 5 CTPs also.

PS. stealed from AxForum

Comparing the Microsoft and Google tool chains

An interesting post about tools (software and hardware) which are used by Microsoft and Google developers.

By the way, I have two monitors too, and it is very useful for development in Ax, especially, for debugging display methods: when I had application and a debugger on the same screen, it was an ether not enough screen space (when debugger and application were placed side-by-side), or a deadloop (when I close the debugger, the underlying window starts to repaint, so display method was called again and debugger appears again).

Gantt

Gannt charts in Ax are displayed Netronic VARCHART XGantt ActiveX control. If you follow the link you can download CHM and PDF documentation (about 900 pages) on it...

FarManager 1.80 will be Open Source

Far Manager1.80 will be Open Source.

FarManager is my favorite Norton Commander-like file manager.

The real power of this piece of software is in plugins. For example, a friend of mine had implemented a nice IDE for BAAN ERP based on FAR. And I also have some experience in this field.

Maybe, it looks weird for people, who do not remember DOS and NC, but is really powerful

MS CRM in dotnetrocks

It is announced that the next tuesday a new dotnetrocks podcast show on MS CRM will be available:

10/30/2007
David Yack Talks Microsoft CRM!

AFAIR it is the first DotNetRocks show related to Dynamics

new version of the DEV_CreateStandardsMethods extendion

The extension now can add suffix to created methods and is fully translated to english. For example parameters from the screenshot will lead to creation of findByGUID and existByGUID methods. See axaptapedia article for download and details.

Tabax is translated to Portuguese (BR)

Thank you, Ricardo

download language file

WF vs WWF

from here

Dianne Siebold's blog

http://blogs.msdn.com/dsiebold

Just found a new blog via Google alerts. Posts are dedicated to AIF and developer's documentation

Print editor hotkeys

Just uploaded a printable version of editor hotkeys. I like lookup facilities of the code editor (F2 for tables and fields), but somtimes forget key combinations. Now I have printed it and sticked it to have it in front of my eyes.

Maybe it can be useful for you also...

Tabax is one year old

About one year ago the first version of tabax was released to public

Great Thanx to all people who took part in Tabax development: AndyD, Ivan, OIP and others.

And for i18n: Manel, Helmut, Romain Gasnier

BTW, Google Alerts gave me some Brazilian blog in Portugues and the only thing, that I can read there was Tabax :)

Below there are two screenshots:

A sidax predecessor, which was developed sombody from axforum




First internal version of sidax (which is two year old now).

Video: howto drag and drop nodes from XPO to application

watch it here

Tabax 0.3.2

download
Changes:

• AxPath: use of primary key of the record instead of recID
  
• French localization (thanx to Romain Gasnier)
  
• If tabax can not find it's resources on disk it tries to download them from Ax resources (useful for Ax 4 installations)

Unwanted fields fetching when selecting by unique index

UPD: Sorry, EmplTable is not good example - because of cache enabled. But this behavoiur is tested with a specially created table with CacheLookup==None.

Last friday i was optimizing a form with a lof of display fields with an implementation like the following:

display EmplName emplName()
{
 return EmplTable::find(this.EmplID).Name;
}

The one of sources to increase performance of such code is to select only fields which will be used lately. So I have replaced this code with the following:

display EmplName emplName()
{
 return this.EmplID ?
        (select Name from EmplTable
             where EmplTable.emplID==this.EmplID).Name
        :
        "";
}

but when I enabled SQL tracing, I found, that this code producess select with ALL fields of EmplTable.
It was strange... With a great help of my co worker, i've found the following:

• when there is only fields of any unique index in the where condition, all fields are fetched
  
• when there is an extra field in the condition, only required fields is selected (and the extra fields in where)
• So I converted previously mentioned methods to the following:
  

display EmplName emplName()
{
 return this.EmplID ?
        (select Name from EmplTable
             where EmplTable.emplID==this.EmplID
                     &&
                     EmplTable.recID
          ).Name
        :
        "";
}

TabaxLite

TabaxLite is a stripped down version of Tabax for end users.
It is focused solely on the window management and does not require any external component

Hosting the Windows Workflow Foundation designer

Windows Workflow Foundation (WF) is the new MS technology. It comes with .NET framework 3.0.

It is interesting that workflow designer can be hosted by any app (here is an example).

And maybe someone can make an ActiveX which can be hosted by Axapta form (here is an example of ActiveX control implemented in C#)

Sending attachments using the "mailto:" protocol

It works with Outlook at least. I think this example job is enough

static void Test_MailTo(Args _args)
{
   str recepient='mbelugin@gmail.com';
   str subject = 'Test';
   str attachment = @'c:\AUTOEXEC.BAT';
   str url = strFmt(
       'mailto:%1?Subject=%2&attachments=""%3""',

       recepient,
       subject,
       attachment
   );
;
   WinApi::shellExecute(url);
}

My first attempt to make a screencast

This screencast is showing TabaxLite in action.

setPrefix

The first line which I always write at the start of the 'run' method in a RunBase descenant is:

setPrefix(this.caption());

Settings prefixes is very useful for detect causes of errors later.

There are also very useful macros: PrefixField, PreFixFieldValue

For example, this code will set prefix to the: ": _item.itemID"

void processInventTable(InventTable _item)
{
;
    setPrefix(#prefixField(_item, itemID));
    ...

BTW, I think it will be also great to have a good logging system in Ax, infolog is not enough

Tabax v 0.3

download (87k)

After the long period of beta stage, the new release of Tabax is out.


This release introduces several new features which will be very useful for developers and end-users

First of all, it works under version 4 of Dynamics Ax.

Second, it introduces the Tabax Plugin API which allows developers to increase functionality of Tabax sufficiently.

There is a plugin for Tabax (in the tabax archive) to integrate AxPath with your system: so, if you install this plugin, you can click on AxPath links in browsers and email clients and go to specific location in code or specific record in the database (thank to AndyD for this functionality).

Ivan Kashperuk has developed a great plugin named RecentWindows which I use heavily. If you close some window, it allows to reopen it quickly.

Also, Ivan added a very useful feature to Tabax: if You press the 'Edit current field' toolbar button, while holding Ctrl and Shift down, Tabax will open a table field or data method related to the currently selected form field.

I have added similar fuctionality to the 'cross referebces' buton - now You can press it while working with form, and you will see cross refereces for the fireld related to the active control.

There are also some minor bugfixes and enhancements in this release

AxPath is supported by axaptapedia

So you can create links to AOT items in Axaptapedia using regular link syntax and if you have Tabax 0.3 rc 1 installed, you can navigate them.

Thanks to Andrew Jones!

• about AxPath


• download Tabax RC1

DLR & X++

About a week ago Microsoft has announced the new technology named DLR. As far as I know, this is a layer for dynamic languages support on top of .NET framework. I watched the very interesting video where integration of Python, Ruby and JScript is shown.

But what can it give to Dynamics Ax?

I think X++ have some features of dynamic languages.

For example, method identification is being done via method names, not some kinds of method ids (i.e. virtual methiod table indexes like C++). If you write code like

MyClass x;
;
x.myMethod();

compiler checks that class MyClass have method myMethod, runtime checks, that object x has method myMethod, but run time does not check whether x is instance of MyClass.

So you can write something like

MyOtherClass y=...;
Object o=y;
MyClass x=o;
;
x.myMethod();

the code will be executed successfully if MyOtherClass have method myMethod, even if MyOtherClass and MyClass have no common superclass.

Such tricks are used with forms (for example ; Tabax plugin SDK is using it also to provide compiler checks for tabax service methods usage).

So if Microsoft is planning to move Dynamics Ax to .NET platform, they should provide support for such behaviour for the backward comapatibility.

I think the work being done on DLR can be used in such case. Jim Hugunin, architect of DLR and and the author of IronPython says (see video mentioned above), that this implementation of the Python language outperform original C implementation (CPython) and runs 2 times faster on standard benchmarks. He also pays extremely high attention on backwards compatibility (for example, you can not use .NET object methods in IronPython code until you place "import clr" statement in your code).

I think when this job will be done and authors of DLR will find and mitigate dynamic languages problems in DLR and SilverLight, the result of the job can be used in the future dynamics products.

PS. I played some time with IronPython and found though it have pretty good perormance in requires a lot of time to initialize an engine and load a script.

Tabax 0.3 rc 1:

download (80K)

changes:

• fixes bugs in AxPath


• AxPath browser integration plugins is in archive in the extras folder


• Plugin SDK documented

AxPath integration with browser email etc

With great help of AndyD, Tabax now have an integration with browser and other tools. For example you can send a link to the specific purchase order via outlook, and when the link will be clicked, user will see purchase order you linked to.

You can also link to the specific parts of code. For example here tabax checks your access to development environment when you are navigating AOT link.

How to make it work:

• download the latest beta of Tabax
  
• Install Tabax and Plugin SDL
  
• download and install AxPath plugin. Run register.bat
  

SYS_ExpressionQueryBuilder

SYS_ExpressionQueryBuilder is an ExpressionBuilder for queries. Read more @ axaptapedia

    InventTrans inventTrans;
    QueryRun qr = SYS_ExpressionQueryBuilder::construct()
        .dataSource(tableNum(InventTrans))
            .count(fieldNum(InventTrans, RecID))
            .groupBy(fieldNum(InventTrans, ItemID))
            .between(fieldNum(InventTrans, DatePhysical), 01012006, 31122006)
            .matches(fieldNum(InventTrans, Qty), '<0')
 
        .exists(tableNum(InventDim))
            .link(fieldNum(InventTrans, InventDimID),
                  fieldNum(InventDim, InventDimID))
            .matches(fieldNum(InventDim, InventLocationID), condition)
    .run();
;
  while(qr.next())
    {
        inventTrans = qr.get(tableNum(InventTrans));
        info(strFmt('%1: %2', inventTrans.ItemId, InventTrans.RecId));
    }

Infolog stack trace

This extension allows to see stacktrace of infolog items and navigate through call stack. read more @axaptapedia

Tabax 0.3 beta 3

Starting a beta stage of the new Tabax version (download)

What's new since 0.2.x:

• Works with Ax 4 (icons are in tabax.ax4 they should be copied to "C:\Program Files\Microsoft Dynamics AX\40\Client\Share\Include\tabax")
  
• User interface can be localized (it is translated already to Russian and Spanish (the last by Manel Querol (Mkz) from http://www.TrucosAx.com))
  
• windows management (enable "fit maчimized" in setup and your window maximization will be emulated with fitting)
  
• tab width setup (maximal width, minial width and "Tabs have same size")
  
• Plugin SDK (it's only first small step)
  
• Ivan Kashperuk added the "Open table field" functionality to the "Edit current field" button
  
• Autosize: tabax don't let to change it's size
  

Tabax 0.2.15 -- fit mazimized windows

homepage

download (30K)

There are two changes:
1. "Fit maximized windows" setting added -- thanks AdnyD
2. Bug in table browser removed -- thanks Ivan Kashperuk

One of tabax users asked for the "Fit maximized windows feature". In you enable it tabax will fit window to the client area of Ax main window when detect maximization of some inner window.

I think, everybody do not like the following Ax behaviour: when you maximize window (for example code editor) and then open child window, the first winow change it's size. The new Tabax feature prevents it behaviour - it just normalize all maximized windows and fit them to the maximal size they can get without some parts being hidden. So when new window is displayed, prevoius window do not change it's size.

What do you think about this feature?

Podcasts

I am now in pause between the two jobs. So almost every day I am walking through the nearby forest park with my child. She is sleeping and I have about three hours to do something interesting or useful. Snowflakes falling down do not allow me to read on paper or my pocket pc, but I can listen podcasts or webcasts.

The additional reason to do such things is to learn spoken english. For example when MS contacted me via phone on the SQL injection hole i've found (BTW i have tried to reproduce it on Ax4 and it is still here) I was not able to understand almost anything from what they have spoken.

So I need to train...

The first candidate to listen is the list of webcasts on channel 9 tagged with "Dynamics" because it is an interesting topic to me.

It is very useful, but have some disadwantages:

• the files are very big - I need soundtrack only
  
• my mp3 player can not play wmv smoothly (and it plays them only after renaming them to .wma) - I am forced to use a Pocket PC
  
• I feel, I can get a slight Danish accent (it is nice, but I think not when mixed with Russian ;) )
  

So I am switched to other podcast named .NET rocks - an internet radio about Microsort .NET and related technologies. It is interesting for me, sounds quite professional and, I think, made with a clean American English.

Can you recommend me interesing podcasts in English?

Do you know something for extracting soundtrack from a wmv file?

PS. The latest ".NET rocks" show is with a Steve McConnell, the author of the "Code complete" book, recomended recently by MFP

Sidax 0.4 b 2

See page at axaptapedia for details. It is strongly recommended to upgrade beta0 to beta 1 or beta 2.

Python

Every programmer, ecpecialy one, which deals with some ugly language like X++ or BAAN 4GL should know some scripting language. Its a kind of practical and easy tool which allows you to write small programs quickly, in cost of performance.

My favorite is Python. It is nice, mature enough and widely supported (even my Pocket PC has an interpretter).

For example one task which I did with python a couple days ago is a preparation of data of the legacy system to load in Dynamics Ax. The source file consists of text lines, where data fields are separated with the piplene character ('|'). Some of data fields values contain pipeline character too. The first field of the line identifies type of the data (invenotory group or inventory item). The file was encoded using DOS (cp866) encoding. So there was 3 actions po perform:

• recode data to Windows encoding (cp1251)
  
• separate item data from inventory group data
  
• check for lines which pipeline in data
  

It was done by the following scipts:

1. Splitting files by data type and converting from DOS to Windows

src=open('input.txt',  'r')
dst = {'asl': open('inventory.txt', 'w'), 'ctl': open('group.txt', 'w')}
lineNo = 1
for line in src:
    type = line.split('|')[0]
    if type in dst:
        try:
            dst[type].write(line.decode('cp866').encode('cp1251'))
        except:
            print line
            print lineNo
    lineNo += 1

2. Checking for correctnes:

import sys
lineCount = 8
fileName = sys.argv[1] if len(sys.argv)>1 else 'inventory.txt'
for lineNo, line in enumerate(open(fileName, 'r')):
    if line.count('|')!=lineCount:
        print lineNo
        print line.decode('cp1251').encode('cp866')

As you can see it is readable and easy.

If you get interested, look at the following links:

• python.org -- python homepage
  
• dive into python -- python tutorial
  
• IronPython -- python for .NET (by MS employee)
  

Tabax 0.2.14: View query of the active datasource

A new version of tabax:

download (27K)

Now you can view the source of the query in the active datasource by simply holding Ctrl+Shift while pressing the 'Table browser' button (code by Ivan Kashperuk).

Also you can list all datasources on the active form and then browse the data by holding Shift while pressing the 'Table browser' button.

Dynamic analog of abstract macro

Palle Algemark have published an article witch solution of the same task which have been solved by abstract macro in my latest post. He uses table map and reflection code to achieve flexibility.

It is good, especially when you have ready to use map for all concrete tables. It is more difficult to create such map id you haven't.

For example you can not just declare fact, that you have same name for a field in each table; uou should: either repeatedly add declaration of all field mappings, or generate it by reflection code, or generate it in xpo.

The following dynamic code uses only list of tables and the fact, that ItemID has the same name:

static void Test_DictTab(Args _args)
{
    container tables = [
        tableNum(InventTable),
        tableNum(InventJournalTable),
        tableNum(InventJournalTrans)
    ];
    int i;

    void processTable(TableID _tableID)
    {
        SysDictTable table = SysDictTable::newTableId(_tableID);
        Common record = table.makeRecord();
        FieldID itemField = table.fieldName2Id(fieldStr(InventTable, ItemID));
    ;
        while select count(recID) from record
            where record.(itemField) == '001'
        {
            info(strFmt("%1 = %2", table.label(), record.RecId));
        }
    }
;
    for(i=1; i<=conLen(tables); i++)
        processTable(conPeek(tables, i));
}

Abstract macro

Recently published article about trick, whch I have often used in BAAN and sometimes in Dynamics Ax programming.

read the article at Axaptapedia

Two days ago I have added a new inventory dimension and was impressed how many work can be eliminated using this trick...

But don't overuse macros in can lead to less readability of your code.

One time I have used macros to build something like internal DSL to describe mapping of Ax tables to interface tables on SQL server and now one my ex-collegue claim it is unreadable.

Tabax 0.2.13

what's new
Summary: open application object for the currently selected item in AOT, some managebility and extensibility.
download

WordSL - Microsoft Word as a visual XSLT editor

Just uploaded a varsion of the WordSL - tool which lets generate Word 2003 xml files via XSLT - you don't even need to have a word on a server to provide a file generation.

details...

customization: do it smarter

If you haven't watched the video Dynamics AX 4.0 - Smart customizations - watch it! (especally if you are novice Dynamics Ax developer).

I can just add few thoughts:

First of all - this sceencast recommends to subclass existing class, but i thing there asre some cases when it is better to tweak existing class. The most often case - when existing class has bad structure (for example LedgerJournalCheckPost in 3.0 - i don't know about 4.0 so much). If you have one large method which does all you can not just overide it to add some functionality - you often have to copy all it's body to the child and tweak it. I you do so you will have more problems when upgrading to the next version: you have not only to upgrade method of existing parent, but to modify all copied parts of the child and there is no obvious clues to find what parts to modify.

Second, what can be done to make upgrades less painful:

• Interfaces - there havte to be more documented interfaces - so Ax devs will know what they can change and what cannot to make Ax backward compatible.
  
• Unit tests as part of Ax package - all unit tests developed by Ax team have to be shipped with Ax to enable partner or customer developers ensure they haven't breaked anything
  
• Events - SAP R/3, as i know, have concept of events - you have not to modify existing code to be informed about some thing ocuured in system - you just subscribe, say, to journal posting and can make extra transaction if you want. So your customisation code isn't mixed with the existing code.
  
• Better code structure - i think there is no excure for very big methods for example. Better code structure can be easy reused by customer programmers and can be seft documented and testable.
  

Go component

Just uploaded a new extension go component - this is like "go" tab from Sidax but standalone and integrated with editor via script.


I am using autohotkey macros to setup hotkeys for various actions and define Ctrl+Enter to go to selected component in the editor:

#IfWinActive, ahk_class AxaptaClientClassName
~^Enter::
     SendInput,{APPSKEY}sg
Exit

So you can, for example, edit the class declaration, click on the class name of the class the current class entends and press Ctrl+Enter - you see the parent of the currently editing class.

Tabax 0.2.11

The main new feature is the new button "Edit current field". Open, say, ledger accounts form from main menu, select "Tax group" field and click this button.

You will see AOT for StringEdit:Tax_TaxGroup.

I think this button fill be helpful for developers and consultants to explore axapta functionality.

more...

Bunch of Tabax extensions

There are some Tabax extensions occured last week.

• AxCreateNewProject from Ivan Kashperuk to create an empty project with two clicks


• Toggle SQL trace for switch SQL trace On/Off instantly with tabax toolbar button (it can be used an example of reflecting state of something via button image )


• Just a button to run the find dialog for AOT node quickly

AxPath is coming: Sidax 0.4 beta 0 + Tabax 0.2.10

download tabax | download sidax

There is the first AxPath implementation. AxPath let you store a link for some record in database or an AOT item in the form of URI and then send it to a collegue or open it. So, for example you can copy link to the some purchase order, send it to colleague and it will be opened by colleague (so purchase orders form is opened and positioned at specific order).

Now Tabax, and Sidax support this technique. I am planning integration of AxPath scheme in the system letting AxPath links to be embedded in the webpages, mails, etc.

so, in Sidax:

• you can copy AxPath of the menu item in main menu with right click
  
• you can navigate AxPath via "go component"
  

in Tabax:

• AxPath:
  
  • when pressing the "Copy" button it copies axpath of the current record to the clipboard
    
  • when pressing the «Ctrl+Shift+Copy» it copies AOT items, currently selected
    
  • if you insert axpath to the input box it navigates the path given
    
  
  
• now tabs are switched correctly under AX3KR3
  
• X++ calculator in the input box:
  
  • enter ?<X++ expression> and press Enter to evaluate an expression
    
  • enter ?<X++ statement> and press Enter to run a statement
    
  
  

I am going to implement "favorits" in the sidax based on AxPath

aggreg8.net - trying to aggregate all Dynamics Ax development blogs

Microsoft launched the new site for IT pros - aggreg8. I have'nt realized what it is exactly, but created the workgroup for Dynamics Ax and aggreated some development blogs there: view online

Sidax 0.3.7b14

download

changes:

• Autohide option at about tab - sidax will autocollapse when you move mouse out of it's window (thank to Blokva from AxForum)


• Images in the main menu - different menues

Sidax 0.3.7 beta 12

Axapta hangs when trying to exit from the thin client. Added workaround for this bug. Axapta will still hang if you login and then immediately close it, but I think this is a very rare case.

download

AxUnit2 updated

Some errors fixed, Tabax integration.

See AxUnit2 homepage

Two new blogs

I've found two new blogs about Dynamics Ax:

•  Flemming's weblog


• Kashperuk Ivan

Sidax 0.3.7 beta 11

download (35k)

• It can handle a project renaming correctly now


• Pause button at 'about' tab: you can stop the background processes so sidax doesn't affect profiler

PS: Axaptapedia is online again

Tabax 0.2.8

download 20K

What's new:

• Extensibility !!!: Now you can add plugins to Tabax: just create a subfolder \Share\Include\tabax\plugs and place bitmap with the following name _.bmp, where type of menu item, ItemName - name of an existing menu item and tabax will have an additional button with placed image pointing to your menu item (download table structure browser plugin for example)
  


• AxSearch: Tabax now have a new input box for invoke AxSearch from it

osalt - the site colleting open source alternatives to various soft

for example, http://www.osalt.com/photoshop - list of open source alternatives to to Adobe Photoshop

AxUnit2 -- primitive unit testing framework for Ax3

download (3k)

One more blog: Dave's Dynamics AX Blog

New technical blog dedicated to Ax4 and AIF

Axaptapedia is down II

Just contacted Andrew Jones via email:

Hi Max

Thanks! I'm on holiday for a month so hadn't looked at it. I'll see what I can do from outback Australia!

so it isn't fatal

Axapta sites search

Just created axsearch (using google coop) - customized search engine for Dynamics Ax Sites

Axaptapedia is down

So if you want to download tabax or sidax goto:

tabax 0.2.6

sidax0.3.7beta10.zip

Tabax, Sidax and KR3

Just updated Tabax for work with Kernel Rollup 3 - see homepage for details

Sidax has been updated also:

• MainMenu is cached now at first load - so you can work after Sidax start immediately (go 'about' tab for cache refresh button)


• 'House'option: you can add any number of windows to the sidax: for example I prefer to run current project window inside it


• When you click on minmized window in the 'window' tab of sidax it will be restored

Sidax 0.3.7 beta 5 -- AOT included

download latest beta of sidax. Changes

• AOT included!!! thanx top IPv6 from AxForum: all problems with built-in AOT was resolved so you have a sidax with AOT in it


• X++ calculator changes
  
  It can output objects and containers
  
  
  It gets sidax as parameter (try to run sidax.collapse())
  
  
  Small other changes
  
  

Tabax ported to 4.0 Axapta programming blog: practical HOWTOs: How to make Dynamics AX interface more user friendly with Tabax?

Yurii Rasskazov has ported Tabax on Ax4 see here:

Axapta programming blog: practical HOWTOs: How to make Dynamics AX interface more user friendly with Tabax?

[ann] Sidax 0.3.6 -- X++ calculator; Go component

Download from axaptapedia

X++ calculator -- evaluate X++ expression or run X++ statement


Go component -- enter component name and choose concrete component from list. You can enter path like "\Data Dictionary\Tables\VendTransOpen"

Tabax: sidax on other side

Tabax is a tabbed interface for dynamics ax

AOT VSS Integration

Just uploaded the project for integration Visual SourceSafe with Axapta to store AOT items.

We've used it for our current projects and it help us to find what and why changes was made.

I think it will be good to use something other than VSS, and it can be done - tool is based on the abstract classes, but now i have only VSS implementation.

GenerateParmMethods extension v2.beta

Just uploaded small fixes to the extension.

Read about the anges at axaptapedia, then download it if you like

ATTN!!! SQL Injection possibility when using literals in queries

I've found a huge security hole in Ax 3.0 SP 4 + MS SQL Server (i don't know about other versions, but i think it is possible with other versions too)

If you have the following database connection options switched on, users can execute any SQL Server query using user defined filter.

So switch off:

• Literals in join queries from forms and reports


• Literals in complex joins from X++

Dont't use forceLiteras in production environment.

It can affect performance but will protect your data

On toolbars

Palle Algemark has recently posted about toolbars imitation in Ax:

Custom toolbars in AX,
Activating a custom toolbar

I have something to add:

• if you want to do something with selected AOT items - use LastAOTSelection class (it's an iterator for last selected AOT items)
  
• if you want to do something with active form: sit on timer, get last active form from info class (method setLastActivatedForm),remember it it's not your toolbar form and use remebered value on button clicks

Undocumented syntax: raw strings in X++

While reading the Fred Shen post Create a method in runtime i discovered the undocumented feature of X++: raw (or verbatim strings). If you place @ before " you can:

• do not escape escaping characters


• make multiline string

so

str s=@"
     test\test
";

is equivalent to

str s="\r\n";
s=s+"     test\\test\r\n"

so it is useful when you want to make methods or AOT pathes (BTW why Fred uses string for pathers ("\\Forms\\Address\\Data Sources\\Address\\Fields\\AddrRecId") instad of raw strings (@"\Forms\Address\Data Sources\Address\Fields\AddrRecId")

see also

• verbatim strings in C#
• 
  
• raw strings in python

ParserClass and KOAN

Just finished an article about a ParserClass and added the new tool named 'KOAN'. It shows the structure of X++ code and lets to play with ParserClass and ScannerClass easily.

Sidax 0.3.5

Now you can download it (20k).

• if you press a small heart at the main menu you see only previously used menu items
  
• you can move you settings between databases (see 'about' tab)
  
• if you rightclick the project history you can delete projects from history nd copy names
  
• small visual improvements
  

What is Sidax?

Feed to read

Axapta specific

• Axapta Blog - Helmut Wimmer,
  Ax Developer from Austria


• Axapta Knowledge Village -
  full of press-releases but sometimes can be something useful


• Axapta Lessons Learned -
  the last post was in 2005, but worth to read


• Axaptapedia - it is not a blog,
  but contains recent changes feed. It contains information and nothing else.
  


• dynamics-ax.blogspot -
  it contain old useful posts but recent are dedicated to marketing opf something
  called "to increase"
  


• Dynamics AX Geek - contains some useful
  info for ax devs
  


• Harish Mohanbabu - Axapta MVP -
  - some integesting posts. His homepage contains
  lots of integresting things too.
  


• msdn:mbs -
  contains feed with recent articles at msnd about mbs products
  


• Palle Algemark - Microsoft
  developer from Ax team. Blog contains useful info


• Solutions Monkey
  - Microsoft employee blogging about MBS events. Not very useful, but interesting

Other

• .NET undocumented -
  if you interested in .NET, Office and other Microsoft technologies, subscribe to this
  


• Martin Fowler - OOP, TDD, XP
  and other smart things
  


• Joel - wise thoughts about software development,
  hiring of programmers, merketing and so on
  

Monte Carlo profiling

Axapta profiler is useful, but very slow (it can make your code 30x slower when enabled). So sometimes i use the following trick (it is like Monte Carlo method in math):

• run the job being profiled


• break it randomly and go to the debugger to see what is going on (Ctrl+Break then Shift+No)


• if you break often in some place, it can be hotspot

PS. Maybe, I simply do not know how to deal with profiler well, but it is hard to me to estimate real timing from profiler output. Maybe anybody can provide some tips for this?

MVP

I've got an MVP award. The main cause is my activity in erpkb.com, russian wiki dedicated to MBS ERP's. I have written lots of small articles about Dynamics Ax programming and I am collecting all bits of information which I see in the web.

The magic semicolon

Example

This X++ code compiles well, but have Two potential errors:

static void test(Args _args)
{
    int axcoder, axcoder1;
    axcoder=1;
    axcoder1=2;
}

This code is fragile. Try now to add the new type called 'axcoder'. Introduce a new class with the name 'axcoder', for example.

You will get a syntax error.

The problem is that designers of X++ decide to:

• allow variables and type with similar name (so it is not possible treate a type as a variable of the special type, lead to tableNum, classNum and other ...Num literals in X++, blocks to declare variables in any place of code and so on)


• do not lookahead deep enough to resolve this collision - so you and me we both able to decide that axcoder is not a class name here, but X++ parser does not (i am not sure its an easy task, but i think it is possible)

There is a common workaround for this situation: add an extra semicolon after the end of declarations like this:

static void test(Args _args)
{
    int axcoder, axcoder1;
;
    axcoder=1;
    axcoder1=2;
}

Now the code compiles well. But this is not the end.

Try to introduce a new class with the name 'axcoder1'.

Oops! One more syntax error.

The cause is the same.

Now let's split multivariable declaration to two;

static void test(Args _args)
{
    int axcoder;
    int axcoder1;
;
    axcoder=1;
    axcoder1=2;
}

This compiles well.

Conclusion

X++ developers didn't copy java accurate enough. The decide to reinvent the wheel so X++ is sometimes ugly. It allows you to compile code which become brocen if anybody introduce the class with a special name. I have seen examples of such fragile code even in sys layer code (see \Classes\SysLookup\lookupTableFieldRelation for example).

There are simple rules to avoid such errors:

• don't use multivariable declarations


• insert extra semicolon after declarations end (but you can ommit it if the first non-declaration is a keyword for example return)


• dont use simple name for classes ('i', for example) which can be name of the variable in existing code

Note on style

I prefer to keep extra semicolon as the first character of line so it help to delimit internal fuction from the main function body:

void test()
{
    void subFunction1()
    { 
         // body of subFunction1
    }
    void subFunction2()
    { 
         // body of subFunction1
    }
;
    // body of the main function
}

Sidax 0.3.4 - user mode sidax

Changes in this version:

• Its now safe to run sidax by end users -- checks for access to menuitems added; check for development rights at start removed


• now you can setup project window titles and timings by editing the 'class declaration' section of sidax


• window tab reflect window title changes


• sidax now uses default menu of the user instead the main menu

Ideas: AxPath protocol

Imagine that you have an ability to create links to everything in axapta: forms, records, classes, busines objects (for example orders). You can insert that link in the web page or e-mail and your correspondent can click on this link and open the item you linked to from browser or email client. For example you open Purchase order 'P0002', click the 'copy link' button and send a letter with words "look at order P0002" and sombody who have received this message can simply click on the link to open this order.

This document describe proposal to introduce that kind of links read more..

COM in Axapta

Just published article in the Axaptapedia in answer to post in microsoft.public.axapta.programming

How to make Sidax autostart.

If you do this, Sidax will start, when you login Axapta.

Open class Info and modify the startupPost method. Replace yourUserID with the name you log in to Axapta.

/*
No SYS code must exist in this method
*/
void startupPost()
{
;
    // ======== Sidax start: =============
    // check for user ID and ask for confirmation
    if(curUserId()=='yourUserID' && Box::yesNo('Run sidax?', DialogButton::Yes)==DialogButton::Yes)
    {
        // actually run sidax
        TreeNode::findNode('\\Forms\\Sidax').AOTrun();
    }
    // ========== end of Sidax start =============
}

Note: If you want to skip question, just remove:

Box::yesNo('Run sidax?', DialogButton::Yes)==DialogButton::Yes)