As you might imagine, since shipping Dynamics CRM 4 the product team has been hard at work designing the next major release. Over the past few months they’ve given a few sneak peeks at some of the more interesting platform pieces that they’re working on. Naturally I grabbed my video camera and got as much as I could. That’s all posted up on Channel 9 now. We also had a couple of excellent CRM “5” sessions at this year’s Professional Developers Conference (PDC). Those also are available for viewing. I’ve pulled together this list of videos for those of you that need a break from the holiday festivities. :)
Overview
In this first video I chat with Andy Bybee, Humberto Lezama Guadarrama and Allen Hafezipour all program managers on the CRM platform team thinking about programmability and the developer experience. We talked about some of the thinking that’s going into CRM “5” (that’s a codename, by the way). Don’t look for any schedule information in here; CRM “5” is still a long way away. We’re talking about this developer-focused stuff early to help developers with design and architecture as they think about future designs. The team is still committed to power of choice and so will continue to use the exact same code base across on-premises, partner-hosted and Dynamics CRM Online.
- Have a look at the video here.
Solution Management
One area that the platform team is spending a lot of time thinking about is solution management. We know that ISVs have numerous things to think about when deploying and we want to make that as simple as possible by introducing the concept of solutions. Think of solutions as providing to CRM the same sort of capabilities that Windows has with its capability to add and remove programs and features. The concept is quite powerful as it allows components to be layered on to the base system but also on top of other solutions (i.e. when there are inter-dependencies). It also provides a way to protect the intellectual property of the components in your solution and includes change management and versioning.
- Have a look at the video here.
Secure Code on the Server
Another area that the team is working hard to make even better is the deployment of secure code on the server. The current version of CRM allows code on the server (for plug-ins or workflows) and that code runs in full trust. That’s the primary reason why server code is not allowed on Dynamics CRM Online where you’re sharing the server with many other tenants. There are a number of different areas where you might need to write custom code on the server; for instance, custom workflows, custom web apps, plug-ins. It’s not hard to allow that sort of thing. Where it gets tricky is allowing developers to do that in ways that don’t compromise security and performance. The team has been thinking hard about what is needed to solve these types of problems (profiling, tracing, and managing security of numerous managed assemblies). They looked at physical (sandboxing) and logical (code access security) isolation levels and have come up with a plan.
- Have a look at the video here.
PDC: Dynamics CRM: The Appealing Business Application
Humberto Lezama Guadarrama presented this session. He walked through an introduction to building line-of-business applications on the CRM platform. I helped him out with a demo my team has been working on (starting at about the 23:00 mark). Humberto talks about leveraging Dynamics CRM in the context of cloud services including Windows Azure (starting at about 36:30). He also shows some of the new stuff coming in CRM “5” (starting at about 45:30).
Abstract: Have you ever built a business application that people actually enjoy using? Learn how you can build appealing business applications using the Microsoft Dynamics CRM product and its application constructs, including the client-side compositing framework, page layout, and forms. See how Dynamics CRM adds value as a rapid application development solution with integration into cloud platform services
- Have a look at the video here.
PDC: Rapid Business Application Development with Dynamics CRM
Andrew Bybee and Nirav Shah presented this 400-level session. In it they show how Dynamics CRM can be used for rapid development of business applications. In it they show some of the new capabilities for extending business logic in Dynamics CRM “5” (starting at about 16:00). They focus primarily on the platform so not so much on the sales, service, and marketing applications but more on the underlying platform or what we often call xRM. They pulled in Shan McArthur from ADXSTUDIO to demonstrate a new solution that his team has been working on (starting at about 43:30). BTW, on my blog I have another video with Shan explaining what he learned while building this Windows Azure/Dynamics CRM app.
Abstract: Learn how the next version of the Microsoft Dynamics CRM data model can be manipulated through meta data. See how to add custom business logic, including plug-ins and custom messages for Microsoft Dynamics CRM entities.
- Have a look at the video here.
Cheers,
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