I am currently leading the implementation of Office 365 for a crowdfunding portal for a UN agency. The portal features stories of survivors of human trafficking. Their cases are generated in Dynamics (for various reasons) and published to the user-facing platform. Each case comprises of a collection of records including various text fields which contain individual story points.
The problem: Those survivor stories are usually generated by teams on the ground but can be diplomatically sensitive.
As such each case needs to go through an elaborate review process to ensure that higher ups can propose changes to the case, make comments for specific fields. Each field can have several (1:n) comments/ change suggestions from n staff (not just one).
It was proposed to collate feedback in a field called 'comments' but this separates the input from the fields the comment was made about. We are now looking for a solution that emulates Word's 'tracking changes' feature.
Options considered but ruled out:
We are aware that Dynamics comes with an audit history module, but this usually requires changes/ comments to be displayed in a separate window which defeats the purpose.
Is anyone aware of a useful workaround which accomplishes one or several of the below:
Flags changes in a particular record per record and next to said record
Allows for said changes to be accepted or rejected by the Case owner
Supports workflow integration and user hierarchies.
Works in Dynamics (not Sharepoint... ... ...)
Any advice would be highly appreciated.
While I am all for creative uses of CRM, and CRM can store the data you're looking for, using CRM as a collaborative document editing system might be pushing the envelope.
Before you build out a custom document editing system, you might want to consider reviewing SharePoint, and some of the other document management add-ons that exist for CRM. While I have not implemented it myself, I have heard good things about LaserFiche.
You might also want to look into a 3rd party editor that provides "track changes" capabilities that you can embed in a web resource on the Case form.
I took a quick look and found this LoopIndex LITE plugin for CKEditor.
If you do go the custom route, here's a potential design for capturing the comments on a field-by-field basis:
Each field could have a separate text box where a user can enter a new comment about that field. A workflow could take that comment, turn it into a new "comment" record which would include the user, timestamp, and text. The workflow would also clear the box for the next comment.
You might also want to have this text box hidden by default for each field and have a checkbox called "Add Comment" (again for each field), which would show the new comment text box.
And you could consider having the new comment text box automatically populate with the original text, so the user can edit it rather than from start from scratch. This could be optional via an "Edit original text" checkbox or button.
To get really fancy you could run a text diff module to compare the updated text and the original, and store the new text as HTML, highlighting the differences.
The approval process would work off the "comment" entity. People could review each comment and approve or deny, with additional "meta-comments".
You could then have a web resource that would compile all existing comments for the field into html and display them under the field, formatted based on their status (i.e. pending review in black, denied in red, approved in green).
While I think this approach can be effective, adding a new field to the survivor's story would have some overhead. Another approach would be to create a Story Field entity and a Story Field Type entity. Let's say there are 5 fields now in the survivor's story. When you populate a story into CRM you'd create 5 Story Field records, each with its appropriate type. And, the Story Field entity would have a 1:N to Comments. This way, adding a new field to the survivor's story template is as simple as adding a new Story Field Type.
My proposal:
Use CRM incident entity or any custom entity as now hierarchy data can be maintained.
Parent incident is field collected record & child incidents can be used for tracking each feedback / comments / change requests from officials.
Build a custom approval mechanism using actions/workflow/plugins based on your team skill set. This can be invoked based on BPF stages in child Case.
On approval (child case closures) the values / comments can be rolled up / incorporated to the parent incident record.
Note: Multiple parallel feedback for overwriting changes can be a challenge, but approval business process flow should take care of this scenario.
Related
Background
Each Dataverse table contains a primary name column. When displayed in a subgrid, clicking on the primary name column will navigate to the form so that the user can edit that row. Most subgrids in my application work this way.
The Problem
I have a Course form with a list of participants displayed in a subgrid. The subgrid displays each student's name (as a link) and the grade received in the course. There is no appropriate primary name column for this Participant table. To edit the participant record, the user must select the row in the subgrid, then click the subgrid's Edit button. As a result, this UI is different from all other subgrids in the application and I know that user's will click the student name to try to edit the participant record and be confused when they are presented with the student record.
Am I missing something? Is there a better way to handle this?
It's a common problem I face quite often. Here is usually what I would do.
Make sure the Primary Name Column always contains relevant information to the user to be able to quickly identify a record. Sometimes it requires copying information from one or multiple other columns into the primary column.
In your case that would probably means concatenating the student's name and grade.
How to do that?
Common to all solutions below
Use one of the following solution to copy the content of one or several fields into the primary column.
Make sure the solution you select also updates the content of the primary name column when one of the copied field is updated.
Remove or hide the primary column from the form, the name of the record will be displayed at the top of the form anyway and you probably don't want users to play with it.
Display the primary name column in every subgrid.
I would recommend not adding the fields copied into the primary column in the subgrids to avoid confusion.
Solution 1 - Classic Workflow
Create a classic workflow that runs when a record is created / updated
Pros:
Very quick to put in place
Runs synchronously (users will see the name updated in real-time)
Cons:
Not very practical if you need to add business logic (using different fields as source depending on a certain condition for example)
Solution 2 - Power Automate
Create a Flow that runs when a record is created / updated
Pros:
You can implement complex business logic in your Flow
Cons:
Runs asynchronously (users will have to refresh the page after the creation of a record to see the record's name)
According to Power Automate licensing that flow would certainly be considered as an "enterprise flow" and you are supposed to pay 100$ / month. That specific point must be taken with a grain of salt. I had several discussions with Microsoft about it and they haven't given me a clear answer about what would be considered an enterprise flow.
Solution 3 - Plugin
Create a plugin that executes when a record is created / updated
Pros:
You can implement very complex business logic in your Flow
It can run synchronously
Cons:
Pro-code (I put it as a con since Model-Driven App is a low-code / no-code approach but there is nothing wrong about pro-code per say)
Developing a new plugin for each entity where you need this logic is kind of overkill in my opinion. I would consider developing something very generic that would only require some sort of configuration when the logic needs to be applied to a new table.
I have a custom parent entity named Artist which has a child entity named Album that I need to map to it. It would be an (Artist)1:M(Album) relationship in that instance.
Currently, on the artist form I have created a quick create form for adding albums to a subgrid. When I click save on the quick create form it creates the album. When user updates the "Finished" field on the Artist form and saves, I need to create an **AlbumSummary* record for each album associated with the Artist.
Im new to dynamics so not sure how to do this or if its even possible to do Out of the box.
This is definitely possible in Dynamics.
I suppose you would like to go 'no code' approach. Taking you data model in mind, this can't be easily done using workflows (https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/dynamics365/customerengagement/on-premises/customize/workflow-processes). Cause they don't do well on working with relationships. There are no queries and cycles through result records in workflows.
Your example may be a bit abstract, but still let's consider some business logic changes that make it possible to use workflows.
If it is one-to-one relationship between Album Summary and Album, then you can just incorporate that summary data in Album itself. And not use Album Summary entity at all.
Album Summary may be easily created on Album creation event. Also doesn't fit well exactly your requirements.
If these are not an options for you, then you will have to go with code approach. You will need to develop plugin or WF activity in C#.
If you are using D365 online with good license plan you can investigate Power Automate (no code) usage.
At the simplest form within Dynamics CRM, it's all about understanding what your triggering events are, and what actions you'd like to take. In your case, you've stated your triggering event is the user updating the "Finished" field on the Artist form. This feels like a bit of a code smell here. Just not sure what "Finished" means for an Artist. Most likely, you want this logic to take place either each time the user adds an album, in which case it would be the creation of the album that should be your trigger. If you'd like your logic to kick in for every album, only when the user chooses, then you might think about creating a ribbon button for this purpose.
Once you've determined your trigger you have quite a few options for performing your actions. Simplest for developers are creating plugin, that you deploy and register to run on the particular event (create/update) of the particular entity/attribute. Simplest for non developers would be a MS Flow (if online) or a Workflow.
So to answer your question, yes, it's supported, just with some supported custom logic.
I am new to CRM. I was reading here that there is a "convert lead to account, contact and opportunity". I understand how it would split the data from lead to account and contact, but I can't see ( from reading the Entity Metadata excel file ) where any opportunity information would be linked to lead.
If I understand your question correctly, you are looking for Originating Lead lookup in Opportunity entity record where the Qualified Lead entity record reference will be stored.
If you want to store more Lead record values into Opportunity record, you can use entity relationship mapping like explained in this blog.
Update:
If you don’t want to create a Contact when qualifying, you will need to associate the Lead to an existing Contact in Dynamics CRM 2015. An Opportunity will always be created regardless of which fields are populated on the Lead.
In fact, if you didn’t fill out a single field on the Lead form (none were set to ‘required’), and Qualified that Lead, you would create a new Opportunity with no information associated to a new Contact that also has no information.
Of course, you can use workflows to adjust these situations as required – e.g. if you never want an Opportunity to be created from a Qualified Lead you could write a workflow to delete the Opportunity on creation (checking to make sure the Originating Lead has a value).
Read more
I want to modify the view of 'Activity' entity, opened the view and try searching for edit filter criteria option and it's not available on view form.
please see below
Can you please help to advice me on how I can add filter criteria for this view above. Or how to make it visible the option 'Edit filter criteria' on the form of a view.
Any suggestion will be much appreciated. Welcome for any feedback...
I don't know any way to do that, but you can do your custom views and for example change the default view for that entity. With custom view you can change everything.
See here step by step: http://www.powerobjects.com/blog/2008/08/11/creating-and-editing-views/
What you want is impossible to achieve. Pedro's suggestion is your only option. Create your own Activity view, and then you can create your own filters. You definitely cannot create your own Associated Views. Public Views are the only ones you will have a hope of creating or modifying, and in this particular case, you are still restricted.
There are various places spread throughout CRM where you will run into problems like this, where an entity, view, or field is "locked down". This is the cost of starting with platforms like CRM which are a blackbox that only offer customization up to a certain point.
The problem in this specific case has to do with the nature of activities and the various activity types. Under the hood, there really is not a traditional record type for Activities. The Activity entity is really a "pointer entity" (note the internal name "activitypointer"). Activities really point to other entity types (in this case Activity Types) such as Email activities. The Email entity is more of a traditional entity which you can run standard queries against--but even still that is "locked down".
This additional layer of complexity makes dealing with Activities programmatically more difficult (ex. querying the data, modifying the data via a plugin/SQL, etc.) and, in this particular case, makes even the most basic customizations impossible.
I'm new to dynamics CRM, and I'm wondering if, and how, the following scenario can be supported:
When a record is created / updated, I want to be able to define how to find duplicate records.
If a duplicate is found, I want to be able to define automatic actions based on the new record's properties.
(for example- when a case is created, check for duplicate cases based on 'customer' and 'owner' fields. If a duplicate is found, then: if the duplicate case's status is not 'active' then go ahead and create a new record. otherwise- update some of the existing record's fields based on the new record).
The first part can easily be accomplished using duplication detection settings, but I don't think they allow for any complex logic when a duplicate is discovered.
The second part can easily be accomplished using workflows. however, I don't think that they offer conditions that check other records. I've looked into customizing workflows, but all I could find was how to customize actions, and not conditions.
Does dynamics CRM offer any solution to this type of scenario?
Yes, it does. You can accomplish this using CRM plugin. It should be Pre execution plug ins registered on Create and on Update events.