Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2009 Programming Cookbook

Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2009 Programming Cookbook

By : Matthew Traxinger

Buy this Book

Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2009 Programming Cookbook

By: Matthew Traxinger

Buy this Book

Overview of this book

Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2009 is a business management solution that helps simplify and streamline highly specialized business processes such as finance, manufacturing, customer relationship management, supply chains, analytics, and electronic commerce for small and medium-sized enterprises. ERP systems like NAV thus become the center of a company's day-to-day operations. When you learn to program in an environment like this it opens up doors to many other exciting areas like .NET programming, SQL Server, and Web Services.Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2009 Programming Cookbook will take you through interesting topics that span a wide range of areas such as integrating the NAV system with other software applications like Microsoft Office, creating reports to present information from multiple areas of the system, and so on. You will not only learn the basics of NAV programming, but you will also be exposed to the technologies that surround the NAV system such as .NET programming, SQL Server, and Web Services.The first half of the cookbook will help programmers coming to NAV for the first time by walking them through the building blocks of writing code and creating objects like tables, forms, and reports. The second half focuses on using the technologies surrounding NAV to build better solutions. You will learn how to write .NET code that works with the NAV system and how to integrate the system with other software applications like Microsoft Office or even custom programs. You will also discover some of the features of the Role Tailored Client including creating Pages and custom add-ins.

Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2009 Programming Cookbook

Credits

About the author

About the reviewer

Preface

Free Chapter

Strings, Dates, and Other Data Types

Introduction

Retrieving the system date and time

Retrieving the work date

Determining the day, month, and year from a given date

Converting a value to a formatted string

Creating an array

Creating an Option variable

Converting a string to another data type

Manipulating string contents

Using date formulas to calculate dates

General Development

Introduction

Repeating code using a loop

Displaying a Progress Bar

Checking for conditions using an IF statement

Using a CASE statement to test multiple conditions

Creating a function

Passing parameters by reference

Referencing dynamic tables and fields

Using recursion

Working with Tables and Records

Introduction

Creating a table

Adding a key to a table

Creating transactions to alter data

Validating data

Retrieving a single record from the database

Using advanced filtering

Retrieving data using FIND

Adding a FlowField to a table

Creating a SumIndex field

Marking records for future use

Clearing filters, keys, and values

Using temporary tables to store data

Retrieving data from another company

Merging records

Writing your own rollback routine

Designing Forms

Introduction

Obtaining input without a form

Using the Form Generation Wizard

Changing text appearance

Preventing editable lookup forms

Adding an editable field to a non-editable form

Creating a matrix form

Creating a wizard-style form

Designing a form based on a temporary table

Updating a subform from a parent form

Updating a parent form from a subform

Report Design

Introduction

Using the Report Generation Wizard

Adding custom filters to the request form

Setting filters when a report is loaded

Creating a report to process data

Displaying a check mark on a report

Dynamically showing Sections on reports

Grouping data to display totals

Adding page totals to reports

Display page X of Y

Using virtual tables to loop through data

Adding a watermark to a page

Diagnosing Code Problems

Handling runtime errors

Using Client Monitor to diagnose problems

Finding errors when using NAS

Implementing Try / Catch / Finally

Roles and Security

Introduction

Adding roles through the User Setup table

Creating and assigning a security role

Using FILTERGROUP to restrict data

Checking for user-assigned roles

Checking Active Directory groups

Using security filters

Field-level security

Assigning menu suites based on company

Ending an idle session

Automatically adding users to NAV

Hiding values in Zoom

Leveraging Microsoft Office

Introduction

Using the style sheet tool

Sending data to Microsoft Word

Sending an e-mail from NAV through Outlook

Exporting data using the Excel buffer

Creating a data connection from Excel to NAV

Creating an InfoPath form with NAV data

Instant messaging using Office Communicator

Creating charts with Visio

OS Interaction

Introduction

Using HYPERLINK to open external files

Working with environment variables

Using SHELL to run external applications

Browsing for a file

Browsing for a folder

Checking file and folder access permissions

Querying the registry

Zipping folders and files within NAV

Integration

Introduction

Flat file exchange using dataports

Sharing information through XMLports

Manually writing to and reading from files

Creating a web service

Consuming web services

Sending data through FTP

Printing reports to PDF

Creating a custom NAS handler

Writing your own automation using C#

Using ADO to access outside data

Working with SQL Server

Introduction

Creating a basic SQL query

Adding the xp_ stored procedures

Understanding SIFT tables

Using SQL Profiler

Displaying data from a SQL view in NAV

Figuring out who is blocking whom

Setting up a backup plan

Scheduling NAV tasks from SQL Server

The RoleTailored Client

Introduction

Creating a page using the Page Generation Wizard

Building a Role Center

Changing default filter columns

Building the report layout

Interactive sorting for reports

Displaying a graph on a report

Displaying a .NET add-in on a page

Index

Customer Reviews

5 star

4 star

3 star

2 star

1 star

Converting a value to a formatted string

There will be many occasions when you will need to display information in a certain way or display multiple variable types on a single line. The FORMAT function will help you change almost any data type into a string that can be manipulated in any way you see fit.

How to do it...

Create a new codeunit from Object Designer.
Add the following global variables:

Name

Type

Length

FormattedDate

Text

30

Name	Type	Length
FormattedDate	Text	30

Add the following code to the OnRun trigger:

FormattedDate := FORMAT(TODAY, 0, '<Month Text> <Day,2>, <Year4>');
MESSAGE('Today is %1', FormattedDate);

Save and close the codeunit.
When you run the codeunit you should see a window similar to the following :

How it works...

The FORMAT function takes one to three parameters. The first parameter is required and can be of almost any type: date, time, integer, decimal, and so on. This parameter is returned as a string.

The second parameter is the length of the string to be returned. A default zero means that the entire string will be returned. A positive number tells the function to return a string of exactly that length, and a negative number returns a string no larger than that length.

There are two options for the third and final parameter. One is a number, representing a predefined format you want to use for the string and the other is a literal string. In the example, we used the actual format string. The text contained in brackets (< >) will be parsed and replaced with the data in the first parameter.

There's more...

There are many predefined formats for dates. The examples listed in the following table are taken from the C/SIDE Reference Guide in the Help menu of the NAV client. Search for "Format Property" to find more information.

Date	Format	Example
`<Closing><Day,2>-<Month,2>-<Year>`	`0`	05-04-03
`<Closing><Day,2>-<Month,2>-<Year>`	`1`	05-04-03
`<Day,2><Month,2><Year><Closing>D`	`2`	050403D
`<Closing><Year>-<Month,2>-<Day,2>`	`3`	03-04-05
`<Closing><Day>. <Month Text> <Year4>`	`4`	5. April 2003
`<Closing><Day,2><Month,2><Year>`	`5`	050403
`<Closing><Year><Month,2><Day,2>`	`6`	030405
`<Day,2><Filler Character, >. <Month Text,3> <Year4>`	`7`	5. Apr 2003
`XML format`	`9`	2003-04-05

Creating filters using other variable types

You will often need to create filters on dates or other simple data types. Usually these filters are not just for a single value. For example, a date filter for all values between January 1st, 2010 and January 31st, 2010 would look like 010110..013110. Because ".." is a string, and you cannot concatenate it with two date variables. Instead, you will have to convert those dates into strings and then place the filters together.

Take the CreateAccountingDateFilter function from codeunit 358, DateFilter-Calc. It creates date filters based on accounting periods for the exact scenario we are describing.

AccountingPeriod.RESET;
IF FiscalYear THEN
AccountingPeriod.SETRANGE("New Fiscal Year",TRUE);
AccountingPeriod."Starting Date" := Date;
AccountingPeriod.FIND('=<>');
IF AccountingPeriod."Starting Date" > Date THEN
NextStep := NextStep - 1;
IF NextStep <> 0 THEN
IF AccountingPeriod.NEXT(NextStep) <> NextStep THEN BEGIN
IF NextStep < 0 THEN
Filter := '..' + FORMAT( AccountingPeriod."Starting Date" - 1)
ELSE
Filter := FORMAT(AccountingPeriod."Starting Date") + '..' + FORMAT(12319999D);
Name := '...';
EXIT;
END;
StartDate := AccountingPeriod."Starting Date";
IF FiscalYear THEN
Name := STRSUBSTNO(Text000,FORMAT(DATE2DMY(StartDate,3)))
ELSE
Name := AccountingPeriod.Name;
IF AccountingPeriod.NEXT <> 0 THEN
Filter := FORMAT(StartDate) + '..' + FORMAT(AccountingPeriod."Starting Date" - 1)
ELSE BEGIN
Filter := FORMAT(StartDate) + '..' + FORMAT(12319999D);
Name := Name + '...';
END;

Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2009 Programming Cookbook

By : Matthew Traxinger

Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2009 Programming Cookbook

By: Matthew Traxinger

Overview of this book

Related Content you might be interested in

Current Title:

Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2009 Programming Cookbook

Converting a value to a formatted string

How to do it...

How it works...

There's more...

Creating filters using other variable types

See also