Great Plains Dexterity History and Programming Overview

As of now - Great Plains Dynamics/eEnterprise is transformed/renamed into Microsoft Great Plains and Microsoft Business Solutions is in process of merging all its accounting applications: Great Plains, Solomon, Navision and Axapta into somewhat granular: Microsoft Financials, Microsoft HR, Microsoft Distributions, Microsoft Project Accounting, etc. So the original design of Great Plains should be deemphasized. But even now - Great Plains is written on the programming language and technology, created in early 1990-th, named Great Plains Dexterity. And the graphical interface looks very user friendly and nice - these are all Dexterity forms and screens.

The original architect of Dexterity, Tim Brookins, pursued several goals, the main are these:

1. Engine, supporting graphical interface, which is computer platform independent - if you remember those days - the main competition was between Macintosh and Microsoft Windows. Mac was graphical and very popular, but Windows, backed by IBM cloning/platform openness was very dangerous competitor. The new engine was targeted to work on both: Mac and Windows. On the other hand - nobody could look at the future far enough to be sure that other competitors from both Hardware and Operating Systems sides not going to take over. This is why the graphical platform independent engine was required for the new type - Graphical accounting/ERP system: Great Plains Dynamics.

2. Database platform independence - initially Great Plains used Ctree (available for both PC and Mac) and Btrieve, later on with Microsoft SQL Server 6.5 Great Plains relatively easy introduced it as a new alternative: Dynamics C/S+ on SQL Server. Again - nobody could guarantee which DB will be a winner. Technically Dexterity could easy provide DB switch. Unfortunately - the necessity to support "cheap" databases, such as ctree forced Dexterity architect to use cursors or loops instead of providing aggregation, available on all SQL blends.

To resolve these goals, and following popular those days believe that C programming language is platform independent, C was chosen as the low level language to write dexterity itself.

This was the story, now to the practical side. You can install Dexterity from Great Plains 7.5 or 8.0 CD #2. Obviously it requires a lot of learning / training, but it allows your custom piece be seamlessly integrated with Great Plains interface.

1. Native Dexterity Cursors. Dexterity was designed as platform independent programming language and so if you want your code to be operable on all currently supported databases ? you use Dexterity ranges and loops to manipulate the records

2. Great Plains Dexterity with SQL Stored Procs Nowadays, most of Great Plains installations are moved to SQL Server ? so you can use Dexterity for custom forms drawing only and make the buttons run SQL stored procedures.

3. COM Objects calls. Beginning with version 7.0 Dexterity supports COM objects ? you register them as libraries in Dexterity. Refer the manual. This technique allows you to call such nice things as web services across the internet.

4. Dexterity Forms ? if you like VBA and are comfortable to do all the business logic in VBA ? you can use Dexterity as new forms creator/editor. This is OK ? but you have to purchase VBA/Modifier and Customization Site Enabler from MBS.

Some restrictions. Great Plains is actually integration of multiple dictionaries: DYNAMICS.DIC, ADVSECUR.DIC, EXP1493.DIC, etc. In your Dexterity customization you can deal with one dictionary ? DYNAMICS.DIC. If you need cross dictionaries customization ? consider using SQL Stored Procs for crossing dictionary borders and pulling data/making changes in the other dictionary.

Happy customizing! if you want us to do the job - give us a call!

About The Author

Andrew Karasev is Chief Technology Officer in Alba Spectrum Technologies ? USA nationwide Great Plains, Microsoft CRM customization company, based in Chicago, California, Texas, Arizona, Florida, Georgia, New York and having locations in multiple states and internationally www.albaspectrum.com, he is Dexterity, SQL, C#.Net, Crystal Reports and Microsoft CRM SDK developer.

akarasev@albaspectrum.com

---

Microsoft Great Plains: Customization Upgrade & Recovery ? Visual Studio VB 6.0

Microsoft Great Plains, former Great Plains Software Dynamics, eEnterprise has... Read More

Where to Find Free Fleet Maintenance Software

Costs of fleet maintenance software can vary widely. It is... Read More

S is for Spying, Surveillance -- and for Software as Well

Words we choose to describe things and phenomena often show... Read More

Microsoft Great Plains Integration Manager: Using Continuum ? Overview for Developer

Microsoft Business Solutions Great Plains has I'd say end user... Read More

Is Your Computer Sick?

Viruses and spyware usually show up on your computer one... Read More

40/sec to 500/sec

IntroductionSurprised, by the title? well, this is a tour of... Read More

Microsoft Great Plains Implementation & Customization: Computer Parts Retailer Example

Microsoft Great Plains fits to majority of horizontals and retail... Read More

Who?s Watching What You Type?

If someone entered your home, uninvited and installed numerous cameras... Read More

CRM 101: Customer Relationship Management for Beginners

Customer Relationship Management, abbreviated "CRM," is the term for a... Read More

Microsoft Great Plains Security Setup - Overview For Consultant

Microsoft Business Solutions Great Plains is very good fit for... Read More

Lotus Domino: Application Integration ? A Programmer View

There are two approaches for application integration:? Programmer's approach ?... Read More

Internet Relay Chat - A Basic Introduction

What is IRC?IRC is Internet Relay Chat. It is a... Read More

Great Plains Bill of Materials Setup & Customization for Process Manufacturing ? Overview

Microsoft Great Plains has full-featured Manufacturing suite of modules: Capacity... Read More

Marketing Your WinRunner Team

It won't matter how effective your WinRunner Team is if... Read More

Microsoft Great Plains IV: Inventory Management

Great Plains Inventory Management (IV) module gives your business a... Read More

Performance Tuning of a Daffodil DB / One$DB -JDBC Application

This article illustrates the best practices to improve the performance... Read More

10 Programming Tips

(1) Avoid using the same variable again and again for... Read More

Microsoft Great Plains on Ctree or Pervasive SQL ? What to Do ? Tips for IT Manager

As you probably know, when Microsoft purchased Great Plains Software... Read More

Free Microsoft Word Online Training Tutorial Resources

Microsoft Word is one of the most popular office applications... Read More

Free PDF Publishing Software

In a previous article, I wrote about OpenOffice... Read More

Microsoft CRM USA Nationwide Remote Support

Remember old good days when your company probably had Great... Read More

Did You Ever Want to Completely Erase Everything on Your Computer?

Did you ever want to erase everything on your computer?... Read More

Running a Program on a Remote Server Using SSH

How do you run a program on a remote server... Read More

Microsoft Navision Database Selection: C/SIDE or MS SQL Server - Overview For IT Specialist

There are certain pluses and minuses in both cases and... Read More

Can You Calculate Complex Financial Calculations?

Are you a whiz at calculating financial information? Not the... Read More

Do You Know These Facts About Spyware ?

Imagine something that follows you home and sets itself up... Read More

Exactly What Does FTP Stand for and What Can it do for Me?

FTP stands for "file transfer protocol". FTP is basically a... Read More

Microsoft Great Plains Implementation for Large Corporation ? Overview for VP IT

Microsoft Business Solutions Great Plains was historically designed to serve... Read More

Microsoft Great Plains Implementation ? Overview for IT Director/Controller

What is installation in the language of technology? Installation... Read More

Microsoft Great Plains FA: Fixed Assets ? Overview For Consultant

Great Plains Fixed Assets Management module is a robust tool... Read More

How to Make Own CMS

Every day millions of new web documents emerge on the... Read More

Microsoft RMS Customization ? PO Items Receiving in Great Plains

Microsoft Retail Management (RMS) and Microsoft Great Plains are retail... Read More

Guide to Software Marketing

Intro This concise article will tell you in plain English... Read More