1. Office Business Applications for Microsoft Dynamics AX
Microsoft Dynamics AX 2009 Integration and Development with .NET Framework
Office Business Applications for Microsoft Dynamics AX
The goal of this presentation is to give an overview of Office Business Application technologies related to Microsoft Dynamics AX 2009
©2008 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
This presentation is for informational purposes only. Microsoft makes no warranties, express or implied, in this summary.

2. 4/2/2017 3:19 AM
Agenda
Introduction to Office Business Applications (OBA) for Microsoft Dynamics
Business Problem
Introducing Office Business Applications
Deployment
Development Side of Office Business Applications
Visual Studio Tools for Microsoft Office
Microsoft Dynamics AX .NET Business Connector
This presentation is divided into 2 parts. The first part covers basic information about Office Business Applications for Microsoft Dynamics AX: What are they, why do we need them, how to deploy them.
The second part covers the development process of Office Business Applications for Microsoft Dynamics AX: different ways of integration, integration with applications of Microsoft Office Suite: Word, Excel, InfoPath ,etc.

3. 4/2/2017 3:19 AM
Microsoft Dynamics AX 2009 Integration and Development with .NET Framework
Introduction to Office Business Applications
Introduction to Office Business Applications for Microsoft Dynamics AX
©2008 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
This presentation is for informational purposes only. Microsoft makes no warranties, express or implied, in this summary.

4. ©2008 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
4/2/2017 3:19 AM
Business Problem
Recent research studies showed:
85% of employees in an organization are not licensed for business management systems
Of the 15% that are, just over half of them actually use it
About 93% of employees have no direct access to data regarding their business
The systems meant to enhance workflow and decision-making throughout the organization are left to a small group of power users, dramatically diminishing ROI
The above details some basic statistical information on employees' difficulties in interaction with Microsoft Dynamics AX.
It can be expensive for companies to provide each employee with license for a Microsoft Dynamics AX.
In some cases these systems are too complex and too difficult for an ordinary non-professional user to understand .
In such cases using Office Business Applications can save the situation, and even improve employees’ productivity.
©2008 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
This presentation is for informational purposes only. Microsoft makes no warranties, express or implied, in this summary.

5. Introducing Office Business Applications
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Introducing Office Business Applications
OBAs:
Bring together front office and back office
Make ERP systems more accessible
Make information actionable by information workers through the familiar, powerful, and ubiquitous Microsoft Office System
Built on the Office Business Application Platform
Microsoft Office
System
Line-of-business Applications
OBA is basically a collection of the best practices, guidelines, techniques, and patterns for building business applications on top of the 2007 Microsoft Office System and for Windows SharePoint Services utilizing both client products and technologies as well as server-side ones such as Windows SharePoint Services.
The major goal of OBA is to allow information workers to connect to and act upon business data from within their daily comfort zone.
©2008 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
This presentation is for informational purposes only. Microsoft makes no warranties, express or implied, in this summary.

6. What are OBAs for Microsoft Dynamics?
Office Business Applications for Microsoft Dynamics are designed to connect information workers with Microsoft Dynamics information from within the Microsoft Office Suite
OBA
Office Business Applications for Microsoft Dynamics works as a connector between Microsoft Office 2007 applications, Windows SharePoint Services, and Microsoft Dynamics AX Application Object Server.
It is a combination of using Visual Studio Tools for Microsoft Office or Windows SharePoint Services and Microsoft Dynamics AX .NET Business Connector.
©2008 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
This presentation is for informational purposes only. Microsoft makes no warranties, express or implied, in this summary.

7. Microsoft Dynamics Snap
Microsoft Dynamics Snap applications are OBAs designed to connect Line of Business (LOB) systems with the people that use them through the familiar user interface of Microsoft Office.
Microsoft
Dynamics
Microsoft
Office
Suite
SNAP
Microsoft has developed some applications for Microsoft Dynamics AX.
For now, Snap add-ins are not available for Microsoft Dynamics AX The latest version of Snap-ins (Wave 2.0 pre-release which is available at codeplex.com/axsnap) works only with Microsoft Dynamics AX 4.0.
Perhaps, in the future, Snap-ins will be upgraded in order to work with Microsoft Dynamics AX 2009
©2008 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
This presentation is for informational purposes only. Microsoft makes no warranties, express or implied, in this summary.

8. Snap Applications Available Today
Allows you to…
From within:
Business Data Search
Search for unstructured data across ERP, CRM and SharePoint sites
Outlook
Business Data Lookup
Search for and insert Dynamics data into the document, spreadsheet or you are working on
Word, Excel, Outlook
Custom Report Generator
Export and analyze Dynamics data in Excel, upload changes back to the system
Excel
Timesheet Management
Report your time directly from your Outlook calendar
Vacation Management
Create, submit, approve/reject, and track status and history of vacation requests
Expense Management
Create, submit and approve/reject expense reports
Excel, SharePoint
Customer Journal
Capture customer data for offline meetings then upload any relevant changes
InfoPath
Business Data Search delivers powerful search capabilities that allow an information worker to search for information across Microsoft business systems including Microsoft Dynamics CRM, Microsoft Dynamics AX, and SharePoint Server portals from within Microsoft Office Outlook. The process is as simple as searching through .
Business Data Lookup allows an information worker to search for and insert Microsoft Dynamics AX or Microsoft Dynamics CRM data into a Microsoft Office Word document, Excel spreadsheet, or Outlook , all without ever having to leave the Microsoft Office interface.  The document or spreadsheet that is created can also be attached to the Microsoft Dynamics record for later reference.
Custom Report Generator enables an information worker to extract, view, and analyze data residing in Microsoft Dynamics AX or Microsoft Dynamics CRM as neatly formatted reports within Microsoft Office Excel. Creating a new report or editing an existing one is easy since the reports are generated from meta-data that defines what data to show, where to surface it, and what formatting to apply.
Timesheet Management allows an information worker to use his Outlook Calendar entries to submit timesheets without having to log into Microsoft Dynamics AX directly.
Vacation Management enables an information worker to use his Outlook Calendar to submit vacation requests without having to log into Microsoft Dynamics AX directly.
Expense Management allows an information worker to easily create, submit, and approve or reject expense reports in SharePoint, without having to log into Microsoft Dynamics AX directly.
Customer Journal enables a sales person to take an offline InfoPath record of all pertinent customer information to a sales meeting, access that information from his desktop, revise that information as needed, then synchronize his changes in the Microsoft Dynamics AX or Microsoft Dynamics CRM system once he is back online.

9. OBA Deployment Architecture
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OBA Deployment Architecture
Client Side
Microsoft Office
VSTO 2008
Office Add-Ins
Microsoft Dynamics AX NET Business Connector
This chart displays the deployment architecture of Office Business Applications for Microsoft Dynamics AX.
From the client side we can see Microsoft Office Applications, Microsoft Office Add-Ins which were developed with VSTO 2008, and Microsoft Dynamics AX NET Business Connector.
From the server side we usually have Microsoft Dynamics AX Application Object Server which manipulates business logic and data within Microsoft SQL Server.
Server Side
Microsoft Dynamics AX AOS
SQL Server

10. OBA Deployment Options
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OBA Deployment Options
Office Client-based add-ins:
Work with Outlook, Word, Excel, and InfoPath
Deployed via SMS or Group Policy
Versions specific to the Microsoft Office 2007 system and the 2003 Microsoft Office system
ClickOnce deployment technology
Office SharePoint Server-based add-ins:
- Built for Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007
- Support a single SharePoint Server deployment
Office Client-based applications are plug-ins for applications of Microsoft Office Suite from the technical point of view.
Windows SharePoint Based OBAs are ASP.NET solutions built for Microsoft SharePoint Server 2007.
New ClickOnce deployment technology allows the deployment engineer to simplify the process of installing and updating applications on a number of PCs by publishing them to Web server or to the network file share.

11. Retrieve Customer Information to Excel
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Demo
Retrieve Customer Information to Excel
Demo of integration of Microsoft Office Excel with Microsoft Dynamics AX by means of OBA.

12. Development Side of OBA for Microsoft Dynamics AX

13. OBA Development: Client Platform Investments
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OBA Development: Client Platform Investments
Open XML File Format
Enhanced add-in model
Customizable User Interface
Custom ribbon, ribbon designer
Custom task panes
Word
Custom XML, data binding
Excel
BI functions, server support
Outlook
Unified object model
Ribbon
Core
Features
Task
Pane
Application add-in
The figure shows how Mircrosoft Office Applications Ribbon, Task Pane, Application level add-ins work with Microsoft Dynamics AX.
Add-ins can extend the core features and the UI components by exposing them in different ways.
Open XML File Format:
Office Open XML (commonly referred to as OOXML or OpenXML) is an XML-based file format specification for electronic documents such as spreadsheets, charts, presentations, and word processing documents.
Customizable User Interface
Applications of Microsoft Office 2007 suite have a very flexible and customizable user interface.
Custom ribbon
The Ribbon Designer is a visual design canvas. Use the Ribbon Designer to add custom tabs, groups, and controls to the Ribbon of a 2007 Microsoft Office system application. Using Ribbon Designer is rather simple and plain.
Custom task panes
Task panes are user interface panels that are typically docked to one side of a window in a Microsoft Office application. The Microsoft Office applications enable you to create task panes by using add-ins. Custom task panes give you a way to create your own task pane and provide users with a familiar interface to access your solution's features. For example, the interface can contain controls that run code to modify documents or display data from a data source.
Word
Visual Studio Tools for Office (VSTO) provides project templates you can use to create document-level customizations and application-level add-ins for Microsoft Office Word. You can use these solutions to automate Word, extend Word features, and customize the Word user interface (UI)
The new file format in Word 2007 divides the file into document parts, each of which defines a part of the overall contents of the file. When you want to change something in the file, you can simply find the document part you want, such as the header, and edit it without accidentally modifying any of the other XML-based document parts. Similarly, all custom XML data is in its own part. Working with custom XML is easy. This allows you to generate documents programmatically with less code. In addition to being more robust and making it easier to work with custom XML, the new file format is also much smaller than the binary file format. The new file format takes advantage of ZIP technology by using the Open Packaging Conventions. This article walks through the structure of a Word 2007 document in this new file format.
Excel
With the right access to data, Excel can become an outstanding Business Intelligence (BI) system. 
Business Intelligence (BI) is the systematic use of information about your company and its business environment to analyze, report, predict, and manage business performance.
Mention a previous demo script as an example of OBA which is an MS Excel plug-in with additional elements in the UI.
Using Ribbon and Task Panes extensibility gives a developer a really great tool which allows him to modify the look of a Microsoft Office Application.
Outlook
To develop add-ins for Microsoft Office Outlook, you can interact with the objects provided by the Outlook object model. The Outlook object model provides classes that represent items in the user interface. For example, the Microsoft.Office.Interop.Outlook.Application class represents the entire application, the Microsoft.Office.Interop.Outlook.MAPIFolder class represents a folder that contains messages or other items, and the Microsoft.Office.Interop.Outlook.MailItem class represents an message.
Application Integration Framework
.NET Business Connector
Microsoft Dynamics AX

14. OBA Development: Server Platform Investments
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OBA Development: Server Platform Investments
Office SharePoint Server 2007
Excel Services
InfoPath Forms Services
Business Data catalog
Content management
Windows SharePoint Services
ASP.NET integration
Workflow support
Content types and meta data
Feature and solution deployment
Office SharePoint Server
Windows SharePoint Services
Office SharePoint Server 2007
Excel Services. Excel Services is part of Microsoft Office SharePoint Server Excel Services is built on ASP.NET and Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 technologies. There are three core Excel Services components: Excel Web Access, Excel Web Services , and Excel Calculation Services
InfoPath Forms Services. InfoPath Forms Services, as part of either Microsoft Office Forms Server 2007 or Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007, is a true multitiered system. The InfoPath Forms Services architecture includes Microsoft Office InfoPath 2007 and the XmlFormView browser control on the desktop. They communicate with the middle tier either directly or through the InfoPath Forms Services Web services, which in turn communicate with the underlying InfoPath Forms Services and Office SharePoint Server 2007 components.
Business Data catalog. Business Data Catalog, a new feature introduced in Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007, provides an easy way to integrate business data from back-end server applications, such as SAP or Siebel, within Office SharePoint Server 2007 without writing any code. This section contains overview information and step-by-step, how-to procedures for programming with the Business Data Catalog.
Windows SharePoint Services
Windows SharePoint Services are based on ASP.NET, leverage SQL Server for the storage of the content, and are a solutions platform. The platform has many enhancements to improve the role of Windows SharePoint Services as a platform for collaboration, document management, and business applications.
Workflow support. You can represent these custom business processes by using workflows. A workflow is a natural way to organize and run a set of work units, or activities, to form an executable representation of a work process. This process can control almost any aspect of an item in Windows SharePoint Services, including the life cycle of that item.
Content types and meta data. Content types, a core concept used throughout the functionality and services offered in Windows SharePoint Services 3.0, are designed to help users organize their SharePoint content in a more meaningful way. A content type is a reusable collection of settings you want to apply to a certain category of content. Content types enable you to manage the metadata and behaviors of a document or item type in a centralized, reusable way.
ASP.NET
SQL

15. Client + Server = Powerful Solutions Platform
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Client + Server = Powerful Solutions Platform
Dynamics AX
ISV OBAs
Office Business Applications
Custom OBAs
Unified Communication & Collaboration
Business Intelligence
Content Management
2007 Office system clients
Microsoft Visual Studio Tools for Office …
Open XML File Formats and Extensible Fluent Interface
Microsoft
Office System
Office SharePoint Server 2007
Search
Workflow
Business Data Catalog
Website & Security Framework
Excel Services
Office Communications Server 2007
Exchange Server 2007
This schema brings it all together. It summarizes what was discussed in the previous slides and reminds us that we are talking here of one solution platform. To connect
Microsoft Dynamics AX
.NET Business Connector
Microsoft Dynamics AX Application Integration Framework
Dynamics AX

16. Customers and ISVs Real-World Cases
4/2/2017 3:19 AM
Common OBA Patterns
Customers and ISVs
2007 Microsoft Office System
OBA Apps as a Reach Channel
Document Integration
Composite User Interface
Comple- mentary Document Workflow
Discovery Navigation
Collaborative Site
Application Generated Tasks & Notifications
Real-World Cases
The following are the most common Office Business Applications patterns.
OBA Apps as a Reach Channel
The main goal is to give more people access to the business data they need for their daily work so that they and the team they are working with become more productive and the organization becomes more agile! The 2007 Microsoft Office System is the daily work environment of many people. Use it as a reach channel to business data! Avoid isolated data islands and custom application front-ends that people have to master to access the data.
Document Integration
The main objective is to integrate business data into Office documents. How?
By generating or assembling these documents already populated with this data and exposed in certain ways in the document
By extending the Office clients to grab and expose the business data in an intelligent way so that users have direct access and can use the data to build better documents
Composite user interface
Office documents and pages in SharePoint = containers. In containers you have components (also called assets). Many assets are available OOB but can be built in a custom way.
Depending on the type of business application you can go for one of these subpatterns:
Context drive composite user interface patterns
Mesh Composite View Pattern
RSS and Web Services Composition Pattern
Analytics Pattern
Complementary document workflow
In real-world applications, people are involved in processes. In OBAs, these processes are document-centric. We need patterns to automate these document-centric processes:
LOB initiated document workflow pattern
Cooperating document workflow pattern
Discovery navigation
This is all about search – how to get access to the business data in an ad-hoc way by searching for it.
Collaborative site
This pattern is about the platform for collaboration and document management. SharePoint is that platform, and it’s extensible so that the business
processes can be supported.
Application generated tasks and notifications
Many LOB applications assign tasks and generate notifications for the end-users – this pattern summarizes the various ways of achieving this
Simple task & notification delivery pattern
Task synchronization pattern
Intelligent Tasks & notification patterns
Form-based tasks and notifications pattern

17. Technologies Microsoft Visual Studio 2008
4/2/2017 3:19 AM
Technologies
Microsoft Visual Studio 2008
Visual Studio Tools for Microsoft Office 2007
New InfoPath form or Project/Excel/Word Add-Ins
Add controls in forms, write event handlers
Microsoft Dynamics AX 2009 AIF or Business Connector
Used to interface with Microsoft Dynamics AX 2009
This is a list of technologies that are used by OBAs for Microsoft Dynamics AX: Visual Studio Tools for Microsoft Office, Microsoft Dynamics .NET business connector. On the following slides there is more detailed information about each technology.
Visual Studio Tools for Microsoft Office 2007 allows one to create Microsoft Office Add-Ins without applying considerable effort and expenses.
Microsoft Dynamics AX 2009 Business Connector allows one to manipulate business logic.

18. What is VSTO? Makes Office a valuable, first-class project type in VS
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What is VSTO?
Makes Office a valuable, first-class project type in VS
Enables developers to create and extend OBA
Enables developers to leverage key Office UI features and support collaboration and workflow
Provides Office developers with advantages of the VS professional development environment
Allows developers to leverage existing programming skills
Developers can leverage their company’s current investment in Office 2003 Pro and new investment in 2007 Office system
Visual Studio Tools for Office enables developers to leverage Visual Studio and the Microsoft Office platform to build scalable line-of-business solutions based on Microsoft Office.
Microsoft Visual Studio Tools for the Microsoft Office system (version 3.0) can help you extend applications in Microsoft Office 2003 and the 2007 Microsoft Office system by using Visual Basic and Visual C#. The tools include Visual Studio projects to help you start creating an Office Business Application (OBA).
Microsoft Office offers a platform that provides many possibilities for application development using managed code. Visual Studio and the Microsoft .NET Framework provide Rapid Application Development (RAD) programming capabilities that help you create Office-based solutions to suit a variety of business needs.

19. 4/2/2017 3:19 AM
Some Examples
A few screenshots of different VSTO sample applications.
Using such VSTO functionality as Ribbon Designer and Custom Task Panes, developer can change the entire look of Microsoft Office Applications, as you can see on these screenshots.

20. Visual designers for key UI features
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Basic Features of VSTO
Visual designers for key UI features
Workflow and Microsoft SharePoint support
Data-bound Word Content Controls
App-level add-ins for most client programs
Doc-level add-ins for Excel and Word 2007
ClickOnce deployment and security
Visual Designer for key UI features
With new Microsoft Visual Studio you can modify ribbon and create custom task panes by using visual designer features.
Workflow and Microsoft SharePoint support
Visual Studio Tools for Office provides tools to help you create custom workflow templates that manage the life cycle of documents and list items in a SharePoint Web site. The tools include a designer, a complete set of drag-and-drop activity controls, and the necessary assembly references. Visual Studio Tools for Office also includes the New Office SharePoint Workflow wizard, which significantly reduces the configuration steps that are required to debug the workflow template in Visual Studio.
Content Controls
Content controls provide a UI that is optimized for both user input and printed versions of the document. When you add a content control to a document, the control is identified by a border, a title, and temporary text that can provide instructions to the user. The border and the title of the control do not appear in printed versions of the document.
App-level add-ins for most client programs, Doc-level add-ins for Excel and Word 2007
Visual Studio Tools for Office has several types of projects that support different business scenarios for Microsoft Office 2003 and the 2007 Microsoft Office system, including the following types: Document-level customizations, Application-level add-ins, SharePoint workflows.
ClickOnce deployment and security
Visual Studio Tools for Office solutions are deployed using ClickOnce deployment technologies. ClickOnce is designed to simplify solution deployment and maintenance.
Deploying an Office Solution
When you deploy an Office solution, you can use the Publish Wizard or the Publish property page to configure the deployment settings.

21. Basic Features of VSTO 4/2/2017 3:19 AM
Here we show the possibility of creating a custom ribbon for Office Business Application in VS One of the new features of VS 2008 is an advanced GUI designer which allows you to create a custom user interface of an Office add-in just by dragging-and-dropping.
First image shows the New Project window of Visual Studio As you can see, there are new types of projects: Excel Add-in, Word Add-in, Outlook Add-in, etc.
The second one displays a new GUI editor that allows modification of Microsoft Office 2007 Ribbon without additional efforts.
The third screenshot displays a part of the Toolbox with some content controls.

22. Ribbon Designer Ribbon Editor Ribbon Control Property Grid Toolbox
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Ribbon Designer
Ribbon Editor
Ribbon Control
Toolbox
Property Grid
The ribbon Designer consists of 3 windows: Toolbox, Ribbon Editor, and Property Grid. Toolbox contains controls that can be used in Ribbon and Task Pane. Editor allows one to edit Ribbon by draging controls from Toolbox.
The Ribbon Designer is a visual design canvas. Use the Ribbon Designer to add custom tabs, groups, and controls to the Ribbon of the 2007 Microsoft Office system application.
Designing a Ribbon
There are three ways to open the Ribbon Designer from the Solution explorer. You can:
Double-click the Ribbon code file.
Right-click the Ribbon code file, and then click View Designer.
Select the Ribbon code file, and then click Designer on the View menu.
The Ribbon Designer contains a default tab and group, which can be removed, if needed. To remove the default group, right-click Group1, and then click Delete. To remove the default tab, right-click an empty area of the design surface, and then click Remove Ribbon Tab.
You can also add new tabs, groups, and controls to the Ribbon Designer. You can find these controls in the Toolbox, in the Office Ribbon Controls group. There are three ways to add controls from the Office Ribbon Controls group to the Ribbon Designer:
Drag a control to the appropriate area on the Ribbon Designer.
Click a control, and then click an appropriate area in the Ribbon Designer.
Select an appropriate area in the Designer, and then double-click a control in the Toolbox

23. VSTO Runtime Components
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VSTO Runtime Components
VSTO Runtime
Office Host
Unmanaged Runtime Loaders
DefaultDomain
Managed Runtime
Check security
Fetch updates
Create appdomain
Connect Office host
AppDomain #2
Usercode
Add-in/
Doc customization
AppDomain #3
Usercode
Add-in/
Doc customization
Host item controls
Managed controls
On this figure process of VSTO Runtime process is displayed.
As you can see, Office Host connects to Visual Studio Tools for Microsoft Office Runtime, which consist of 2 parts: Unmanaged Runtime loaders and Default domain.
Managed Runtime runs within default domain and is used for checking security, fetching updates, and appdomains creation. Also within Managed Runtime, item controls and managed controls are hosted.

24. 4/2/2017 3:19 AM
Building Task Panes
Deliver additional data to the user to act upon or integrate within Office documents
OBA Intelligent Document Pattern
Two types of panes:
Actions Pane
Associated with a specific Word or Excel document
Custom Task Pane:
The same general idea as Actions Pane, only on the application add-in level, not an individual document
Task panes are user interface panels that are typically docked to one side of a window in a Microsoft Office application. The Microsoft Office applications enable you to create task panes by using add-ins. Custom task panes give you a way to create your own task pane and provide users with a familiar interface to access your solution's features.
Benefits of Custom Task Panes
Custom task panes let you integrate your features into a familiar user interface. You can create a custom task pane quickly by using Visual Studio tools.
Familiar User Interface
Users of applications in the Microsoft Office system are already familiar with using task panes such as the Styles and Formatting task pane in Word. Custom task panes behave like other task panes in the Microsoft Office system. Users can dock custom task panes to different sides of the application window, or they can drag custom task panes to any location in the window. You can create an add-in that displays multiple custom task panes at the same time, and users can control each task pane individually.
Windows Forms Support
The user interface of a custom task pane that you create by using Visual Studio Tools for Office is based on Windows Forms controls. You can use the familiar Windows Forms Designer to design the user interface for a custom task pane. You can also use the data binding support in Windows Forms to bind a data source.

25. Task Pane Persistence Models
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Task Pane Persistence Models
Actions Pane
Custom Task Pane
Actions Pane
Associated with both documents and document projects
Document is open – task pane is available
Document is closed – task pane is gone
Custom Task Pane
Associated with window frame and app-level add-in
Available when the solution invokes it for each individual window frame separately
Destroyed when the window is closed
More flexible than Actions Pane, but requires different coding techniques between MDI and SDI applications
MDI is trivial (Excel, PowerPoint)
SDI is much harder (Word, Outlook, InfoPath)

26. How to Program Ribbon and Task Pane Interaction
Implement a custom task pane
Declare global variable which will indicate state of your task pane visibility in ThisAddin class
Implement methods which will manipulate your task pane in ThisAddin class:
Implement Ribbon callbacks in your Ribbon class
Toggle task pane visibility inside “Click” handler of RibbonToggleButton control
AddTaskPane method:
ctpCustTaskPane = this.CustomTaskPanes.Add(new CustTaskPane(), "Caption");
ctpCustTaskPane.VisibleChanged += new EventHandler(CustTaskPane_VisibleChanged);
ctpCustTaskPane.Visible = true;
RemoveTaskPane method:
this.CustomTaskPanes.Remove(ctpCustTaskPane);
To add a custom task pane to an application
Open or create an application-level project for one of the applications in the 2007 Microsoft Office system.
On the Project menu, click Add User Control.
In the Add New Item dialog box, change the name of the new user control to CustTaskPane, and then click Add. The user control opens in the designer.
Open the ThisAddIn.cs code file.
Add the following code to the ThisAddIn class. This code declares instances of CustomTaskPane as member of the ThisAddIn class.
public Microsoft.Office.Tools.CustomTaskPane ctpCustTaskPane;
Add the following code to the ThisAddIn_Startup event handler. This code creates a new CustomTaskPane by adding the MyUserControl object to the CustomTaskPanes collection. The code also displays the task pane:
ctpCustTaskPane = this.CustomTaskPanes.Add(new CustTaskPane(), "Caption"); // Add new task pane
ctpCustTaskPane.VisibleChanged += new EventHandler(CustTaskPane_VisibleChanged); // Add new event handler
ctpCustTaskPane .Visible = true; // Make task pane visible

27. Outlook Form Regions Additive UI enhances Outlook’s built-in forms
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Outlook Form Regions
Additive UI enhances Outlook’s built-in forms
Adjoining and Separate Regions for both custom and built-in forms
Regions are created in Outlook Forms Designer
Forms solution implemented via Add-in
Deployment via Windows registry
You can use form regions to customize Microsoft Office Outlook forms. Visual Studio Tools for Office provides advanced tools that make it easier for you to design, develop, and debug form regions.
Advantages of Using Form Regions
Form regions offer many enhancements over traditional Outlook forms development:
Customize the default page of any standard form.
Add up to 12 extra pages to any standard form.
Replace or enhance any standard form.
Display custom UI in the Reading Pane and in Inspectors.
Form regions support Microsoft Forms 2.0 controls, some third-party ActiveX controls, and Microsoft Office Outlook controls.

28. 4/2/2017 3:19 AM
Outlook Form Regions
VSTO 3.0 simplifies and speeds up Outlook form region design and configuration process with a visual designer and a wizard
Achieve maximum form region design flexibility with VS visual designer
Configure your form region with a simple, intuitive wizard
Run and debug your form region right from VS (F5)
No need to manually handle manifest XML, OFS files, registry entries, etc.
Option to import Outlook-created OFS file
You can use the New Outlook Form Region wizard to design a new form region or import a form region that was designed in Outlook. Also, if you have a form region that you used in another Visual Studio Tools for Office add-in project, you can reuse it.
Creating a New Form Region by Using the Wizard
To create a form region, add an Outlook Form Region item to an Outlook add-in project. This starts the New Outlook Form Region wizard.
Use the wizard to indicate whether you want to design a new form region or import an existing one designed in Outlook.
Next, specify the type of form region you want to create.
You can also use the wizard to specify display conditions and to select the type of form to extend.
The selections that you make in the wizard affect the options available in other wizard pages. For example, if you select Adjoining or Separate on the Create a New Outlook Form Region screen, the Title and Description fields will be unavailable on the Supply descriptive text and select your display preferences screen. This is because Outlook does not use these fields when displaying an adjoining or separate form region.

29. 4/2/2017 3:19 AM
VSTO Deployment
The deployment process involves the following considerations:
Office solution requirements
Deploying an Office solution
Installing an Office solution
Updating an Office solution
ClickOnce cache
Visual Studio Tools for Office solutions are deployed using ClickOnce deployment technologies. ClickOnce is designed to simplify solution deployment and maintenance.
The deployment process involves the following considerations: Office solution requirements, Deploying an Office solution, Installing an Office solution, Updating an Office solution, ClickOnce cache
Office Solution Requirements
Before your 2007 Microsoft Office solutions can run, a few components need to be installed on the computer, such as the .NET Framework 3.5 and the Microsoft Visual Studio Tools for the Microsoft Office system (version 3.0 Runtime). You can deploy these components along with your solution.
Deploying an Office Solution
When you deploy an Office solution, you can use the Publish Wizard or the Publish property page to configure the deployment settings.
Installing an Office Solution
After the solution is copied to the installation location, end users can download and install it. You can install solutions in several different ways: by running a Setup program, by opening the deployment manifest (.vsto file), by opening the document, or by opening the application that loads the add-in.
Updating an Office Solution
You can configure a solution to check for updates at specified intervals, and install updates automatically. The default setting for automatic updates is every seven days. You can deploy updates by using the Publish Wizard. The Publish Wizard generates a new application manifest and copies the solution files to the same publish location as the earlier version.
The publish action also updates the deployment manifest to point to the location of the new version of the solution. When the end user's installed solution checks for updates at the specified interval, it will download and install the correct version.
ClickOnce Cache
ClickOnce Office solutions are installed into the ClickOnce application cache. The ClickOnce cache is a family of hidden directories that holds all of the solution's files, including the assemblies, configuration files, application and user settings, and data directories. ClickOnce Office solutions use the same cache as Windows Forms ClickOnce applications. Links to other Internet or network locations can be opened while working from the ClickOnce cache, and the cached solution can also function as an offline mode. For document-level customizations, the document is not cached, and can be located on a user's computer or a network file share.

30. What is .NET Business Connector?
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What is .NET Business Connector?
Standalone Microsoft Dynamics AX component
Set of managed classes that provide easy access to X++ functionality in Microsoft Dynamics AX
.NET Business Connector is a Microsoft Dynamics AX component that allows external applications to interact with Application Object Server instances.
The .NET Business Connector provides a set of managed classes that provide easy access to X++ functionality in Microsoft Dynamics AX. The .NET Business Connector can be installed as a stand-alone component and is used to develop third-party applications that integrate with Microsoft Dynamics AX.
.NET Business Connector enables third-party applications to interface with Microsoft Dynamics AX as though they were a native Microsoft Dynamics AX client. Applications built using the Microsoft .NET Framework or ASP.NET can now interface with Microsoft Dynamics AX using the .NET Business Connector. The .NET Business Connector is integrated with Enterprise Portal and Web services. You can leverage the benefits of these other applications and services by installing the .NET Business Connector. Install and uninstall Business Connector using Setup.exe on the Microsoft Dynamics AX DVD. Business Connector is automatically registered when installed.

31. Characteristics Requires Microsoft® Windows® authentication
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Characteristics
Requires Microsoft® Windows® authentication
Automatically registered during installation
Can be used to implement and deploy both client-based applications, such as Microsoft Office add-ins and server-based applications
Has a Business Connector Proxy user, which "acts-on-behalf-of“ Microsoft Dynamics AX users who cannot be fully authenticated
Basic characteristics of .NET Business Connector
Authentication
To support integration with Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services and to enhance product security, the .NET Business Connector requires Windows integrated authentication.
Registration
The .NET Business connector library is automatically registered during installation so the developer doesn’t need to register manually.
You can develop and deploy client-based applications (OBAs for example) as well as sever-based applications which use SharePoint services.
Proxy User
The proxy is a Microsoft Windows domain account that enables Business Connector to “act on behalf” of Microsoft Dynamics AX users when authenticating with Application Object Server (AOS). You must set up and configure the proxy as described in this topic. If you do not set up and configure the proxy as described here, remote users cannot connect to Microsoft Dynamics AX using external Web application if the application depends on user impersonation in Business Connector.

32. Business Connector Architecture
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Business Connector Architecture
The Business Connector run-time interactions
Managed classes
Transition layer
Interpreter layer
Managed classes
Exposes public methods that can be called to interact with Microsoft Dynamics AX.
The Transition Layer
The transition layer is where the mapping occurs between .NET Framework objects and types and their Dynamics AX equivalents, as part of both request and response processing associated with the use of the Business Connector.
The Interpreter
The interpreter consists of the kernel. Dynamics AX allows code to be executed locally in the Business Connector AX kernel or remotely in the AX kernel of the AOS. The interpreter manages local and remote code execution. It also manages connectivity to the AOS and other infrastructure, such as session management and security.

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Managed Classes
The following managed classes are provided by the .NET Business Connector:
Axapta
• AxaptaBuffer
• AxaptaContainer
• AxaptaObject
• AxaptaRecord
• VariantWrapper
These are the managed classes that are provided by .NET Business Connector:
Axapta Class
The Axapta class provides the ability to connect to the Microsoft Dynamics AX system, create Microsoft Dynamics AX classes, create Microsoft Dynamics AX record, container, and buffer objects, execute transactions, and perform other Microsoft Dynamics AX system tasks. The Axapta class also contains methods to call static class methods, static table methods, jobs, and TTS commands.
AxaptaBuffer Class
The AxaptaBuffer class provides the ability to add data to and retrieve data from a Microsoft Dynamics AX buffer. An AxaptaBuffer object can be used with AxaptaContainer objects.
AxaptaContainer Class
The AxaptaContainer class provides the ability to read and write to and from Microsoft Dynamics AX containers.
AxaptaObject Class
The AxaptaObject class provides the ability to call Microsoft Dynamics AX class methods.
AxaptaRecord Class
The AxaptaRecord class provides functionality for reading and modifying Microsoft Dynamics AX records.
All of these classes (except Axapta) have a corresponding NotValidException class (eg. AxaptaContainerNotValidException). There are 27 exception or invalid classes available in the
Microsoft.Dynamics.BusinessConnectorNet namespace. For more information on these classes, see the Microsoft Dynamics AX .NET Framework topic in the Developing for Microsoft Dynamics AX help book within the application.
All these classes are found in the namespace:
Microsoft.Dynamics.BusinessConnectorNet, and assembly
Microsoft.Dynamics.BusinessConnectorNet (in
microsoft.dynamics.businessconnectornet.dll which is
located in the Bin directory in the Microsoft Dynamics AX Client directory)

34. Examples of Usage Declare variable instance of Axapta class
Axapta ax = new Axapta();
ax.Logon(CompanyName, Language ,ObjectServerName,Configuration);
ax.Logoff();
Declare variable instance of Axapta class
Call Logon() method. Parameters are: name of company, language, Applciation
Object Server name, and path to configuration file. For default values pass null
Logoff method disconnects from AOS
Line by line programming .NET Business Connector in C#:
Connecting to Application Object Server:
Create a new instance of the Axapta class.
To log on, call the Logon method. This method receives the following parameters: company name, default language, Microsoft Dynamics AX Application Object Server name, and path to configuration file. If you want to use default values , pass null
To log off, call the Logoff method of your instance.
Example of making request to AOS:
Create a new instance of the AxaptaRecord class and assign a value of ax.CreateAxaptaRecord(“NameOfTable");
Call the ExecuteStmt method. Pass the query string as a parameter.
AxaptaRecord axRecord = ax.CreateAxaptaRecord("InventTable");
axRecord.ExecuteStmt("select * from %1 where %1.ItemGroupId == 'RawMat'");
Declare variable instance of AxRecord class
ExecuteStmp receives x++ statement and executes it

35. Example of Realization…
using Microsoft.Dynamics.BusinessConnectorNet;
Axapta ax;
String invItemNameField = "ItemName";
Object invItemName;
String invItemIdField = "ItemId";
Object invItemId;
// Log on.
ax = new Axapta();
try {
ax.Logon(null, null, null, null); }
catch (Exception)
Console.WriteLine("Exception occurred");
Console.WriteLine("*** List inventory item records");
AxaptaRecord axRecord = axCreateAxaptaRecord("InventTable");
// Execute a query.
axRecord.ExecuteStmt("select * from %1 where %1.ItemGroupId == 'RawMat'");
// Loop through matching Dynamics AX records.
while (axRecord.Found)
invItemName = axRecord.get_Field(invItemNameField);
invItemId = axRecord.get_FieldinvItemIdField);
Console.WriteLine(invItemId + "\t“ + invItemName);
axRecord.Next();
axRecord.Dispose();
// Log off of Dynamics AX.
ax.Logoff();
This is the simplest example of using Microsoft Dynamics AX .NET Business Connector.
Here are the important aspects of the code example:
Variables are declared to store the Dynamics AX record data that you will retrieve and to hold the field names used.
Authentication is the same as in the HelloWorld example.
To begin working with a specific type of Dynamics AX record, you must first instantiate an AxaptaRecord object and provide the name or ID of the record as an argument.
A query is executed against the Dynamics AX record using ExecuteStmt, which parses the query syntax and replaces the substitution variable (%1) with the name of the record. The query syntax is of a generic form. Dynamics AX executes the query with the exact syntax appropriate for the database being used, whether it is Microsoft SQL Server or Oracle.
A while loop cycles through the records returned from Dynamics AX, which uses another method on AxaptaRecord called Found to determine that matching records exist.
For each record, get_Field() retrieves each of the field values and assigns a value to the appropriate variable declared earlier.
To proceed to the next record, the Next() method is called.
The AxaptaRecord object instance is disposed of to release any unmanaged resources associated with it, and Logoff() is called to terminate the session.
You can also invoke X++ business logic directly from the .NET Business Connector.

36. Sources of Additional Information
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Sources of Additional Information
Office Business Applications Developer Portal
Office Solution Development Overview
Office Solution Architecture Overview
.NET Business connector
A few links for developers in order to keep in touch with the latest articles and news about OBA.

37. Demo Develop OBA for Microsoft Dynamics AX 4/2/2017 3:19 AM
Demonstration of a new OBA development.

38. 4/2/2017 3:19 AM
Q&A

39. Introducing the Lab In this lab you will:
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Introducing the Lab
In this lab you will:
- Create a new VSTO project based on Excel 2007 add-in template
- Create custom task pane
- Create connector class for Microsoft Dynamics AX and Excel integration
- Create new Excel template

40. 4/2/2017 3:19 AM © 2008 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
This presentation is for informational purposes only. Microsoft makes no warranties, express or implied, in this summary.