VSTS Add External User

How to Invite External user on your VSTS

One of my colleague was want to add external user in VSTS. but while he is trying to add external user and typing user name then only organization users are appearing in the drop down.

Resolution

Login to Azure Active Portal with admin right or contact you AD administrator

Go to Azure Active Directory 

Select Users Menu

Now click on New Guest User and save it.

Now login again to your VSTS and try to add users

Dynamics 365 Finance & Operation WebAPI with POST MAN

Dynamics 365 Finance & Operation WebAPI with POSTMAN

Most of the time we used 3rd Party tools like fiddler, Post Man and SoupUI as clients to consume web services.

In this blog i will explain, How can we use POSTMAN to consume Web-API by using Oauth2 Azure Authentication.


Step-1 Download the POSTMAN from this link.

Step-2 Register The Azure Application (Web API). You can follow this link

Step-3 Add the below URL in the Reply URL section https://www.getpostman.com/oauth2/callback. check the below screenshot.

Step-4 Once App registration completed Enter Application ID in D365FO

Reference screenshot

Step-5 Open POST man and navigate to Authorization Tab and select OAuth2 as Authentication Type.

Reference screenshot

Step-6 Click on Get New Access Token. A Popup will appear.

Reference screenshot

Step-7 Fill the required fields Like below

Call Back URL > You can't change this.
Token Name (As per your requirement)
Auth URL

https://login.windows.net/YourTenant.com/oauth2/authorize?resource=https://EnvironmentURL.operations.dynamics.com

Access Token URL
https://login.windows.net/YourTenant.com/oauth2/token?resource=https://EnvironmentURL.operations.dynamics.com

You can find the tenant from AX as well. Open D365FO Click on the Setting icon. you can find it the on the top right of the screen then click on about.

Client ID > Application ID You Registered On Azure Portal
Secret Key > Enter the secret key you generate against your Azure Application.

If you don't provide a secret key then a popup window will appear for login.

Reference Screenshot

Step-8 Click on Request Toke. Within 4 to 5 seconds you will get the Azure Authentication Token.

Step-9  Now select the Header value from the drop-down and click on USE token to add this token in your request.

Reference screenshot

Step-10 Navigate to Header Tabs for the verification of the Authorization token in your request

Reference screenshot

Step-11 Enter the Complete service URL and click on send. in my case, I have called getFoo service.

Reference screenshot

Please check the above screenshot. You will find the successful result 


Please feel free to contact me if you are facing any issues during the implementation of this blog.

VM Development server using LCS

Microsoft Azure using Microsoft Dynamics Lifecycle Services (LCS). This topic applies to deploying a development environment on Dynamics 365 for Finance and Operations

Let's Begin

Use this procedure to deploy a development environment on Azure using LCS.

Open your LCS project and click on the Hamburger icon of LCS Menu Bar and click on cloud hosted environment. 

Once the page is loaded then click on Add button to start the environment provision process.

Select Environment Type

There are two types of topology available on LCS, Demo, and DEVTEST.

In Our Demo, we select DEVTEST Topology.

In the very next step, you will find two options Build and Test and Develop Machine.

Build and Test

Select this option when you want to provide the environment for the Build machine.

There are only a few steps difference between both environments is only the configuration steps of build agent and TFS.

Important 

Microsoft highly recommends to don't use Build & Test for development purpose.

DETEST

This topology uses only for development purposes..

If you faced the below error, means the Azure ARM connector not define on your LCS.

Click on the hamburger icon again and go to the project set to add Azure connector.

Now select the Azure connector Tab and click on Add button, check the below screenshot.

Fill the required fields 

• Name 
• Azure Subscription 
• Azure Tenant Domain

Please check the below screenshot.

If you don't know your Azure Subscription Id then login to Azure Portal with Admin accounts, you also have the rights of Administrator on Azure AD.

Search Subscription in the search bar or you can find the path with the help of the below screenshot.

Click on Add and follow the MS ARM on-boarding blog. 

After completion of Onboarding ARM. GO to project setting Add Azure Connector and fill the required fields and click Next.

If your ARM Onboarding process is successfully completed a role will be shown to you. if this role is not showing to you then click on the Azure portal and follow the ARM instructions again.

If everything is showing as expected then click on next.

Click next Again and select your Azure region and click connect.

After completion of the Azure connector, Click on the hamburger Icon and click on cloud-hosted environment again.

Then follow the steps I mentioned at the start of the project. once you come on the below screen Enter the Environment Name.

for Advance configuration setting for Environment click on Advance settings.. below information will be shown to you. 

Select the configuration as per your requirement and click on close

Select the Machine Size and click on Next to finalize the provision. It will take 5 to 6 working hours in the environment configuration. 

I personally prefer the D4V2 Machine for development you can change as per your requirement.

Feel free to contact me if you are facing issues in the implementation of the above blog.

BYOD (Bring your own database) D365FO

What is BYOD?

The BYOD feature was released in Microsoft Dynamics 365 with platform update 2 (August 2016)

BYOD feature lets administrators configure their own database, and then export one or more data entities that are available in Finance and Operations into it.

The BYOD feature allows you to push data into a database that you manage on Azure or on-premises.

This is done with the use of data entities. This means you can use existing entities or build your own entities to structure the data how you need for your external database. As per MSFT, Currently, more than 1700 Data entities are available.

Objective 

You have data in D365 running in the cloud but you still have other applications that you run on-premise or somewhere else. 

So you need to get data from D365 into another environment so other applications can use the data. 

The most common use of BYOD is for data analysis and long-running reporting (Long-running reports are the pain point of AX)

Prerequisite

First Create a database on Azure SQL or on-premise SQL (You need static IP for connection)

How to create a Database on Azure.

Log in to the Azure portal

Follow these steps to create a blank SQL database.

1. Click Create a resource in the upper left-hand corner of the Azure portal.
2. On the New page, select Databases in the Azure Marketplace section, and then click SQL Database in the Featured section.

Fill out the below fields.

Click on a server to configure server for you newly created database a pop will appear to fill the required information 

Once the database is created on SQL or AZURE Then log in to D365 to configure the data source of the Newly created database. for Azure database detail please follow this link

AX Data source Configuration.



 Go to Systems Administrations > Workspace > Data management 

Click on > Configure Data Source and click on New

Now fill in the data source name and description and select the type Azure SQL DB.

Please check the below screenshot.

Now Go back to Systems Administrations > Workspace > Data management 

Click on > Configure Entity export to database

Now, click on the EDIT button to Edit the newly  created data source.

Enter Azure SQL / SQL connection string and click on validate 

Then enter the connection string of the Azure DB.

It should be in the format:

Data Source={azure.database.windows.net},1433;Initial Catalog={database};Integrated Security=False;User ID={userid};Password={password}

Configuration of data source is completed.

Now Go back to Systems Administrations > Workspace > Data management 

Click on > Data Entities

If Entities are not showing then go back to Systems Administrations > Workspace > Data management and click on framework parameters and refresh the entities 

After 2 or 3 minutes all entities will appear on your Data Entities List page.
Now select the required Entity which you want to export. 

Enable the change tracking for incremental Export.

Once Change Tracking Enable on Entity click on Publish then select your data source where you want to publish and click on publish 

A Job Will schedule like the below screenshot 

The message will appear once the job is complete and a table will be created for targeted DB.

Now Go back to Systems Administrations > Workspace > Data management 

Click on > Export Data 

Please make sure you always use Enhance View for Import and Export

Now fill the required fields Like Name and Select Target data format to your Data source, Default refresh type should be incremental then click on Add 

Once you fill all the required fields, You are ready to export :) Make sure you are exporting the data in batch for better performance.

After completion of data export, you can verify your targeted data source Like below screenshot

Please feel free to contact me if you are facing any issues implementing the above blog.