@ Convergence 2007: Diary

Waldo

Convergence 2007 Diary: General NAV Session (Partner Day)

Source: my Blog

I'm attending this year's Convergence EMEA in Copenhagen as well. Last year, in Munchen, it was my first convention which was a very positive experience. This year, I have the chance to attend Convergence as MVP. This involves for me some work (MVP Kiosk, Information Desk, ...). I wonder what it's going to involve.

As a partner, I have the chance to participate on Partner Day as well, where I am now following the General Session about Dynamics NAV.

Off course, Jan Silleman made some time to explain what the delay of Dynamics NAV 6.0 involves.

First of all, a new code name: 6.0 . This version is going to be a major release, so 5.1 made no sense at all. I think we all agree.

Second, as you know, the new release date will be Q4 CY2008 for W1 version.

Next, there is more time for readiness, and there are a few initiatives as well:

ISV Beta Access Program (where we (iFacto) are participating in as well)
Technical peview ... Which is promised the first half of 2008 to all partners (I sure as hall hope it'll not be second half of first half).
TAP program with "go-live" customers (don't know yet what this means (didn't hear it) but I'll try to get some more info)
If you wondered ... there is going to be an Update Statement of Directions (makes sense...).

Then ... A new announcement: NAV 5.0 SP1 that contains a number of improvements:

SQL performance: index hinting and other improvements
Planning engine: re-doing the planning engine to make it easier to use/understand/maintain
Costing: Some more improvements
Mobile solutions. From what I've seen, the Mobile Framework works on NAV... But also this is not clear after this general session.

Documentation. What is there to say about documentation. Not much, but one very nice thing will be that the Localizations will be documented in code! We've been waiting for it for a long time.

One more thing to do, Microsoft, make it possible to include multiple localisations in one NAV license.

The Dynamics NAV screensaver. Like I already mentioned on my WPC diary, there is going to be a new Screensaver with lots of more info like RSS feeds, changing pictures (own pictures),... . It should be available now (according Jan Silleman).

On Wednesday, there is going to be an announcement that I'm not allowed to publish yet. I know it now, it looks very nice for customers, so check my blog on Wednesday (at least if I don't forget myself ).

There are going to be more countries on 5.0, but sorry, I didn't catch which ones ... Damn he's going fast!! . It seems a logical decision now that 6.0 has been postphoned (again)... .

Demo time...

Michael Rosenorm did a small demo about the Jobs-module. Not really exciting (sorry Michael ). The mobile solution that is going to be part of SP1 was more exciting to say the least!

Then some marketing fluff... A lot I didn't catch by writing the above ... But let me try to sum up some highlighted points:

Business opportunities:
Value of upgrade:
One thing I would like to highlight is the use of upgrade centers. Why?
High Quality: they do this every day, so there is a huge knowledge
Low cost: as they are doing it every day, they can do it faster. Also, it can be don in a low cost country.
Increased capacity: your own people don't have to do it.
Personally, I'm using Liberty Grove as upgrade center. They do everthing, full service (also go live) for a fixed price.

Business Ready Licensing (BRL) and Enhancement Plan. A colleague of mine is going to sort this out during the conference, so it could be that I'll be giving an update about this as well.
Sure Step Methodology: an implementation methodology to do your projects more efficiently. I know we're working to implement this in our organisation, and I can say one thing: it's a very good initiative, but implementing the full blown methodology is a bit too much for us. But there are already many CPLS's that provide training about this methodology. I would advice to get informed about this!!

Next, Jan showed a brief release schedule. They didn't go deep into it (may be for the best ):

Q1 2008: 9 new localised countries
1H 2008: SP1
2008: 6.0
2009: Malta (Minor Release)
2010: Mallorca (Major Release)


Then 6.0 Demo!

I got my first (very small) demo a year ago in Munchen, so I'll just try to concentrate on the most important points:

Date fields: the good stuff still works ("w", "w32", ...) ... And also a date picker.
The development environment is still happening in the classic client!!
Webservices: you can expose a page or a codeunit. In this demo: a page.
He exposed the customer card
Then he showed a C# program, to create a customer by giving a customer name.
Then, we saw that te application got a Customer No. From the No. Series ... To show it executed business logic from within NAV.

Time for Q&A. Mogens Elsberg, Jan Silleman and Darren Laybourn were the ones that were answering these questions:

Is it possible to release the Web Services solution for 5.0:
No!
It is part of the 3 tier technology
How is MOSS going to communicate?
Through NAS
How can we prepare for 6.0 (regarding coding)
There is a white paper available on Partnersource that describes this in detail.
There were other questions, but it was too hard to follow... .

ara3n

great blog.

Have hey done anything to improve the filtering?

In classic client you hit F7 on any field and can filter on it. In new client I saw a lot of mouse clicking to filter on something.

web service on 5.0 not being released.

could you tell us about the mobile off line implementation. Did they demo that?

It's great that they are redoing the planning engine.
Traceability would definitely help.
I don't know if they are looking at all 4 erp systems?

Maybe the next thing they should look at is reservation/serial/lot tracking?

Waldo

It was just a general session, so they didn't go deep into it.

The filtering was just like we saw already a 100 times before ... only much and much faster. In some way, the demo performed much better then before ... .

The mobile solution was one of the most interesting topics, but they didn't go deep into it. Just showed us that it is possible to work offline and create stuff (the non-synchronised stuff are grayed, so it shows you in the list what data hasn't been synched yet...).

Luc_VanDyck

Thx Eric, for posting this here. Seems you are having a great time there ;-)

Waldo

Convergence 2007 Diary: General NAV Session (for customers)

Source: My Blog

Mogens Elsberg started off with a fairy tale... Really. How the NAV story started (with the 3 guys from which I didn't get the names) to the fact ware "Big Bill G." wanted a conference call to talk about a joint venture... . I must say, it was quite a original way to point out that NAV is succesful as hell.

You could see that also on the number of people that attended this general session. If I remember correctly, there are 3300 registeres parters+customers. I could see at least 1500 people attending this session. That says to me that NAV is popular as hell in EMEA.

Especially for my colleague-MVP Kamil: Kine, Czeck Republick is going to be on 5.0. Not in Q1 2008 ... The date is "to be decided", but it's coming!!! FINALLY. There is a huge list, so not able to copy it from the screen, but many many countries is planned to be on 5.0.

I was thinking that this session was going to be the same as yesterday, on partner day, but it was completely different. Yesterday, in the beginning of the session, we had the delay of 6.0 ... But nothing mentioned so far (It seems that I'm not able to attend the complete session because I have a meeting in a few moments... So I might miss that statement to the customers).

Anyway ... It was already demo time...

Michael Rosenorm showed again the outlook integration. The export of the item list to a price list... . Jesper Reabilt showed the document approval functionality with even seinding a mail to the approver, and a link to the form in NAV.

Furthermore, Michael showed the Item tracing functionality. I love the treview on that... .

After this, a German customer explains why he's so glad with NAV . The customer was Markant. Sorry, but this part was boring . I'm here for the product, not for Markant's Story... and it was not very well presented either.

Niels Nybo Jensen presented the "Value of Upgrade". The reason to upgrade is simple, according Niels. It's just "getting most out of your business".

... Sorry, I had to go for my meeting ...

Waldo

Convergence 2007 Diary: MVP contribution

url: my blog

I didn't have the chance to follow any sessions whatsoever. It seems that the MVP contribution involves more that I expected.

First, we had our MVP Lunch meeting. Nothing I can say about that, but it was an interesting talk with the Microsoft people.

Second, I had to man the "Information Desk". I was wondering what it involved, because what the hell do I know of anything involving the organisation of the Microsoft Pavilion. People were joking with it during lunch that many people would ask for the toilet and stuff ... but that was luckily not the case (only David, Rene, Mark, ... couldn't find that toilet ). Actually, the most popular question was "where is person x from microsoft?". Like we would have some kind of RFID locating system that can locate people in this humongous building. Anyway, it was interesting. I met Michelle and some other guy from "training" and "documentation" at Vedbaek and we had a nice talk about live at Vedbaek .

Next, I had to attend the "MVP kiosk". At this kiosk, people can ask some questions about the MVP Program, Community and all that. But I must say ... the most common question was how the gadget we were distributing works: the sonic balls. Nevertheless, I've had an interesting time. The fact that the kiosk was part of the Microsoft pavilion, everybody could see and find us, and we had the opportunity to meet and speak to very interesting people (Microsoft and non-microsoft). I love b eing there and talking to all those people, and that's also why I'm attending less sessions then other conventions (which you might have noticed ).

There were other opportunities concerning interaction with the NAV development team, which made my schedule pretty full, but also which made my day .

Ciao!

Waldo

Convergence 2007 Diary: Microsoft Dynamics NAV in Retail

url: my blog

Out of personal interest, I attended a session about NAV and Retail. It is a small interactive "Chalk & Talk" session, so I don't know what it's going to be ... And either do they .

First, there was a presentation about Denner. A supermarket chain that uses NAV as integrated full ERP system. Well, actually not full ERP, because the shops itself didn't use NAV, but a custom made application (based on MS technology) . Typical stats:

They have 1000000 transactions / day... .
The stock of the different shops couldn't be seen online, but is updated to all shops twice a day.
No performance issues
70 concurrent users
Why not NAV in the shops? Basically because about all POS products (like LS Retail) are based on "fashion". LS Retail was too big and too expensive as well.

Now, they have online handheld PC which also have 100% offline capabilities. This is used for inventory stuff... . Everything is controlled within NAV.

Apparently (after hearing customers and partners), in general, performance is quite a problem. Also there is the need for partners that understand retail business. These two conclusions came from 20 minutes discussion of saying two thing about twenty times... [8(].

One good remark I remeber was about the fact that in the retail world, they like the adaptebility of NAV, but it can't realize every wet dream of every user .

Denner, for selecting partners: most important thing is references! I think this counts for every customer in every sector... . Also language was very important for them. The users don't speak English, so it had to be a Suiss or German partner.

Finding resources was also an issue that was pointed out. We all know this. NAV is growing, but the resources/consultants slower. Microsoft should do something about that.

Next point: what product is better: AX or NAV. Well, we all know it's NAV, but anyway ... . The customers were wondering if AX isn't better for Retail. It was a typical C&T, because no clear answer or opinion on this was stated. In my opinion, it has not much to do with verticalisation (may be except for manufacturing) ... but I don't know AX well enough.

It was interesting to hear from a customer point of view what he thinks of NAV for retail. Off course, Microsoft invited this customer, so the positive story shouldn't be "generalized". The comments in the room also sounded more like personal adds instead of real comments... (at least some of them).

Waldo

Convergence 2007 Diary: NAV on SQL Server: Benefits and opportunities

url: my blog

Michael Meissner's challenge was to convince us that choosing SQL Server as database server is a right choice.

The challenge is simple. He summed up the different tools you have inside the SQL Server suite:

Integration services: to move data around
Analysis services: to analyse your data / everything around reporting
Reporting Services: the open, extensible enterprise reporting solution
(Power)users can build their own reports with report builder.
Next big thing about SQL Server is the high availability:

Database mirroring: two storage systems: if the bomb drops on one, the other can take over. Two identical databases - instant standby.
Failover custering: Hot standby.
Log Shipping: Can have multiple other servers. Don't have to be for failover. Can also be for reporting. Warm standby.
Replication: Warm Standby.
Offline availability solutions: Backup/restore - Cold standby
It wasn't very well explained .. But it' obvious ... SQL Server can offer much more than C/SIDE datbase.

All of this comes together in the SQL Server Management Studio. It is actually an "integrated management".

How does it run today:
The NAV application runs on SQL Server and on the native db.
There have been SQL improvements since the firsts version on SQL Server, plus, a platform for business intelligence.
Actually, the main advantages of SQL Server are:
Industry leading database server
Platform for business Intelligence and Reportin
Better Database Management Tools
Locking Mechanism (record level locking).
Michael assured that they are constantly benchmarking. The results are compared and it seemed that SQL2005 is much better and more stable. My assumption is that this can only be the case after tuning the database.

He also assured us that they are working on taking advantage of new SQL Server functionality. That is very important, of course, but as some of us know, a lot can be improved towards the future... .

Michael recommended to upgrade/migrate to SQL Server to benefit the most out of it (see the above). If you're planning to do this, and you're coming to Directions, there is going to be a session about the steps that are needed for migrating to SQL Server. I reviewed the contents and commented on this session myself (will be presented by Mark Brummel) and it is going to be very interesting and complete, I promise you . Anyway, the migration process was presented here as a simple project , but my experience tells me there are quite many things to think about ... .

Small remark, in the new version of SQL Server (2008), there is going to be a new possibility to store performance monitoring data out-of-the-box. He didn't go deep into it, but it sounds great!

... I'll have to stop soon, because my battery is dead ...

I was hoping he would say something about the advantages of 64 bit, but nothing .

For me, there was nothing new in this session, unfortunately. It was more marketing fluff to recommend SQL Server (I could have known by looking at the title ...). Useful for customers, may be useful for partners, not useful for developers... .

Waldo

Convergence 2007 Diary: Optimizing Performance on SQL Server

URL: my blog

Sorry for writing this entry just now, but my battery was empty, so I had to write this down on paper first ... and after a 10-hour drive from Copenhagen to Beerse (Belgium) ... my head wasn't feeling that fresh to write decent stuff... (not that this is decent, but anyway ).

This was the third time that I attended Hynek's session. The first two were exactly the same, but Hynek told me he changed the contents, so I decided to go again, and it was worth it. Not that I learned something new, but SQL Server Performance Tuning on Dynamics NAV is quite a complex subject, and you know what they say: "repetitio mater studiorum est".

He handled both infrastructure and application in one hour. You can imagine it went fast .

Only 10 to 20% of the problems are due to infrastructural problems. This is not much, but if it's set up wrong, it could really mess up for the application as well ... .

When we think of "infrastructure", these items are important (in order of importance):

RAM
DISK
CPU
NETWORK
RAM:

There are some general guidelines what you need:

<see my blog>

Keep in mind, these are rough guidelines. The choice also depends on the implementation.

DISK:

The disks are the slowest components, thus very important to choose the right DISK configuration.

First of all: Don't use RAID 5. Use as many disks as you can afford, with a minimum of 3 times RAID 1 (=6 disks). Why? To split all OS files, all Transaction Log files and All Data files. If you have more than 6 disks, scale the array of the data files up to RAID 10.

CPU:

The CPU is tupically not a bottleneck, but here are some guidelines:

<see my blog>

Now, Hynek wasn't that a fan of duo or quad cores, because it actually just performance 60% of the performance if you compare it with full CPU's... .

NETWORK:

Some very quice recommendations:

100Mb minimum
The network should be switched (as switched as possible)
On server side, best you use a 1Gb network
Now, for planning your hardware, you shouldn't only use these guidelines. Also take for instance in account other factors like the annual business growth, seasonality, ... .

On software side, it is best to keep everything up-to-date, but be aware:

2000 is not 2005: it does not behave the same
2005 uses tempdb more ... And it's may be a good idea to put it on a seperate spindle.
4.00 update 6 is a good release:
It fixes some SIFT issues
It does not use OPTION (FAST xx) any more
Is uses index hinting by default ... Bewar of that!
There are many infrastructure software setup things to think about. Amongst them (didn't catch them all):

Degree of Parallellism should be 1
Split the TL, Data Files and Tempdb (if necessary)
Maintenance:
Update statistics
Rebuild indexes
Then, finally, the things you can do at application level.

First of all, he briefly explained the Tools you can use to monitor performance:

SQL Profiler
Mainly used for analyzing queries that come from the Dynamics NAV client. Also for analyzing deadlocking and timeouts
Client Monitor
To record the server calls from within NAV. It links certain SQL queries to pieces of code in C/SIDE.
SQL Server Mgt Views
Keep in mine: only SQL Server 2005 has got these. Interesting dm views are:
Dm_db_index_usages_stats
Dm_exec_query_stats
Dw_os_wait_stats
...
PerformTools
Demotime

Hynek showed us how you can use profiler, client monitor, code monitor and some of his tools. The Benchmark Toolkit was used during the demo for creating load on the database.

These tools can be used to do index tuning. In this stage, you are going to get your write transaction down by deleting/disabling sift (not the ones that are frequently run) and disabling/creating indexesen doen we - or just should do when you're tuning that hell out of you:

Eliminate Head
Optimize your code (you know... Findinstructions
Optimize the process: break Llong transaction
App Setup: e.g. Auto cost posting / Find as you type
Data Archiving
...
Focus:
You should focus on "low changing fruit". That means, where it's fairly easy to gain performance with. Usually this means using the HOT tables. Which are the hot tables? There are the tables that causes most of the probles. Using the SQLPerformTools, this is quite easy to find out... .

Hynek also warned us for the fact that 4.0 SP3 update 6 does index hinting by default. Just know this, and try it out what works the best: disabling index hinting or not).

That was all that I wrote down. I hope it's still useful.

Enjoy!