Tool for Database Design Dynamics NAV Native Database

sre

Hi all,

this topic didn't fit in anywhere in the Dynamics section so I decedid to post it here ...

I'm looking for a (free/GPL) tool that allows to illustrate my Navision database tables. The ideal application would not only illustrate the fields with the correct types but also the relations between the tables. I've been able to find fabFORCE DBDesigner which comes very close to what I'm looking for. I'm able to connect to the NAV-DB using ODBC and read the tables and fields. But the data types get screwed up an the relations are not illustrated properly.

Does anyone of you know an alternative product? Or - to use a more general approach: What do you do when you have the need to illustrate your ER model e.g. when talking to software developers who want to develop an online shop based on your data model? I don't want to use Visio or something similar to illustrate the basic structure. Any help (and alternatives your using) are welcome.

Thanks!

Sascha

PureHeart

Did you connect to a SQL Nav Database?
Did you tick the maintain relationships flag on the alter database?

OR...

You can try with this http://code.google.com/p/theartofnav/...

sre

Thanks for that quick reply ... :thumbsup:

PureHeart wrote:

Did you connect to a SQL Nav Database?

No, it's the good ol' Native database (sorry, I thought I had mentioned that in my post but I only included that hint in the title)

PureHeart wrote:

You can try with this http://code.google.com/p/theartofnav/...

Thank's for the link ... but I'm afraid that's not what I'm looking for, neither the tool to view the table fieldes nor the given illustration (as we've got many adaptions to beyond standard)

PureHeart

Ops Sorry I didn't check the Title #-o

I only tried with SQL and then with Visio (or any other similar tool) to generate the data structure...
You could try with that?

rdebath

http://www.mibuso.com/dlinfo.asp?FileID=398

I suggest you look at the above images and then decide if any picture will be able to give what you want from your diagrams.

Then you can think about free vs. expensive.

sre

PureHeart wrote:

I only tried with SQL and then with Visio (or any other similar tool) to generate the data structure...
You could try with that?

OK, I see ... but you have to do it manually with Visio, right? Or is there a way to connect to the native DB with Visio to automate this task (at least to read the basic structure)?

sre

rdebath wrote:

http://www.mibuso.com/dlinfo.asp?FileID=398

I suggest you look at the above images and then decide if any picture will be able to give what you want from your diagrams.

Then you can think about free vs. expensive.

Thanks for that link ... I read about that ER diagram tool somewhere else but wasn't able to find it in the download section. The basic structure doesn't help me as we have high level of customization in our database so I would have to pay for that. The funny thing is that the author of that ER diagram used/uses the same tool which I suggested above (DBDesigner 4) and you can only buy the service the he does the diagram for you with that tool ... but it's not a tool itself. So not really what I'm looking for.

I guess I'll have to go with DBDesigner for now ...

PureHeart

If you use visio or similar software there is a functionality to reverse engineer the database and it does everything for you... I did it on a highly customised database...
Hope that helps...

sre

PureHeart wrote:

If you use visio or similar software there is a functionality to reverse engineer the database and it does everything for you... I did it on a highly customised database...
Hope that helps...

Oh, that's cool! I didn't know Visio was capable of that ... that's just perfect as I have Visio 2007 on my machine anyway.

I just tried to connect to my native NAV2009 SP1 - DB using the ODBC universal driver in Visio but then all tables names seem to be in chinese letters. When I try to connect using the general OLE-DB Provider (Microsoft OLE DE Provider for ODBC Drivers) Visio crashes.

Do you remember how you managed to connect to the Navision database?

PureHeart

As I said I didn't try with the Native but with the SQL one so if you could try with the SQL one... but before alter the database to have the flag "maintain relationships" set to true...don't set the flag on a live or development copy just take a new copy of the db only for this purpose...

kine

PureHeart wrote:

You can try with this http://code.google.com/p/theartofnav/...
Thank's for the link ... but I'm afraid that's not what I'm looking for, neither the tool to view the table fieldes nor the given illustration (as we've got many adaptions to beyond standard)

Part of this project are objects for NAV which will show you the relations based on any text file with NAV objects. You can look at relations of any customized solution through it. Just import the objects, select the .txt file with your table objects and run it... :-)

sre

kine wrote:

Part of this project are objects for NAV which will show you the relations based on any text file with NAV objects

I just tried the tool now ... but it's not really what I'm looking for. I guess it's quite useful to identify the existing relations but I'd prefer a graphical representation in an ER model or something similar for my purpose.

kine

If you have see the graph I have on my blog, than you must know that it is not easy to create one. The graph was created by graphviz application, using dot language which is easy to write when you have data for it. Use the tool to extract the relations, create report, which will write the data as dot language, run the graphviz on it and you have what you need. But you will need to use it just on some limited set of tables, else you will end with graph similar to the my one, which are unusable, because you will not find any application which is able to display them...

If you want something on higher level than only tables, you need to do it manually or somehow divide the tables into bigger objects.