Merge tool for NAV. Which one can you recommend?

Nosta · 2010-01-11

Hi All,

Recently I've got an upgrade project and I need to upgrade one NAV version to another. Both of them are NAV 4.03 but with quite different verticals. In fact, I need to merge them into a single version. Before, I used to use text comparing tools, like Araxis Merge or Beyond Compare for this purpose, but I find them comfortless if you need to merge not C/AL code only, but fields, controls, properties also. Especially when you have different fields/controls/variables with the same ID in both versions.

Just wondering if there is any tool available where the user can operate by "entities", like field, control, key, variable, procedure, etc. instead of comparing and merging line by line text versions of NAV objects.
What is your way if you need to merge/upgrade NAV objects?

br/Gennadii.

lvanvugt · 2010-01-11

Untill last summer I was part of the MS Dynamics NAV GDL team (i.e. the localisation team) in Western Europe. We used Araxis very comfortably.

Araxis did a better job than BYC having the regular expression filtering feature. this enables you to define what kind of line need to be filtered out, like for example the Time, Date and Version List object properties. But also to filter out any RDL lines on reports.

Hope this makes sense to you.

Nosta · 2010-01-11

few years ago I took a part in a couple of GDL projects also

. some of them were related to NAV upgrades and we also used Araxis in our work. probably, the regular expressions have not been implemented yet by that time or I did not learn Araxis in details.
thank you for the answer. will check Araxis latest version.

br/Gennadii

Belias · 2010-01-11

also developer's toolkit works with "entities"..you need some time to learn it if you've never used, but it can become more useful than you expect

Miklos_Hollender · 2010-01-13

I have very positive experiences with mergetool.com . It merged many objects completely automatically and merging the rest manually was easy.

However mergetool is for upgrading one customized NAV db to a new version, it analyzes the differences of the old base version, the customized old version, and the new base version. I'm not completely sure if it's useful for merging two add-ons.

Nosta · 2010-01-13

thank you, guys.

obviously, I need to try many tools to find the one I really like. or create the new one

kitik · 2010-01-13

Last year we had to merge 4 differents NAV databases into 1, and upgrade them all to NAV 2009.
The originals databases where on different NAV versions (2.60 and 3.70).

We used the Navision Developers Toolkit for merging and the CompareIt! for little text comparisons.

Salut!

Alex_Chow · 2010-01-13

http://www.mergetool.com

'nuff said.

It's created a Per, one of the best developers in the NAV world.

davmac1 · 2010-01-13

As of Feb 1, Per will be running this as his new company with Lanham as his first customer (see official Lanham announcement).

matttrax · 2010-01-13

Big loss for Lanham.

Alex_Chow · 2010-01-13

matttrax wrote:

Big loss for Lanham.

Not just big. I'd consider that catastrophic...

generic · 2010-01-13

why?

The lanham products existed before.

Alex_Chow · 2010-01-13

generic wrote:

why?

The lanham products existed before.

If you used Lanham products before Per joined the company, you'd know why.

matttrax · 2010-01-13

Does someone have a link to an announcement? I didn't see one on Lanham's website.

generic · 2010-01-13

It's not like Lanham products will get worse. Unless new developers screw up the code.
Their products have been on a maintenance mode for a while. And the quality of code will stay the same as when Per left.

Did Lanham (Per) release their products for Nav 2009 (Sp1)?

matttrax · 2010-01-13

True, the products themselves will not get worse. But whenever someone of his caliber leaves an organization there will be issues.

Alex_Chow · 2010-01-13

matttrax wrote:

Does someone have a link to an announcement? I didn't see one on Lanham's website.

It's an e-mail that I'm assuming is confidential.

Since there's no official annoucement from Lanham to the public, you should consider Per's leaving as a rumor.

matttrax · 2010-01-13

Alex Chow wrote:

Since there's no official annoucement from Lanham to the public, you should consider Per's leaving as a rumor.

Absolutely. Unless we see an official document / announcement all of this should be assumed to be false.

davmac1 · 2010-01-14

mergetool.com website - will be open for business February 1.
Sorry if I was premature - but I wish mergetool.com all the best.

matttrax · 2010-01-14

http://mergetool.com/news/default.html

For those who want a direct link. I think it's a bit of a stretch to say he's leaving. We'll find out, though. NAV is way too small of a community for people not to know. So yeah, I'm going to continue to assume it is false unless I see something concrete.

Per · 2010-02-06

I would like to step in here. Thanks for all the nice words.

I will still be associated with Lanham Associates product development and ensure the quality of the products stay the same as before.

I have placed a link here with the announcement from my web-site.
http://www.mergetool.com/news/20100113Lanham.html

There is more information about what we will be doing with mergetool.com in the future.
http://www.mergetool.com/

matttrax · 2010-02-06

I think it's safe to say that everyone here wishes you all the best. Congratulations.

Per · 2010-02-06

Thanks

I will still be supplying the Mergetool free of charge and open source. But it is now possible to attend classes on a regular basis.

David_Singleton · 2010-02-06

Great move Per,

I wish you all the best of luck.

=D>

kapil4dynamics · 2010-02-06

Per wrote:

Thanks

I will still be supplying the Mergetool free of charge and open source. But it is now possible to attend classes on a regular basis.

=D> =D> =D> =D>

davmac1 · 2010-02-09

Congratulations too.
I am sure you will be highly successful.
One of our major challenges is to make role tailored more functional and also less of a drain on classic development.

Alex_Chow · 2010-02-09

Per wrote:

Thanks

I will still be supplying the Mergetool free of charge and open source. But it is now possible to attend classes on a regular basis.

Good luck on your venture!

One suggestion I may add to your website is to have a link to ask for donations. Most of the very awesome shareware products have links so grateful people can donate to the work that's done.

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Merge tool for NAV. Which one can you recommend?

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