The D365 Tech Conference

Yes, I am in Seattle this week for the D365 Tech Conference! Don't worry though, I am not completely abandoning my AX followers for Dynamics 365 for Operations. I know that there will be people using AX for years to come and I will continue to provide content for AX users as long as I am using AX. But this week, I am all about Dynamics 365.

AX Word of the Week: Contoso

Ok, so maybe this isn't TRULY an AX word, but anyone who has ever used an AX demo environment has seen the word Contoso.

So, what is Contoso?

Contoso is the Microsoft demo company that is used to show the functionality of AX. It's not just limited to AX though. You may see Contoso pop up in other products as well! Contoso is a very diverse company. It sells everything from HDMI cables to orange juice. And if you visit their website, www.contoso.com, you might be redirected to another large corporation's official website.

AX Word of the Week: X++

In my AX Word of the Week post last week on the AOT, I briefly mentioned the code in AX that developers work with to make the system work as intended. Well, that programming language, X++, is the AX Soup Word of the Week!

X++

X++ is the AX programming language, and is most similar to the programming language C#.

Number Sequences: The Building Block of AX Transactions

One thing that is easily overlooked as one of the basic building blocks of all transactions within AX is the number sequence. A poorly built number sequence will cause headaches, confusion, and unnecessary stress.

A Number sequence in AX is set up so that records requiring identifiers can have unique identifiers that are easy to understand tied to them. They are typically tied to transactional records and master data.

Number Sequence Information in AX

Number sequences are set up in the Organization administration module under Organization administration > Common > Number sequences. There are unique number sequences for each company within your organization, so there is a possibility that you have hundreds, or even thousands, of number sequences set up in your AX environment.

This is just the beginning of the list in my demo environment. There are 23,384 unique number sequences set up for 24 demo companies.

AX Word of the Week: AOT

The AX Word of the Week this week is AOT, another acronym! Not to be confused with last week's word of the week, AOS, the AOT is quite different.

AOT - Application Object Tree

The AOT, or the Application Object Tree, is the back end of your AX environment. This is where all of the code, the tables, and all of the objects defined in AX reside. Typically, you will hear a developer or a system administrator talk about the AOT. The typical AX user does not have access to the AOT, so this blog post will be a very high level overview of what the AOT is. This will be helpful for the next time you hear someone talking about it, you might be able to hang with the conversation a little bit longer.

AOT Structure in AX

AX Word of the Week: AOS

Ok, this is kind of a cheater here because it's actually three words, but it's something that you might hear your System administrator or your IT Department throw around. So what is an AOS?

AOS - Application Object Server

The Application Object Server is one piece of three that make up your AX architecture. The three pieces that make up the AX architecture are the database, the AOS, and the client. The AOS manages the connection between the database and the client and is on its own server(s). If the server that the AOS is on crashes or has any issues, this is the message that users who are trying to log in to AX will see:

This error always elicits a lot of groans and calls to IT.

New Post Series: AX Word of the Week

Keep an eye out for a new weekly post from me called AX Word of the Week. In these posts, I will take a word or phrase that you may have heard about in AX and give you a definition for it that is easy to understand.

I have had a lot going on lately, so this will help me stay in touch with my blog on a more regular basis. I also have a couple of great post ideas lined up for the future. Stay tuned!