Microsoft has promised that it will launch Business Central’s major version every six months. The last major release was made in April, which was part of the Spring 2019 release wave. The next release is due in October. In this post, we shall share top major highlights out of the coming release. The autumn 2019 release will have total 42 changes. This might put the development team on fast-forward for a few months. And, since the development progress is unpredictable, all the changes mentioned in the release plan (shared by the Microsoft officials on their site) are subject to change.
Base app delivered as AL apps
The rumors were there about integrating the programming language of NAV into Microsoft’s developer tools since Microsoft acquired Navision A/S back in 2002. It has become big and future-oriented step which is set to go. Microsoft has begin working for the introduction of AL language and extension over a few years back, enabling partners, ISVs, and the community to adapt to the latest technology. Dynamics 365 BC Development team have used the opportunity.
The growth of AppSource is steady. AppSource is the Microsoft’s store used for storing extensions and services. The blogosphere is already having endless tips and tricks about AL. However, there are some big ISVs struggling with the change. For instance, if an ISV won’t provide its solution with Extensions until November 2019, it will disable their customers to do their upgrades by this year.
Currently, there is only information available is that the Windows Client and the C/SIDE development environment will not be a part of the newer versions. Moreover, the base application will be categorize in two parts-
- The System part – It will be delivered in single modules with the idea of 1 feature = 1 module. People will be able to modify the base application.
- The Apps part
Multiple Production environments
Microsoft will provide the option to have localization-extensions per company. Multiple production environments include business value. Here, multinational companies must be able to handle their finances based on the legal requirements in the same regions or countries they are operating. The update allows you to create a Business Central production environment for subsidiaries, business divisions, and so on, that run in different regions or countries throughout the globe.
For each tenant, administrators will be allowed to create multiple production environments.
This is a big deal since until now it has been important to maintain the same code base for every company in a database. This can bring unfavorable situations in which you have to agree on a version and “fit it to work” with disabling or enabling setup or modifications to code that query the name of the company. This is a deal breaker for the SaaS option as reported by majority of partners.
We need to see how Microsoft officials will implement it and how ISVs leverage this update to structure their price model in AppSource for extensions. This indicates that Microsoft is interested in listening.
Modern Clients
Since the old Desktop client will get no longer support of Microsoft, it is important to bring the other clients on the same level. We can’t deny the fact that the Desktop Client is still superior and the best option to choose in some scenarios like multi-tasking and data input. To fill the gap and cope with the journey of transition with an ease, most entries in the release plan belong to enhancements in the modern clients.
It is important to offer user friendly solutions to customers. One solution that doesn’t have simplicity is the resizing of columns. There is a hope that Microsoft officials will allow the resizing of columns without an extension or without any need of opening the personalize menu.
Next limitation is the ability of the user to choose individual filter in a Report. Currently, user has only one option to choose from, i.e. the predefined fields. To add new field, user need to use an extension. To make changes in complexity, Microsoft will enable powerful filtering for reports to allow UX similar to Pages.
It is possible to have multiple tabs and independent navigation through Business central.
The developers can now have to deal with lesser stress. It will be possible to attach the Debugger to an existing session once again.
