Menus for Visual Studio Tools for Microsoft Dynamics GP 10.0
Great News for Visual Studio developers working with Microsoft Dynamics GP 10.0.
The Issue
As I worked more with the Developer Toolkit and in particular Visual Studio Tools for Microsoft Dynamics GP, I found that the main support issue being seen was that it is not possible to add menu entries into the Microsoft Dynamics GP application navigation system without creating a Dexterity dictionary. This is mentioned in the following Knowledge Base (KB) article:
While creating a Dexterity dictionary to add the appropriate menus is not that hard for a Dexterity developer, it would mean learning a new set of skills for a Visual Studio developer that doesn't have previous dexterity experience. It seems rather inefficient to force Visual Studio developers to work in Dexterity, when they had achieved everything else with Visual Studio, just to add some entries in the menus.
If the customization is sufficiently complex that it requires Dexterity code (maybe for procedure/function triggers, table triggers, or for alternate windows) as well as Visual Studio code, then there is no problem adding the navigation code into the existing dictionary. However, this is not the case for many smaller Visual Studio customizations.
The Solution
The long term plan is to provide built-in support for adding to the navigation menus from Visual Studio into the next version of Microsoft Dynamics GP.
In the meantime, I have created a generic Dexterity dictionary which has an API (Application Programming Interface) which easily allows Visual Studio Tools developers to create their own menus, sub menus and separators directly from C# or VB code.
After discussions with the development and support teams, it was agreed that this code could be made available to developers to use with their Visual Studio based add-ins for Microsoft Dynamics GP release 10.0. Due to several fixes and enhancements in Visual Studio Tools for GP 10.0, this menu solution will not be available for GP 9.0. The plan for GP 11.0 onwards is that this functionality will be built into Visual Studio Tools.
[Edit] The menu functionality did not make it into GP 2010 (v11.0) and so an updated version of Menus for Visual Studio Tools will be released for v10.0 and v11.0 soon. Details will be posted on the blog.
We are still working on getting everything ready for release, but it will be made available soon.
Downloads
For downloads, please see the Menus for Visual Studio Tools Portal Page:
Menus for Visual Studio Tools Portal
Support Information
Technical support for Menus for Visual Studio Tools for Microsoft Dynamics GP can be obtained through the standard Dynamics GP Support channels. Information on contacting support can be found in the support area of the MSDN Dynamics GP Developer Center.
https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/dynamics/gp/bb468042.aspx
For customers or partners on a Dynamics specific support plan, please use the following link from CustomerSource or PartnerSource to log a "Visual Studio Tools-Developer Toolkit" case.
https://mbs.microsoft.com/support
More Information
For more information, please see the Menus for Visual Studio Tools Portal Page:
Menus for Visual Studio Tools Portal
Please add your feedback as comments, will this tool be useful to you?
David
26-Aug-2008: We are looking for beta testers for this utility, if you are interested, please use the email link at the top of the page.
28-Aug-2008: We have enough beta testers for now. You will need to wait a little bit for the actual release now.
25-Sep-2008: Added link to release announcement blog post.
13-Oct-2008: Created post on Using Menus for Visual Studio Tools from VBA.
24-Jun-2009: Added Link to KB Article 922871.
23-Apr-2010: Updated status menu support for Microsoft Dynamics GP 2010 (v11.0).
03-Nov-2010: Added links to related articles.
16-May-2013: Changed More Information Link to go to Menus for Visual Studio Tools Portal Page.