New name for Microsoft Great Plains or former Great Plains Dynamics is Microsoft Dynamics GP. Microsoft Dynamics GP 9.0 is definitely new product, comparing to old GPS Dynamics, however if you use so-called “fat” client – Microsoft Dexterity is still doing its graphical interface and database interaction job.
If you have Microsoft Great Plains and support it for your company and have light or heavy Great Plains customization, written in Dexterity – you need to know your options in upgrading Great Plains or migrating it from ctree/Pervasive (not supported by Microsoft since 2005) to MS SQL/MSDE.
Great Plains Dexterity is proprietary programming language/environment, which was created in early 1990-th to provide platform / database / graphical interface independence for Mac and Windows based Great Plains Dynamics. Today it is legacy and Microsoft Business Solutions is phasing Dexterity out.
However Great Plains 8.0 and even 9.0 is Dexterity based application, so you have to deal with it and it’s customization.
Positive News. Prior to version 7.0 Great Plains had plans on expanding GP functionality and so was changing tables structure – forcing Dexterity customization to be analyzed and partially rewritten with each upgrade. Not any more – GP structure stays the same – Microsoft is doing new modules acquisition and unifying it’s graphical interface to move all it’s ERP packages: Great Plains, Solomon, Navision and Axapta to web-based Microsoft Business Portal.
Negative News. Dexterity has possibility to customize existing Great Plains screens, so called Alternative Great Plains forms. This was upgrade problem in the past and it stays now – there is no way to do it in house (until you are willing to pay for full-time internal developer – who is usually in the learning curve). You got to bring in consultant.
Recommended approach. You should have the strategy to migrate Dexterity customization to SQL, Crystal Reports, custom web publishing – Visual Studio.net and slowly abandon Dexterity customization
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Dexterity Customization for Dynamics GP Evaluation Level Paper
When you are developer it is always a good idea to read technical manuals. But if you was just assigned to the IT team to decide if Dexterity is the right tool to customize your ERP application then first you need something which is in style of ‘easy reading papers’ or FAQ
Planning Dynamics GP Customization in Large Corporation
If you are reading this page then chances are high that you were not able to find ISV add-on and need customization project. Let’s talk about planning, quality assurance and future event such as version updates.
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Initial Great Plains Dynamics architecture had three SOP Invoice forms: Long, Short and Blank. Modern GP is popular in scenarios where you have more than three companies under one business entity umbrella
