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CRM 2013 – How to add reports to the sitemap

A customer wanted to add reports to the sitemap.

Actually this is wrong the customer said they wanted to add a reports button, I knew it was a change to the sitemap.

What is the sitemap?

I think of things from a CRM 2011 perspective because I have done most customization in CRM 2011 environments and that’s how it should be structured

When I say Sitemap this is the left hand menu in CRM 2011

CRM 2011 left hand menu

This page Change application navigation using the SiteMap

in CRM 2013 it draws the left hand menu up on the top but the underlying setup is still exactly the same (picture borrowed from Gareth Tucker’s great CRM blog

Above is the main menu and then if you click one like sales you then get another menu below

Sitemaps are a bit of an odd

Microsoft believe CRM Developers should modify the sitemap by editing XML files, this is tricky and prone to syntax errors.

This page has good detailed instructions –Change application navigation using the SiteMap if you wish to try it by hand

I don’t know any CRM Developer who has manually edited an XML file in versions of CRM 2011 and above.

The reason Microsoft can do this is because the CRM community have some fantastic CRM developers who have created Site Map editors.  There are probably  a few to choose from but my Site map editor of choice is

XrmToolbox for Dynamics CRM  2011/2013/2015

Not only does it have the sitemap editor but it has lots of CRM tools, if you haven’t downloaded it then I would recommend you do it NOW!

site map editor top

How to Add reports

Adding reports couldn’t be easier with the Site map tool (I sound like a salesman)

Open up the XRMToolBox

Connect to your CRM instance

Open SiteMap Editor

You get the screen below

site map editor

To understand what is what, it’s best to have CRM open and you can get a feel to how the names and groupings.

Find the area you want to add the report button

Right click and select – Add SubArea

Give it a name and select the reports entity

site map 2

Not to be confused with Ribbon editing, which is where you edit the ribbon on an individual record e.g. Contact ribbon, account ribbon

If you are going to edit the ribbon (also XML editing) then I would recommend you use the Ribbon Workbench written by Scott Durow

You can download it here


Filed under: CRM 2013

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