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Upgrade issues

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Posted on by OzVik

Hi There,

Want to gather your experience and thoughts on how unsettling the Business Central upgrade have been for you. How risky it is to add new tables and create functions on new tables and fields. Tactics you have used to make sure the customizations don't break with the upgrade?

Cheers

Vkias Jain

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Mohana Yadav 60,993 Super User 2025 Season 2 on at

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I have not seen any upgrade without a custom table/field/function.

It is very common to have customizations and we have to handle them in the upgrade.

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Hein Kruger 629 on at

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Hi,

My first upgrade was from NAV 2013 R2 to BC21. It was a bit of a nightmare.

1. You will have to add new temp table to help transfer the data.
2. Make sure you follow Microsoft steps EXACTLY. Don't skip any steps and take the time to understand how it works.
3. Your upgrade will fail at least 10 times. accept it. (Make descriptive notes of all your steps. You will need them!)
4. Going from On-prem to SAAS. Make sure you use an account that has all the bells and whistles (Think Customer- Business Manager). Not sure what permissions is needed, but you will have a tough time if you dont have an essential account.
5. Use a compare tool like "Beyond Compare 4" to get all the new fields that have been added. Note: Dont include flow fields.
6. Forcesync Schema mode ALWAY later. you do the ForceSync Schem Force once in every instance. Dont do it unless the steps says its time.

NAV 2013 R2 --> NAV 2018 (Data) Steps
1. Compare NAV2013 DB with Customer DB. Find all the new fields and Tables that have been added. Write the fields for each table in an excel spreadsheet.
2. In SSMS make a Database copy.
3. Open NAV2013 Development Environment. Delete all objects EXCEPT Tables. (Yes all the code Units and all the reports. Everything)
4. NAV2018-- In SSMS Create a demo database and import cronus from the install file
5. Open the NAV 2013 R2 Database in NAV 2018 Development Environment.
6. Create Temp Tables for the Temp Fields and New Tables.
7. Compare UPG Tables with Temp Tables. If there is a match copy temptables fields to UPG table & Other way around aswell.
8. In the UPGW1 Code unit-->
* For Extended Field use the "Copy" functionality
* For the New tables use the "Move" functionality

9.Delete all tables in the "50000" range (This is you extension custom code range)
10. Connect to the instance
11. Start Upgrade steps in Powershell (Run as Administrator:: Always)
12. If upgrade is complete copy data from UPG to Temp Table (Run the UPG & Temp table)
13. After completion delete all objects except tables (again)
14. Delete all upgrade objects.

Hope this helps.

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OzVik 55 on at

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Thanks for the elaborated response. I think I missed an important part in my question. My client does not have Dynamics 365 Business Central.

Our first implementation of Business Central will be in the latest version 21.5 of Dynamics 365 Business Central. It will have many customizations, both tables and forms.

I wanted to know how often does the regular upgrades from Microsoft break such customizations in your experience.

Cheers

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Mohana Yadav 60,993 Super User 2025 Season 2 on at

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It depends on many factors.

If Microsoft redesigns the area that you have customized then you may have to rewrite the customizations etc.

We cannot predict how often it will break.

It may not break at all for some customers and it may break on every update for others.

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Inge M. Bruvik 1,105 Moderator on at

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In my experience that happens very seldom as long as you make sure to use the code cops when you write your AL code.

You should also use a pipeline in your Dev environment that compiles your code against next minor and next major version.

Read Freddys blog about AL Go for Github - that is a great tool to help you keep your code current.

freddysblog.com/.../

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