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Dynamics 365 Community / Forums / Microsoft Dynamics GP (Archived) / Visual Studio Tools Ve...
Microsoft Dynamics GP (Archived)

Visual Studio Tools Versus VBA

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Posted on by NOORUDDIN AZHAR 165

Hello Everyone,

Having worked on Visual Basic 6.0 / VBA for many years now, I've done lots of customizations using VBA in GP.  Over a period, I've realized that, VBA is certainly out and it's a challenge to work on GP customizations using VBA as I feel it's not so flexible in terms of using OR customizing Grids.  I normally add Visual Basic's Flex-Grid Control through VBA to user-forms in GP, which creates problem while registering on client machines due to new Operating Systems post XP, where Visual Basic is no more a good choice and not workable - the common DLL hell.  On the other hand, the grid control of GP doesn't allow you to control it through VBA like in case if I want to tab through rows to read the values OR update the values.

Moving ahead, if I want to customize the GP screens using Visual Studio Tools - .Net - in opposed to using VBA, I'm still un-sure whether the VS is a replacement for VBA to GP.  I mean whether I can do the same using VS Tools what I used to do using VBA because I'm not able to alter the existing screens using VS Tools but yes it allows to add new screens/forms. 

My main requirement is to add new forms with all the dotNet controls in GP and also to customize the existing GP screens and control the GP grids in order to validate / read / write data in grid by tabbing through the grid - Example grid in 'Inventory Transaction Entry'.

I appreciate, if someone can highlight on this and also refer to some very useful links / sources to identify the differences.

 

Thanks in advance.

NOORUDDIN AHZAR.

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  • L Vail Profile Picture
    L Vail 65,271 on at

    Nooruddin,

    VBA is not the future for Dynamics GP. What I think you need to do is learn how to create your user interface using Dexterity and then create your .net code in VS tools. Your VS Tools code would run off of similar Dex events. Going forward, WinForms are not supported by the Dynamics GP 2013 client, so I wouldn't spend a lot of time developing a user interface that cannot be used by the web client.

    You can use your code to interact with all of the scrolling window 'grids' just be learning the events that are triggered in Dexterity and registering those triggers in VS Tools. It's the best of both worlds, you get to use your .net code and also develop native Dexterity windows that can be modified by the user and interacted with by other third-party programmers.

    It's no secret that I am a big supporter of Dexterity. If VSTools programmers would build their user interface and create their tables with Dexterity, they would save themselves so much time. Your interface and tables would be part of the GP security model and your forms could be customized by the user with Modifier.

    You have the same events available in WinForms, and the ability to look EXACTLY like native GP windows, not just close to GP windows.

    Kind regards,

    Leslie

    Oh  - you can come to Dallas in June of this year and learn Dexterity. I'm holding a class at ConexusSG..

    LV

  • L Vail Profile Picture
    L Vail 65,271 on at

    Nooruddin,

    When I said Winforms were not supported by the GP 2013 client, I meant the WEB client. The rich client still supports VBA, VBA User Forms, WinForms, everything. It's ONLY the web client that does not support these items.

    Leslie

  • NOORUDDIN AZHAR Profile Picture
    NOORUDDIN AZHAR 165 on at

    Dear Leslie,

    Thanks for sharing such a valuable information and guiding me towards VS Tools.  My main challenge is that, I need to manipulate and focus my cursor and tab across the grid in GP, which is not possible with VBA.  With VBA, I'm not able to tab to next row in the grid as it'll jump back to the first text i.e. the first column in the same row rather than jumping to the next row's first column.  I want to reduce the overhead of verifying each account distribution i.e. the off-set account for each row in Inventory's Transaction Entry screen - Grid.  Actually, when you specify the offset account code in the Item Maintenance for each item it picks the same account in the distribution but what if the same item is used by different cost centers???  This I want to achieve by changing it dynamically.  I want to create on top of the screen one text box control where the end user will enter the cost centers one segment example 02.  Then as this particular document is for cost center 02, I want to tab through each row and change the offset account's segment to '02' where it could be '01' OR '03.

    Hope you got my point.  If possible, kindly give me any other solution to achieve it.  There could also be possible to change it through back-end directly but I wanted to do it through application.  I appreciate and I'm thankful to you for the help.

    Thanks in advance.

    Noor.

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