Dynamics Community Forum Thread Details

Power Apps or Dynamics 365 - when to customize Dynamics?

How do you know whether you should build a new dataverse and application(s) connected to your CE or Marketing Dynamics 365 instance or build out the new capabilities/tables and supporting processes within your Dynamics implementation? It all appears to be converging and conventional customizations appear to be less and less popular. Even with experience in both areas and certifications to support and clients with licensing in both it's hard to provide clear long-term direction to clients. There power users are more comfortable supporting Dynamics 365 and are used to supporting Client and Marketing initiatives in Dynamics. But they're smart enough to learn and adopt Power Platform - direction from management is keep it simple.

Are there some best practices and guidelines here? Are there forums specifically to cover this?

Any ideas? Anyone else often wondering what to do?

I worked with a client a few years ago who needed a more robust product catalog that was simpler in some ways but had greater capabilities when it comes to bundling and selecting product options based on contract or existing customer setup and availability of service by region. The result was developers overly customized the ordering solution, bastardized the back end to meet data needs and wrote a lot of .NET to make a custom solution work. I roled off the project before it was complete - advised against the route they were taking but they've recently called me back to help them sort out what is currently no longer sustainable. Haven't met or have the details yet - I'm a BA with some config/customization experience and I'm no longer 100% sure what we might be looking at except that their new architect mentioned a product catalog build in Power Apps.

Interesting topic, without an exact solution and depending on business needs. Most likely:

> Dynamics licensed users will have access to additional features/Tables: Cases, WorkOrders, etc. Also, specific functionalities (Customer Insights, some Business Process Flows, etc). This will rely basically on out of the box functionality.

> PowerUsers (With PowerApps/PowerAutomate licenses) might find easier to have a custom model driven app tailored to their needs, even created by themselves. This can include creating a specific app on top of Dynamics (for example, that shows 3-5 specific tables with specific forms to capture data)

> Additional customization goes one layer beyond this: Additional business Logic that is not easily accessible through PowerApps, Plugins or Data integrations with other products (like API requests to other services)

In reality, this relies a lot on what as a customer is needed on a specific point, and what internal management/Partners can offer.

Hope this helps.

Regards,

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