Quick Tip - Allow Lookup fields to search by multiple attributes

Lookups as you know in CRM show a list of records of a related entity. Using the lookup, you can search for records by typing in the search key words to filter the list.

This search is performed on all fields that is listed in the Find columns in the Quick Find View of the entity.

Instead of clicking the lookup button, the same search can be performed by directly typing in the search string in the lookup field.

The Lookup field is designed to auto-resolve the text to a matching record in the lookup entity.

This little known feature is very helpful in cases, where you identify the records not by thier names but by a unique id. Take for example you have a form in CRM that you need a user to fill in, and the user is aware of the SSN # of the contact and it would be a time saver if the user could type in the SSN# in the Contact lookup and it would auto-resolve to the Contact.

To acheive this follow the steps below

1. Customize the Contact entity
2. In Views, Select Quick Find View

3. Click on the Add Find Columns

4. Check the SSN field

5. Save and publish the entity.

Open the Account form. In the Primary contact type in the SSN# and tab out...

It will auto resolve to the contact that has that SSN# assigned.

Hope this little trick saves a lot of data entry time!

R8 aka Q2 2012 Service Update Plans revised

The Q2 Service Update plans have been revised. As per the road map made available earlier this year, Q2 Service update was all about "CRM Anywhere". It planned to include Cross Browser availability and Mobility that would let Dynamics CRM be accessible "anywhere" be it any browser or any device.

However in the recent Press Release posted on 6th July, Cross Browser availability and Mobility plans have been delayed and these would not be included in the Q2 update. Here is what it says

On July 19th, as we committed, our Q2 release will include Microsoft SQL Server 2012 support, Industry templates and certifications for our online service. After listening to the feedback from our customers and partners we are delaying availability of Microsoft Dynamics CRM Mobile and cross-browser support. These were previously scheduled to be delivered in the Q2 2012 Service Update, and we now plan to deliver them in the service update scheduled for Q4 2012

You can read the entire post here

This was one of the features that I was most excited about and I am little disappointed with the delay... Q4,,, a bit too long a wait :( Nonetheless it is always better to have a great finished product than half-baked one and as long as this feature is made available in the future with no scope for issues/errors.... I would be willing to wait...

Waiting for a great Cross-Browser Release!!!

CRM 2011 Install Errors - Tips and Tricks continued

The more I get to install/upgrade to CRM 2011 in different environment the more I come across different issues and fortunately there are workarounds to it. So here are some additional items found since the last post on this subject.

A Microsoft Dynamics CRM Server component is using the same account as the instance of SQL Server Reporting Services

You receive the above error when installing SSRS Data connector. I had never seen this before. But this was a system on which there was a previous install of CRM 2011 Async service (A distributed install). The Reporting Service was running under Network Service Account. Changing it to another domain user account did not fix this issue.

This issue has been explained in detail in this KB article http://support.microsoft.com/kb/974584. Though this KB has been targetted for CRM 4, the following section of the resolution worked in this particular case

Add the IgnoreChecks registry key to the computer that is running Microsoft Dynamics CRM so the installation can proceed when an error is shown in the Environmental Diagnostic Wizard (EDW):

1. Click Start, click Run, type regedit, and then click OK.
2. In the registry, locate the following subkey:
   HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\MSCRM
3. Right-click MSCRM, point to New, click DWORD Value, and then type IgnoreChecks.
4. Double-click IgnoreChecks, and then type 1 in the Value data field.

After this change is made, the Environmental Diagnostic Wizard will still point the same error. But notice the Next button is now enabled :) Go ahead click Next and complete the install.

After successful installation remove the key added to the registry.

Index was outside the bounds of the array.

I came across this while trying to fix the one above :) The one above complained about same service account being used, so I tried to fix it by using a Domain user account. Instead of typing the user name, I chose to use the lookup button to seach the user from the AD. Selecting the user set the service user name in the form of user@domain.com.

Change the service account back to domain\user and this error will vanish.

Action Microsoft.Crm.Setup.Server.GrantConfigDBDatabaseAction failed.
Windows NT user or group 'NTDomain\SQLAccessGroup{xxx} not found.

If you see this error during an install or upgrade and if you are using SQL Server on another machine, you are connected to the SQL Server machine through an RDP session. Log off. Restart the install and it will proceed without any error :)

The transaction log for database 'ORG_MSCRM' is full due to 'ACTIVE_TRANSACTION'.

Do not try to check the transaction log size for this. Most probably all is good there. The first thing to check is free disk space on the drive on which the ORG_MSCRM database and log file resides. You are probably running out of space there. Make some space and you are ready to go. Check this
Installation of Microsoft Visual C++ Runtime failed. Exit code: 5100. Result: Asia

Setup will not run on a machine that has Visual C++ 2010 with version 10.0.40219 install. This system had SQL 2012 installed that probably installed this higher version. CRM Setup requires an older version to continue. Go ahead and uninstall the VC++ redistributable on this machine and let CRM install the required components including Visual C++

As usual, the above solutions have worked in our scenario and you can give them a try at your own risk

How to Debug Plugins using Profiler

One can debug CRM plug ins without connecting to CRM server or without remote debugging.

Here are the steps as in how you can use Profiler for debugging plug ins:

   1>     Connect to CRM using plugin registration tool of March SDK 2012.

   2>      Click on Install Profiler

         

   3>     You will find a new node attached to registered plugins “Plugin Profiler”.

   4>     Select a plug-in step and click Profile to enable profiling.

5>     Then start your plugin from MSCRM i.e if your plugin is on update perform  update operation and download the error file.

6>     Then in Visual Studio attach to process “plugin registeration.exe”. Add the breakpoint  from where you would like to debug.

7>     Then click on Debug in plugin registration tool.

8>     In Profile location provide the path of the error log of the plugin.

9>     In Assembly location provide the dll of the plugin from which you got error.

10>     Then select the Plugin class from Plug-in. This drop down will contains all classes present in the dll.

11>     To start debugging just click on Start Plug-in Execution.

      

Solutions to issues with Reports in Dynamics CRM 2011

OK I am having a real hard time getting reports to work after installing CRM in recent times. This is an attempt to compile all SQL reports related errors and solutions that have worked for community in general. I have not checked each of the solutions but since I am experiencing issues with reports pretty often I am create this as a quick reference source. The solutions and errors have been picked up from queries posted on community forums and other blog posts.

1. Reports dont work after upgrade to CRM 2011 not even in the new organization added.

I have a separate post on that. But if that does not resolve your problem. It could be that the CRM 4 reports are still being referenced and the new CRM 2011 reports are not being published. The reports do not work in any of the CRM organizations. The Reports are stored in Shared Reports\5.0 folder on Report Server. You can go ahead and delete the Shared Reports folder and then execute the publishreports.exe to publish the reports.

2. Reports do not work with the following error recorded in the log files.

You can access the log files at Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSRS10_50.MSSQLSERVER\Reporting Services\LogFiles

Cannot create a connection to data source 'CRM'. ---> Microsoft.Crm.Reporting.DataExtensionShim.Common.ReportExecutionException: Immediate caller DOMAIN\crm has insufficient privilege to run report as user S-1-5-21-1756635634-....

There are a couple of solutions available for this.

Open Reporting Services Configuration Manager and uncheck the credentials provided in the Execution Account

Another solution available on this blog.

3. Another common reason for reports not working is the user running the reports is not a part of the following groups

4. Check your Datasource settings in SSRS.

There are 2 datasource created within each CRM organization as well in the Shared Reports folder.

MSCRM_FetchDataSource - This is used by Fetch based Reports

MSCRM_DataSource - This is used by SQL queries based Reports

This is not a comprehensive list and suggestions to include other problems/solutions related to reports in this post are most welcome.

Note: These solutions should be used at your own risk.