Developing Microsoft Dynamics GP Business Applications

As a Dynamics GP end user, I wasn't sure if I could reap any benefits from Ms. Vail's book. I have to admit I was pleasantly surprised. Sure, there were parts that were 'over my head', so to speak! For the most part, she made it fairly simple for the reader to see and comprehend what she was explaining. She even tried to lighten the mood of the book (if you can even do that in a reference book) by interjecting her sense of humor throughout the book.I liked how she started with the overview of Dexterity to give those of us who might not be familiar with all of the terminology a good starting point and something we could refer back to if needed. I thought she did well in her order of information flow. This book could have easily been one of those books where you were constantly flipping back and forth between chapters. I also really enjoyed how she altered her screen shots and actually pointed out the item she was referring to. If you aren't familiar with Dexterity, you might not have seen most of her screen shots before so this really was a great aide and very clear, colorful graphics were a nice perk. I, personally, liked Chap 9 on her Code-free Customization. This was something everyone could and should benefit from. Dynamics GP has some excellent tools in their Smartlist Builder, Excel Report Builder, Drill-Down Builder and Extender. I even tried her examples and was able to make everything I tried work. WOW, what a concept! How many times have you tried something in a book you were reading and it didn't work for you!There were a lot of areas in the book that I look forward to learning about and trying out. I see this book as a great resource for anyone's library. After going thru it the first time I can see going thru it again now that I have a better understanding of how Dexterity works and consequently how I have e better picture of how Dynamics GP works. I would highly recommend this book to anyone that is contemplating making that step into Dexterity.

I work with GP at my place of employment. I am by no means an expert but I wanted a book that would give me a good introduction to the architecture of GP and how to integrate other applications with it. When I saw the title of this book, I assumed it was like other books that talk about integrating other applications with a specific piece of software. They list of all of the ways to integrate with the software and spend a chapter or two about each integration method. This book did not do that.The first two chapters provided valuable architecture information about GP. The second chapter in particular talks about the various ways to integrate with GP. I was hooked at that point. The rest of the book was basically everything you wanted to know about Dexterity but were afraid to ask. The author spent basically 1 chapter on Extender and the Visual Studio Tools after that; however, nothing was written about integration manager, eConnect, or web services.It would have been nice to have added a what's next chapter.If you want to build custom add-ons to GP and want to do it in Dexterity, then buy this book. If you want to learn how to integrate data or other applications into GP, dont bother. I have experience with eConnect and the web services and know that these tools provide very powerful means to extend GP.

Great information. Being an IT Manager at a Manufacturing company with a new installation of GP we are always looking for ways to get more functionality out of our system. This book contained a lot of useful information about the tools available to customize GP.

As a 30-year veteran of Dynamics GP business implementations, the question I am asked most often is how to choose between the various tools and options for customizing and enhancing GP. It is often difficult to assess the best option for different situations but Leslie Vail demystifies the choices and provides guidelines where they overlap. Her 17 years as a certified trainer of this product line has clearly benefited the reader as it delivers her incredible experience to draw upon for examples and sample development projects. Her writing style has a great flow and her sense of humor adds to the book's readability.Just as she does regularly in her Dynamics Confessions Blogspot, Vail clearly describes each tool and she provides clear, concise direction on how to use each of them to maximum advantage. The reader should have a good foundational understanding of the Dynamics GP product line as well as at least some basic understanding of report writing, data queries and Office data connections. However, having said that, Leslie's development guide provides hands-on, clear direction of several options for customizing and extending Dynamics GP applications. The novice consultant will find her clarity and training experience useful while the more experienced developer will gain perspective and a checklist/reference for planning and executing on complex implementations.So often too I have been asked into a client's "botched" implementation to clean up the mess that inexperience leaves behind. Cleaning up what was already led astray is more difficult than starting from scratch with a "clean slate". Vail provides sound advice on how to maintain customizations as well as how to avoid common pitfalls. She further guides the reader into choosing one method of customization over another based on sound advice, clear direction and years of GP experience. The book is organized in a way that allows the reader to target only those areas of interest, though the early chapters lay a good foundation for any product enhancement or customization. I would enthusiastically recommend this read to any user, developer or consultant engaging in a GP development project.