It’s been some time since I wrote “Is Dataverse the future of Finance and Operations apps?“, and when I did, Dataverse was still called CDS and still went through several name changes.
Has anything changed since I wrote that post? Do I still see Dataverse as the future of Finance and Operations apps? Well, now we know some things for sure, and new functionalities have been rolled out.
Let me look at my crystal ball again and see what we can see inside…
Convergence
We can think about convergence as the process that will bring is bringing Dynamics 365 Finance and Operations and the Power Platform closer, and making our life easier when wanting to integrate both.
If you want to learn more about FnO and Power Platform convergence, take a look at this:
- Microsoft Power Platform integration with Finance and Operations apps
- New scenarios enabled with Power Platform convergence
And also these sessions on YouTube:
- Finance Operations & Power Platform Convergence Road Map, by Sunil Garg at the Pakistan UG.
- D365 Platform Convergence Series – Introduction to Dataverse, by Preety Singh and Rachit Garg.
- Business events in Finance Operations and Dataverse, by Cameron Robinson and Rachit Garg.
Keep an eye on the ANZD365 FinOpsTeam YouTube channel as they’re currently doing a series on convergence and more content will be streamed during the coming weekends.
Linking the ERP and Dataverse is easier than ever
I remember when I first set up Dual Write for an environment during the preview. Everything was manual and there was some part of trial and error in the process.
Have you deployed a Finance and Operations environment lately? There’s a section for Dataverse, and after marking a checkbox, it will automatically deploy a Dataverse environment that will be linked to the FnO one you’re deploying. Once it’s running, setting up Dual Write is peanuts!
And what about Virtual Entities? You can use them in your Power Platform solutions instead of using the Finance and Operations connector. This will also make Dataverse developers’ lives easier, as they will be able to access ERP data in a way they’re used to and know well.
Add-ins in Dataverse
All the add-ins that we can install to extend Finance and Operations are being installed in Dataverse. Need to install the Inventory Visibility or Export to Azure Data Lake add-ins? You’ll need to link a Dataverse environment first!
Will AxDB ever be in Dataverse?
I don’t think we’ll see that in the short or midterm, but maybe in a distant future… or maybe not. If you watch Sunil Garg’s session, he makes very clear that right now the ERP and CRM/Dataverse databases being in the same DB is not in the roadmap of the convergence. But at least we’re all living in the same elastic pool-type Azure SQL servers!
Then I think that given the transactional nature of the ERP it’s a bit difficult that this will happen. But who knows, because the products are evolving at such speed that maybe, one day, we’ll see it.
X++ developers
If you’re an X++ developer, you might be asking yourself: “With all this convergence stuff, should I start learning about Power Platform?“.
Of course, you should! But not because X++ will disappear, this is made crystal clear by Sunil Garg in his session in Pakistan UG “Finance Operation & Power Platform convergence roadmap” (minute 9:25).
But X++ developers need to stop thinking they’re ONLY X++ developers. Juanan and I have said it in several of our sessions, we’re not just X++ developers anymore. First, the move to Azure and now the irruption of the Power Platform, we need to think of all that as tools to complement our X++ customizations. And not only complement, in some cases even replace them, like using Logic Apps to connect to an FTP server.
