Dynamics 365 Monthly Update-February 2018

Featured News

Beginning March 19, 2018, Microsoft will limit the number of API requests made by each user, within an organization in Dynamics 365 (online). This change will affect all versions of Dynamics 365 (online).

Each user will be allowed up to 60,000 API requests within five minutes. This limit will help ensure that users running applications that make extraordinarily large demands on servers will not affect other users.

Some of the typical scenarios where this would happen are:

• A plug-in that is written to pump data in a loop, without a well-defined max termination limit.
• An inefficient client application that queries for status on thousands of records, without any caching or without any interval between successive requests.

For more information and guidance about this limit, please see API Limits.

New Security enhancements have been added to Dynamics 365 (online) version 9.0 to better secure the application. The enhancements are: set session timeout and set inactivity timeout.

User session timeout

By default, Dynamics 365 (online) sets a user session timeout of 24 hours. A user is not required to log in with their credentials for up to 24 hours regardless of whether the user was active or inactive. Administrators can now enforce users to re-authenticate after a pre-determined period by modifying the user session timeout.

Inactivity timeout

By default, Dynamics 365 (online) does not enforce an inactivity session timeout. A user can remain logged in the application until the session timeout expires. System Administrators can modify this behavior.

For more information on how to configure these features in Dynamics 365 (online), view the following article.

NOTE: These security enhancements are also available for:

Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2016 (on-premises, version 8.2)

Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2016 (on-premises, version 8.1)

Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2015 (on-premises)

Details on these versions can be found here.

As announced in September 2017, product support for legacy Adxstudio Portals v7 will end on August 1, 2018. A guide is now available to help customers migrate their portal solutions and configuration data stored in Dynamics 365 organization into the schema and format supported by Portals capabilities for Dynamics 365. The migration guide for customers on Adxstudio version 7.0.0025 and above can be downloaded from here.

Details about Portals capabilities for Dynamics 365 can be found here. For any questions, contact your Microsoft representative, your partner or adxquest@microsoft.com.

Updates & Releases

After upgrading to Dynamics 365 (online), version 9.0, customers will need to upgrade their existing Field Service and Project Service Automation solution to the latest version. To update to the latest solution, visit the Admin Center for Dynamics 365 online, access the solutions page and install the update. For details, refer How to Install, Update a Preferred Solution. Known issues for the application can be found here.

The latest update to the Field Service and Project Service Automation solutions for Dynamics 365 version 8.2 is now available. This update includes improvements to quality, performance, and usability, and is based on customer feedback and requests.

Field Service enhancements (v7.4.0.74)

Resolved issues include:

• Error message received when editing any field on Product Receipt or when changing PO status to Products Received

• End Date on Agreement was incorrectly updated when start date is in DST but end date is not

• “Address Not Found” error when selecting address from suggestion popup

Project Service Automation (v2.4.0.48) Enhancements

Resolved issues include:

• Contract confirmation was not correctly processing unbilled actuals coming from journals

• Estimated cost on project entity page did not include expense estimates

• Resource Requirement created from the Generate Project team with tasks with decimal hours were off-by-one end date

Universal Resource Scheduling Enhancements

Note: Improvements and bug fixes for Universal Resource Scheduling apply to Field Service and Project Service Automation as well as to other schedulable entities in the Sales or Service applications.

Improvements for Universal Resource Scheduling can be viewed at What’s new in Universal Resource Scheduling for Dynamics 365 February 2018 Update.

Resolved issues include:

• Problem when switching between horizontal and vertical hourly schedule boards when a resource name is populated in the schedule board resource search box

• Issue with loading default saved filters on Schedule Board

• In the booking requirements grid, users can now filter to show requirements that do not have a value in the territory field

For more information review the Release Notes for Field Service and Project Service Automation Update Release 4.

The Interactive Service Hub (ISH) was introduced with Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online 2016 Update 1 and Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2016. ISH offered a web-based client to simplify daily tasks for Customer Service Representatives and Managers. It included interactive dashboards, interactive forms, and reference panel control. Though the ISH intuitive interface combined vital information in one place and allowed Customer Service Representatives to prioritize work and be more productive, there were certain limitations in extending it. The new Customer Service Hub (CSH) available in Dynamics 365 (online) version 9.0, offers even greater flexibility and improved controls and extensibility.

New features include:

• An interactive interface that is an App Module featuring a new Custom Control Framework

• Unified Interface that eliminates the prolonged initial metadata download

• Easy to filter forms, dashboards, and other metadata components shown to business users

For more information about the new features and how to upgrade, review this article.

Microsoft Social Engagement 2018 Update 1.2 is now available. With this update, a feedback dialog is included for a sample of users when they sign in. Everyone is encouraged to provide feedback to help shape the service.

Resolved issues include:

• Fixed an issue to enable replies containing special characters on LinkedIn from within Social Engagement.

• Improved the search setup for keyword search rules to explain how to enter keywords, inclusions, and exclusions. Additionally, we list the limitations for keywords, inclusions, and exclusions per search rule.

• Improved the Message Center to explain more clearly that post alerts are sent every few hours, and not immediately after a specific post matches the configured alert.

Visit the Help Center for more information.

Portal capabilities version 8.4.0.275 is now available.

New features include:

• Access to detailed error logs for any issues with the portal

• Administrators are notified about the portal authentication key expiration and can renew it via the Portal Admin Center

• Portal Administrations can configure the General Data Protection Regulations to meet their organization’s needs.

All new features and resolved issues can be viewed here. For a full list of all portal update releases please reference this KB article.

The Unified Service Desk (USD) 3.2.0 release is now available. The latest version of USD has major enhancements on performance diagnostics, faster load times for CRM entity pages and graceful handling and recovery of crashed or unresponsive Internet Processes. For more information review this article on the Microsoft Dynamics CRM Unified Service Desk blog.

Additional News

The Dynamics 365-Data Export Service is an add-on service available on Microsoft AppSource that can be used to replicate Dynamics 365 (online) data to an Azure SQL Database store in a customer-owned Azure subscription. The Data Export Service intelligently synchronizes the entire Dynamics 365 data initially and synchronizes it on a continuous basis as changes occur in the Dynamics 365 (online) system. The supported target destinations are Azure SQL Database and SQL Server on Azure virtual machines. For more information on the Data Export Service and its requirements, review this article on the Microsoft Docs site.

Machine learning implementation strategy for a customer service center

With the digitization of almost all industries on the way, advanced technologies like machine learning are revolutionizing the way of work for most industries today. Many customer service centers are thinking about adopting machine learning for their day to day operations. These techniques will soon be a part of industry standard best practices.

Customer service leads can leverage various machine learning capabilities to meet their Key Performance Indicators (KPIs). Examples include task automation, relevant Knowledge Base article suggestions, similar cases suggestion using text analytics and proactive notifications to engage with customers.

This post describes how traditional call centers can create a strategy for adopting machine learning capabilities.

Microsoft is happy to announce the Dynamics 365 for Marketing is available in public preview for organizations seeking a marketing automation solution to generate more demand and drive more sales.

Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Marketing is designed as the front end of the sales cycle to help companies nurture more sales-ready leads, align sales and marketing and make smarter decisions. Most importantly, Dynamics 365 for Marketing works together with Dynamics 365 for Sales on the same platform which aligns teams with common data, connected processes and Office 365 collaboration tools. For more information and to sign up, view this announcement.

Microsoft is happy to announce the launch of a new Help + support ticketing experience for admins to contact a Microsoft support representative for Dynamics 365 (online). This feature is in preview so customers can get early access and provide feedback.

For more information, review this article on the Dynamics 365 Customer Engagement Team Blog.