Overview

The possibility to prevent items currently in your warehouse from being used in standard processes has often been requested. In previous versions of Dynamics AX this was primarily possible with the quarantine order functionality. However quarantine orders require items to be (logically) moved to a separate quarantine warehouse.

So the new blocking functionality is designed to allow items to be blocked at their current location.

The first requirement is to be able to block some of the current on-hand. During the analysis for the new functionality it was discovered that in addition there is also a need to block some incoming goods until quality inspection is complete.

The second requirement is that the current on-hand is always correct – both from a quantity point of view and from a value point of view.

The ideas behind it all

For most types of issue transactions – like sales orders – it is possible to point out specific on hand and use the physical reservation to reserve/block current on-hand for the specified transaction. To ensure that items on-hand are blocked we create a set of issue transactions and use the same physical reservation mechanism. This set is identified by a unique InventTransId value.

To ensure that the expected on-hand is always correct we create a set of expected receipt transactions. The date when the items are expected to be released back to inventory can be modified by the user. This ensures that master planning can correctly considers items currently blocked.
The set of expected receipt transactions is identified by another unique InventTransId value.

We have defined a new reference type for the inventory transactions related to blocking called “Inventory blocking”.

This screen shot shows the transactions for a blocking entity where a single piece is being blocked

The corresponding on-hand form in a scenario where 1000 pieces are on hand is shown below

The inventory blocking functionality intentionally doesn’t have any scrap functionality – or other means of deducting some of the blocked on-hand. If you want to allow for such functionality you need to combine the blocking functionality with other processes for issuing items.

As the inventory blocking functionality never consumes or moves any on-hand there is no need to ever pick, pack or invoice any of the issue transactions (which would also require updating of the receipt transactions). When the items are no longer to be blocked the quantity is simply reduced or the entire blocking entity is deleted along with all the transactions associated.

Manual inventory blocking

Manual inventory blocking – as opposed to quality order blocking – is the process where a user directly creates a new inventory blocking entity and specifies quantity and inventory dimensions.
The form for maintaining inventory blockings can be found in the “Periodic” section under “Inventory and warehouse management”.

When saving the new inventory blocking entity inventory transactions are automatically created which makes the physical reservation and represent the release back to inventory.

Quality order blocking

A quality order can be created either manually or automatically as part of the receipts process. For both cases an inventory blocking entity is automatically created – just as for a manual inventory blocking entity. However as the received items may be part of a linked chain (marked) of transactions the blocking transactions are inserted into this chain upon creation and the original chain is recreated again upon release from blocking.

Author: Kim Moerup

The product release process is part of the product setup in Dynamics AX 2012. Every single product must be released to a legal entity before the system allows you to procure, sell, or produce it.

For more details, about how to release products, product masters and product variants, see: Release products.

In some cases, the product release process can fail to release products due to inconsistencies or missing setup. In this post, we will take a look at system capabilities that allow you to troubleshoot the product release process and take action to resolve any issues.

Quick overview of the product release process

The product release process allows you to release multiple products and product variants or, in other words, make multiple products available in various legal entities. This action can be executed from various list pages and detail forms.

If you work with a small number of products, it’s a very quick process to release them to a single legal entity. But in the case of, for example, a new site deployment, it can be a time consuming task to release all products to the new legal entity.

For this scenario, we recommend using a server batch job to execute the product release process in order to avoid extra load on the system during work hours. If issues arise during a batch job execution, the release session concept in Dynamics AX 2012 will help provide you with information about any issues or conflicts. Based on the system reports you can then resolve the issues or conflicts that occurred during the batch job execution.

The release session concept and the release process

The release session is a database persisted object which groups all products that should be released to legal entities. The release session object is automatically created behind the scene when you request to release one or more products.

If all products have been successfully released without any issues, the release session is automatically deleted and no further actions are required for the release product request. However, if issues occurred during the release process, then the release session will remain open with all the individual products that failed during the process. This allows you to troubleshoot the release process, fix the issues and repeat the action without having to select all products and legal entities one more time.

Example

Assume that a product manager must release a new collection of products to a new legal entity. When he executes the release process, various errors are reported by the system. The product manager can now navigate to the most recent release session, troubleshoot the issues and repeat the entire release action from there.

Open product releases list page

All open release sessions can be found under Product Information Management -> Periodic -> Open product releases list page. This list page contains all release sessions where something went wrong. You can filter all sessions by the user ID and release session time stamp to see all the products and product variants that the system could not release to the legal entity.

You can click the View Infolog button to view details about the issues with the specific product or product variant. This is a great way to figure out what went wrong and why.

Let’s take a look at some issues that commonly occur during the product release process:

· The product already exists in a legal entity.

o This can happen if you release a product for the first time by mistake and then release the product again after having made changes to it. This action will create a conflict and one way to solve the conflict would be to delete the released product from the legal entity, go back to your product definition, make the required changes, and then release the product again.

· A different product already exists with the specified item ID.

o This might happen due to an issue with the number sequence for the item number or because the item number has been defaulted from the product number and by coincidence, another released product exists with the same item number. To solve this issue, you must use another number sequence or rename a product with a different product number value. For more information about the product and item numbers, read this blog post: Product Number and Item Number in Dynamics AX 2012

· The product variant could not be released

o This usually happens when the inventory dimensions (InventDim) number sequence setup is missing in the legal entity. Make sure that the number sequence is properly set up. For more information, see Set up number sequences.

When you have investigated and resolved all issues, you can repeat the release action by clicking the Release product button. For more information about the Open Product Releases List Page, see: Open product releases (form).

Working with the release session from the code

If you have access to the code, you can also release a series of products without using the user interface. The following code example demonstrates how the release session can be created and how it should be used for release purposes:

 1:staticvoid releaseProductToCurrentLegalEntity(Args _args)

 2: {

 3:     EcoResProductReleaseSessionManager  productReleaseSessionManager;

 4:     EcoResProduct                       product;

 5:     CompanyInfo                         companyInfo;

 6:

 7:     companyInfo = CompanyInfo::findDataArea(curext());

 8:

 9:     product = EcoResProduct::findByDisplayProductNumber('myProduct');

 10:

 11:     ttsBegin;

 12:

 13:// Create a new release session

 14:     productReleaseSessionManager = EcoResProductReleaseSessionManager::newReleaseSession();

 15:

 16:// Add a product to the release session

 17:     productReleaseSessionManager.addProduct(product.RecId);

 18:

 19:// Add a legal entity where tne product should be released to 

 20:     productReleaseSessionManager.addLegalEntityForAllProducts(companyInfo.RecId);

 21:

 22:// Release all products within the current session to the specified legal entity

 23:     productReleaseSessionManager.execute();

 24:

 25:     ttsCommit;

 26: }

Another approach would be to use the existing Product-Item data management services. For more information, read this blog post: Product-item data management services.

Summary

The product release process is an important concept in Dynamics AX 2012. We hope that the tools and functionality of the system sufficiently and effectively support your business process. Please leave any feedback or suggestions here or provide the information via our AX SCM requirements group: AX SCM requirements.

Thank you for reading this!

Evgenij Korovin

This blog post describes some of the enhancements to the Warehouse management (WMS) functionality that have been implemented in the R2 release after the launch of Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 (RTM).

Shipment list report printed in a batch job at shipment update

By using outbound rules for a shipment and by setting up automatic printing of the shipment list you can have the shipment list report sent to a batch job.

Make sure you assign a printer setting that uses a paper printer for the batch job printing.

You can define the printer setup from Inventory and warehouse management> Shipments> Printer setup> Shipment list:

New uses of the location type Picking location

The location type Picking location can now be used as part of the item arrival process and for pallet movements.

· Item arrival: Locations of the type Picking location are now available in the registration process and you can apply a picking location on a journal line in an item arrival journal even if the inventory item’s warehouse item setting does not use a picking location.

· Pallet movements: When you use the Move pallet functionality, you can now select a location type of Picking location even though the location is not an item picking location.

Relocation pallet transport

In AX 2012 R2 you can create a relocation pallet transport and then assign the actual pallet transport processing to a warehouse worker.

You can access the new functionality from the Move pallet menu item via Inventory and warehouse management> Setup> Inventory equipment> Pallets> Functions:

You can then process the pallet transport from Inventory and warehouse management> Common> Pallet transports:

Detailed blog post on the relocation transport

A detailed blog post about the implementation of the relocation pallet transport will follow.

Shipment template enhancements for joint shipping

An option called Grouping inventory reference has been added to the Joint shipping field in the Shipment templates form.

You can access the Shipment templates form from Inventory and warehouse management> Setup> Distribution> Shipment templates

When the Grouping inventory reference option is selected, output orders for withdrawal of kanbans are grouped based on the ID of the parent manufacturing kanban. If you use this option with output orders that do not reference kanbans, the grouping reference is the same as the reference for the output order.

By Bibi Christensen, Per Lykke Lynnerup & Lennart Conrad

Introduction the Relocation Transport

A new type of pallet transports called Relocation transport has been introduced in Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 R2.

The new pallet transport type can be used to move items on a pallet from one warehouse location to another warehouse location even when you have transactions that are physically reserved against the quantity on the pallet. With this added functionality the common warehouse activity of moving pallets between locations is supported more efficiently.

When the transport is created, two sets of inventory transactions are created:

- Issue transactions with the issue status Reserved physical that will reserve items on the pallet at the from-location.

- Receipt transactions with the receipt status Ordered on the to-location.

When the transport is created, existing transactions that are Reserved physical on the pallet at the from-location will be updated to Reserved ordered on the to-location. If there are any transactions that are Reserved physical and fixed against the from-warehouse or from-location, and any of these are changed, the transport cannot be created.

If there are any transactions with the pallet id that have status Arrived the transport is not created. This is typically the case if a transport already exists for the pallet.

Transactions with the pallet id that have an issue status of Quotation Issue, On order, Reserved ordered or a receipt status of Ordered are not updated. In this case the from-location and pallet remains the same on these transactions.

Once the transport is completed Reserved ordered transactions on the to-location will be updated to Reserved physical.

How to set up and use the new transport type

The new transport type is set up the same way as the existing transports.

In the Inventory and warehouse management parameters form you can set up the priorities for pallet transports.

· Click Inventory and warehouse management> Setup to open the Inventory and warehouse management form.

In the Forklift form you can specify the forklifts that should handle the relocation transports.

· Click Inventory and warehouse management> Setup> Inventory equipment> Forklift to open the Forklift form.

When you move a pallet, you can create the relocation transport.

A check box is added to the Move pallet form and when the checkbox is selected, a relocation pallet transport will be created.

· Click Inventory and warehouse management> Setup> Inventory equipment> Pallets> Functions> Move pallet to open the Move pallet form.

New code APIs and thebackporting of feature to the previous releases

The API to create a relocation transport from code is quite simple; You basically just call one line of code:

WMSTransport::createRelocationTransport(wmsPalletToMove,newWMSLocation);

It has also been decided to port this new functionality to Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 and it will be available as part of AX 2012 RU5 and with KB2770782.

Introduction

Dynamics AX 2012 provides a new feature that allows you to validate the released product setup and ensure data integrity and overall process readiness. This feature is useful for managing master data and we expect it to be widely used by our partners and customers in order to support the product data life cycle processes, engineering change, approval workflows etc.

Retrospective look at the previous versions of Dynamics AX

Traditionally, the system stores item definition data in one main table (Invent Table). Every time a user creates a new item, a set of mandatory fields must be addressed in order to successfully save the new item definition. This approach looks simple and logical; however, the item definition requires a good overview of all the mandatory settings. Insights into these settings are usually divided between users in multiple departments in an enterprise organization and it usually requires quite a lot of work to coordinate this information. A common approach in order to ensure consistency is to create shared and approved item templates which are strictly controlled and can be re-used across enterprises for the initial item data creation.

Another inconvenience of requiring users to address all mandatory fields relates to in-flexibility since it makes users working with the system less agile and process driven. Say, for example, that an engineering department wants to create a new product definition in the ERP system. There is an urgent need to send product descriptions to the external vendor for the localization and for the creation of marketing materials for the upcoming sales campaign. However, users cannot simply create items with the settings to control the external vendor relation processes. In this case, ALL settings must be defined which includes setup of financial accounts, inventory tracking, reservation rules etc.

Item master data setup enables the core business processes within ERP, so it’s not a surprise that we see a number of partner customizations in this space. If, for example, a company wants to retire an item, the company must ensure that the item cannot be produced or sold any longer within the organization. At the same time, it should be still possible to handle customer returns based on the existing customer agreements. When the item master data setup changes, one would expect some validation mechanism to ensure that the new item master data state is consistent with the user’s expectation. Unfortunately, there is no single centralized place to support such item validation process, so our partners and customers have to introduce such capabilities by themselves.

Why are there no any mandatory product master data fields in Dynamics AX 2012?

With the introduction of the Product Information Management (PIM) module in Dynamics AX 2012 we get an opportunity to remove some of the above described boundaries and to build a more flexible and process-oriented solution. There are a couple of key differences for users who deal with products compared to the previous versions of Dynamics AX:

No mandatory fields

• When you create a new shared product definition, the only property that you must provide is a product number (product ID). Once a new shared product is created, you can continue with the master data setup.

Figure 1 Create new product

• When you release a product to the given legal entity you need not set any company-specific properties.
• When you create a new released product from a legal entity, the only property you have to provide is the product number and the item number. Usually those IDs are bound to the automatic number sequence, so you can create a new released product definition with just one click with the mouse.

Figure 2 Create new released product

Once you have a basic product or released product definition in place, the system allows you to continue with the various master data setup processes such as to define translation, attach documents and images, sync product data to an external solution via existing product-item services etc.

When can my product be used for procurement, sales, and production?

This is a valid question at this point because if there are no mandatory fields anymore, how do I know when my product can used for procurement, sales, production, quotation …?

In order to answer this question let’s focus on process readiness and how the system behaves in Dynamics AX 2012.

There are hundreds if not a thousand different business processes which can be controlled by product master data. The total number of those processes varies from industry to industry and the processes vary a lot based on the end customer business requirements. It’s hard, if not impossible, to predict or know in advance which product master data is required in order to enable each unique business process.

Therefore, in Dynamics AX 2012, every single business process has to, metaphorically speaking, verify all required product master data. In other words, if some master data is not set for a given business process, the system will throw an error and the end user must set the master data before the system can continue.

Example

A user creates an inventory movement journal. The system tries to retrieve all inventory dimensions that should be tracked for the product. If the setup is not complete, the process will fail since the basic pre-requirements are not fulfilled.

Figure 3 Create journal line for product with missing setup

Understanding a product validation feature

The new product validation process has been introduced in order to help assess the overall product data readiness for the main business processes.

As mentioned before, it’s impossible to predict what master data will be required for what process in the system. However, we can definitely focus on the setup that is most essential in order to cover key processes in Dynamics AX 2012.

The product master data validation logic can be triggered from released product list pages and released product details forms. The functionality will verify that the following essential fields are specified for the released product:

• Product storage dimension group
• Product tracking dimension group
• Model group
• Item group

In addition to the previous fields list, the following essential fields have been added to the validation logic to cover the Process Industry for Dynamics AX 2012 Feature Pack:

• Catch weight unit setup for the catch weight enabled products

All these settings can be set on the released product list page which prevents the need to navigate across different places and modules in the system. Users can then leverage one single form to complete all the setup that is required.

When, why and how to run a product validation

We strongly recommend to always validate the product data setup to ensure overall process readiness. This process helps to prevent last minute issues for end users.

Example

• A product manager releases all product data to a legal entity.
• The product manager uses product templates to address the main field values and to execute the validation logic.

You can run validation logic for one or for multiple products and you can apply a product template for multiple products at the same time.

Figure 4 Run a product validation function for multiple products

Tip: Read more about how to use product templates: previous blog post

How to customize the product validation process

The EcoResProductValidationService class holds all the product validation logic. The class gets the number of released product references as an input, runs the validation logic, and reports all validation errors in a standard infolog message.

 1:staticvoid runValidationForReleasedProducts(Args _args)

 2: {

 3:     container                           packedProductsPerCompanyInfo;

 4:     InventTable                         inventTable;    

 5:     EcoResProductValidatonDataContract  dataContract = new EcoResProductValidatonDataContract();

 6:     EcoResProductValidatonService       service = new EcoResProductValidatonService();

 7:

 8:// Find all released product with the itemId pattern like 'production*'

 9:while select itemId from inventTable

 10:where inventTable.ItemId like 'production*'

 11:     {

 12:         packedProductsPerCompanyInfo += [[inventTable.ItemId]];

 13:     }

 14:

 15:if (conLen(packedProductsPerCompanyInfo) > 0)

 16:     {

 17:// Create service operation data contract class and pass all released product references

 18:         dataContract = new EcoResProductValidatonDataContract();

 19:         dataContract.packedProductsPerCompanyData(SysOperationHelper::base64Encode(packedProductsPerCompanyInfo));

 20:  

 21:// Run validation logic

 22:         service.validateProducts(dataContract);

 23:     }

 24: }

Assume that we need to make sure that all items are produced with a production order for the current manufacturing company. The existing EcoResProductValidator can easily be extended to accommodate such a validation check:

Figure 5 Customization example

Summary

Managing product master data can be a complex and challenging task. We hope that the product information management features in Dynamics AX 2012 can help your organization to deal with some of these challenges. The product validation process is there for you, so please learn how to use it and enhance it if you need to.

Thanks for reading.

It’s the warehouse managers’ responsibility to make sure that sufficient space is available for all goods that are to be stored in the warehouses that they control. This can be a challenging task. Warehouse space is expensive, and warehouse managers must avoid an excess of free space and on the other hand they must make sure that space is available at the time when goods arrive at the warehouse locations.

In some industries, a shortage of space at the time when goods arrive at a warehouse location can result in huge financial losses for a company. If, for example, there is not space in a warehouse when a truck load of frozen fish arrives, the warehouse manager cannot just unload the fish on the parking lot outside the buildings. Possible solutions to the problem would be to redirect goods to another warehouse owned by the company, to buy inventory space at the warehouse hotels, or, if there are no other options, to send the goods back.

All of the solutions mentioned above to the problem of not being able to store goods due to a lack of available warehouse space, will result in added expenses for the warehouse and they might even result in goods not being available for customers or the production.

What is important for the warehouse manager is to be able to quickly get an overview of the current space utilization in terms of, for example, pallets, volume or weight and to be able to project the future space utilization based on transactions generated by master planning.

In Dynamics AX 2012 R2, a new report provides a possibility of short and long term operation planning for current and future space utilization of a warehouse.

How the space utilization feature can help the warehouse manager

As already mentioned, warehouse managers manage the space that is available in the warehouse and they must make sure that the inbound products can be stored in the warehouse. Information about current and forecasted space utilization can enable the warehouse manager to make decisions about where items should be stored. The new report can help the warehouse manager to identify problems with missing space for items that will arrive today or in the future and it can provide insights in transaction details that are related to an excess of unused space.

To avoid space related issues, the warehouse manager can analyze the amount of capacity that the warehouse or warehouses are currently using and the amount they will use in the future. The warehouse manager can get a detailed overview of the transactions that cause space management issues, and maybe these issues can be avoided by using projections that allow more lead time.

The space utilization feature in Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 R2 can display the current capacity of a warehouse and the projected capacity of the future. Capacity can be displayed in pallets (if advanced WMS is used), weight, or volume. Forecasted capacity is based on a master plan and other space utilization settings as defined by the warehouse manager. This will be covered in the sections below.

The warehouse manager can:

· Choose a master plan based on the need of a space utilization analysis.

· Select how many days of future space need to be calculated

· Specify if either planned or confirmed transactions or both should be included in the report.

Space utilization is calculated from transactions that are generated by a master plan for the warehouse. The calculation model uses the space utilization situation in the warehouse from before the last MRP run. All of the transactions that are to happen on that warehouse space are calculated no matter if they are planned or confirmed. The result as it would look by the end of the day is shown in percentage vs. maximal space available. The result can be viewed in pallets, volume, or weight provided that this information is set up correctly for all of the products.

· Check the setting of the products on the Manage inventory fast tab in the Released product details form under Product information management.

Reports provide warning functionality for master data configurations. For example, say that the warehouse space utilization report is viewed in a unit volume and there is a purchase order line with an item that does not have any setup for physical dimensions. In this case a warning will be shown for this instance and for all similar cases. A detailed report will be generated for all of the missing inventory item setups. If items do not have fallback warehouses, this will be included in the report as well. A warning icon on the report indicates to the warehouse manager that calculations might not be precise and that a fallback warehouse or some inventory item setups are missing.

How to use the space utilization feature

To use the Space utilization feature in Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 R2, you must complete the following three steps. Also, data from at least one master plan must be created before the report can be generated.

Master planning > Periodic> Master scheduling

Figure 1

Configure and run the report:

1. Configure one or more space utilization setup templates.

2. Run the Schedule load utilization periodic job.

3. Analyze the space utilization information. This can be accomplished in one of two ways:

1. Run the Warehouse load utilization report from Inventory and warehouse management in Dynamics AX 2012 R2.

2. View the report in the Space utilization web part in the Warehouse manager role center.

1. Configure one or more space utilization setup templates.

Click Inventory and warehouse management> Setup> Warehouse reports> Space utilization.

Figure 2

From the Schedule load utilization form, you can create any number of space utilization setups and switch between the setups.

Space utilization: Enter the space utilization ID.

Name: Enter the space utilization name.

Storage load mode: In the Storage load field, you can select Warehouse, Zone or warehouse and Zone. This field is used to determine the output of the report. For example, if you select Warehouse, one line is printed for each warehouse. If you select Zone, one line is printed for each store zone. If you select Warehouse and zone, one line is printed for each warehouse and store zone combination.

Exclude blocked locations: When this check box is selected, the report will not include capacity for a location that is locked by the inventory blocking feature.

Location type: Select location types to be used as available allowed space. The information on the Location type FastTab is used when you run the Schedule load utilization periodic job in step 2 below. When the current and forecasted capacity is calculated, only location types that are selected are analyzed.

Note: The setup only needs to be created once.

2. Run the Schedule load utilization periodic job.

Open Inventory and warehouse management > Periodic > Schedule load utilization.

Figure 3

Master plan: Select the master plan that you want to use for space utilization calculations.

Note: the warehouse manager can shift to another master plan at any time. This is useful in order to determine how the space utilization will look if the planning team decides to change to another plan.

Number of days: Enter the number of days that you want to project and analyze warehouse space utilization for in the future. The current report shows space utilization for 10 days in the future.

Space utilization: Select the space utilization configuration to be used in combination with the number of days and the master plan that is selected in step 1.

Click OK to generate data for the report.

Use the options on the Batch tab to schedule the generation of data for report as a batch process. Normally the batch process is set to run automatically once a day after the master planning has been completed.

3. Analyze the space utilization information (generated in step 2).

As mentioned previously, the report can be viewed from the warehouse manager’s role center (out-of-the-box), or from the Dynamics AX client. This description is based on Dynamics AX 2012 R2 client.

Note: To be able to view the report from the warehouse manager’s role center page, the configuration and generation of data in step 1 and 2 must be completed.

Complete the following setup to run the report:

Open Inventory and warehouse management> Reports> Analysis> Warehouse load utilization.

Figure 4

Show by: Use this field to determine how the rows of the report are displayed. If you select Site, one row is printed for each site. If you select Load unit, the Storage load field on the Space utilization setup template is used to determine how the rows are printed (Warehouse, Zone or Warehouse and Zone). If you select Site, a report will be generated on the site level where each site can contain load units of the types Warehouse, Zones, and Warehouse and zone.

Site: Selectone or more sites.

Load unit: When one or more sites and a space utilization setup are selected, load units are displayed for all the sites that are selected under Site. The Load unit field only applies if the Show by field is set to Load unit and the Space utilization setup field is selected. The options in the Load unit field varies based on the option selected in the Storage load field for the current space utilization setup. For example, if storage load is set to Zone, a list of store zones is displayed in the Load unit field.

Load type: Indicate if the report percentages should be calculated and viewed using pallet, volume or weight.

Space utilization setup: Select the space utilization setup that should be used for the report.

Click OK to run the report.

Example of a generated report

Figure 5

In the example above, the report shows what site we are looking at, what load units have been selected, and what load type we are using.

The report is generate by a load unit combination of warehouse and zones as specified in the selected warehouse space utilization configuration. The combination of warehouse and zones basically means that the warehouse capacity is divided by a unique combination of warehouse and zone. In this example, the warehouse manager can monitor space utilization for each zone and, at the same time, identify the warehouse of the zone.

If there is an intersection between zones and they share the same location in one warehouse, they will automatically be grouped in one single load unit and capacities for the intersections are not counted twice. In the example, the load unit on warehouse WH1 combines two zones, Z1 and Z2, due to an intersection.

When looking at the table columns, the column to the far left is the space utilization situation by the end of the current day. The other columns represent the future with increments of one day each. If a load unit exceeds the maximum space available, the color of the cells turns red. This will happen if, when all transactions are conducted on a particular day, the total available space on the load unit is less than what is needed to store the goods by the end of the day.

Every single table cell can be clicked regardless of the color. The color indicates when and where there is or will be a problem with space utilization.

When one cell is selected, a new report is shown with a list of all of the transactions that are to be conducted on that day, grouped by regular issues, receipts, and backlog transactions, if any.

Backlog transactions are transactions that should have been conducted before the current day. Backlog transactions are not displayed for each cell in the report, but if any backlog transactions exist it will be indicated by an icon for the particular load unit. If you then select the icon, a report with list of backlog transactions will be generated.

Transactions that occupy the largest part of the space are shown on top in the detailed view of the report. This helps the warehouse manager identify transactions that must be accommodated or moved to another date in order to avoid space utilization problems.

Example of a detailed report view

Open this view by clicking a cell in the report:

Figure 6

A warning icon is displayed for items that are part of the transactions but which cannot be calculated correctly due to insufficient setup information as presented on Figure 5.

If you select the warning icon, reports will be generated with information about the setup that must be completed in order to calculate transactions correctly.

There can be may be many reasons why space utilization calculations cannot be completed correctly for all transactions.

The yellow warning icons indicate if the numbers of the report can be trusted or not. By selecting a warning icon you can then identify the missing setup, correct the problem, and rerun the report again.

Warning icons will be shown in the following situations:

· Warehouse item setup is not correct.

· Pallet conversion has not been set.

· The Weight of an item has not been specified.

· The volume of an item has not been specified.

· A fallback warehouse has not been specified.

Example of a missing setup report

When you select a warning sign, the report representing the Deficiency types in data setup t might look like this:

Figure 7

From this report it appears that on Warehouse WH3 we have two items missing pallet conversion and two Items missing warehouse item setup.

These missing setups need to be corrected and after warehouse space utilization report can be selected and warning icon wil not be there anymore, wich means that we can trust calculations and numbers presented in a report.

Demo of the Warehouse space utilization

 Warehouse space utilization report on Youtube

This blog post describes some of the enhancements to the Product Information Management (PIM)
area that have been implemented in the R2 release after the launch of Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 (RTM).

Discovering the small secrets of the Authorized by
company fact box

Yes, it almost qualifies as an Easter egg! If you resize the Authorized by company fact box in R2, you will find a new column by the end of the grid, and in this column you’ll find the item number that identifies the product within its legal entity.

 
 
This field saves you the hassle of first having to select the company and then the More link to be able to right-click on the Item number field in order to jump to the details of the product in the specific legal entity. Since these fields are part of a grid, you can of course drag the Item number field closer to the company field and thereby have a smaller FactBox with the direct link.

This allows you to jump directly to the record and continue the setup process for the product, with the option to use templates.

And speaking of templates…

“Catching” the process fields in templates

With the addition of the Process Industry (PI) solution, a lot of new functionality and product characteristics have been enabled. A small subset of the fields that were added with the solution brought about some minor issues and especially the question of whether a field was a catch weight item or not has caused some confusion.
These issues have now been resolved in order to unblock the procedure.

Enhancing the product services

If you rely on some of your products to be created via AIF services, you will find a couple of updates to the services.

Firstly, the PI characteristics have been added to the released product services, allowing you to read and write product definitions.

Secondly, a much requested field such as the default order type has been added to the released product service. This allows you to indicate whether the product should be purchased or produced or if it should use Kanban.

And thirdly, the product and product master dimension value services have been updated to offer full CRUD support.

It’s seems like it’s time for a new post in the series about importing vendor catalogs in Dynamics AX 2012. The previous couple of blog posts covered setup and importing a sample catalog. It’s all well and nice but what if something went wrong somewhere along the way of setting up the feature. Below you will find a list of problems that can arise during vendor catalog import setup. And of course the solutions to the problems will be described in detail.

Questions and Answers

I try to import a Vendor catalog with Dynamics AX. I generate the XSD File but it is really not clear how to populate it.

The XSD file that you can generate from the vendor catalog form provides you with the schema of the CMR file that can be imported. XSD (XML Schema Definition) is one of several XML schema languages. The blog post about importing a sample catalog contains a detailed list of steps that you need to take to generated a sample CMR file.

I’d like to see an example of a CMR file with data to import?

It is important to note that the XSD schema for CMR files depends on the procurement hierarchy that you set up in Dynamics AX so the chances of successfully importing sample CMR files are really-really low because the XSD schema produced from your system will most probably differ from the one that was used to generate the sample file. However it’s always nice to see a sample file just to have an idea of what kind of beast the CMR file is. Below is the XML that a sample file might contain:

<?xmlversion="1.0"encoding="utf-8"?>

<VendorCatalogVendorName="CatImpVend"LoadDate="1900-01-01T01:01:01+01:00"ProductClassification="Procurement Category"xmlns="http://dax.com/vendorcatalog">

<Productxmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"xsi:type="root"Delete="No"ProductCode="ProductCode1"ProductSearchName="ProductSearchName1">

<PriceInformation>

<PriceCurrency="USD"UnitOfMeasure="%"Value="100">

</Price>

</PriceInformation>

<ProductNameAndDescription>

<NameAndDescription>

<Description>Description1</Description>

<Name>Name1</Name>

<Language>af</Language>

</NameAndDescription>

</ProductNameAndDescription>

<ProductAttributes>

<ColorLanguage="af">Blue</Color>

</ProductAttributes>

</Product>

</VendorCatalog>

I’m getting the error “Imported schema for namespace ‘http://www.w3.org/XML/1998/namespace’ was not resolved” when trying to generate in Visual Studio a sample CMR file based on the XSD schema.

This is a known issue. The workaround is to remove the line below from the XSD file:

<xs:importschemaLocation="http://www.w3.org/2001/xml.xsd"namespace="http://www.w3.org/XML/1998/namespace"/>

When I run the AIF job for processing no error is given but the status of the import in the Catalog file history does not change

The error was most probably logged in the AIF exception log: System administration\Periodic\Application integrationServices and Application Integration Framework\Exceptions.

In the AIF exception log there is an error: Could not find schema information for the element 'http://dax.com/vendorcatalog:VendorCatalog'.

Make sure that you set up the inbound port in AIF as in Walkthrough: Configuring an inbound integration port for catalog import [AX 2012]. Pay special attention to the paragraph about setting up the pipeline component:

The catalog import service requires a special component that processes CMR documents. To enable this component, follow these steps.

1. In the Inbound ports form, on the Processing options tab, select the Preprocess service operation requests check box, and then click Inbound pipelines.

2. In the Inbound pipelines form, click Add. Then, in the Class name list, select CatVendorXmlTransform.

3. In the Purpose field, enter an optional description, such as “Transform vendor XML files,” and then close the Inbound pipelines form.

4. Click Activate to deploy the integration port.

Conclusion

I hope this information was useful. I would like to make this article into a live blog post. So if you have any problems with setting up vendor catalog import please write to me or post a comment and I will do my best to resolve your problem and post the resolution in this article.

Introduction

Those of you who know the Shop floor control module in Dynamics AX 2009 will notice that it is not a separate module in Dynamics AX 2012. This post gives you a quick overview of how to access the Shop floor control functionality in Dynamics AX 2012.

Time attendance and Manufacturing execution

The Shop floor control module has been divided into two feature sets:

• Time and attendance contains functionality to register work time and attendance such as clock-in and clock-out, indirect activities, absences, breaks, overtime, and flextime. It also includes features to generate payroll information that can be used in a payroll system.
• Manufacturing execution allows you to register time and item consumption for a specific production job or project, provide job feedback, do job scheduling and prioritization, etc.

The division of the time and attendance and the job registration functionality provides more flexibility. The licenses for the two feature areas are separate and more users and more industries can now benefit from the functionality that is relevant for their work areas.

The Time and attendance features are moved to the Human resources module and the features can be accessed through the Human resources area page. The related menu items are located in Time and attendance groups under Common, Reports, Inquiries, Periodic and Setup. There is also a Time registration workers list page menu item under the Workers group in the Common area.

The features to clock-in and clock-out and to register time with an electronic timecard are available on the Home area page in the Time and attendance group under Common. These tasks can be performed by any employee and this is the reason why the features are not located in the Human resources or Production control areas.

The menu items for Manufacturing execution are located on the Production control area page in the Manufacturingexecution groups under Common, Periodic and Setup and in the Registration group under Inquiries

We hope this short post was useful for you. Further information about Manufacturing execution can be found on MSDN

By Slava Chernenko, SCM, Microsoft Dynamics AX

Disclaimer

All the information about AX 2012 posted here is a pre-release. Any feature is a subject to be changed before the release without notice.
This disclaimer is applicable to all posts about AX 2012 in this blog.

Introduction

Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 introduces role-based security, which makes security easier to manage. Relations between security roles, duties and privileges are complex. However, you can apply a tool to represent these relations in a grid.

This document describes another way to represent security objects and the relations between these objects.

DGML is an XML based file format for directed graphs. For example, this is the graph:

…and this is the DGML file behind it:

<?xmlversion="1.0"encoding="utf-8"?>

<DirectedGraphGraphDirection="LeftToRight"Layout="Sugiyama"xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/vs/2009/dgml">

<Nodes>

<NodeId="Duty D"Area="X"Type="SecDuty"/>

<NodeId="Duty E"Area="Y"Type="SecDuty"/>

<NodeId="Privilege F"Area="X"Type="SecPrivilege"/>

<NodeId="Privilege G"Area="Y"Type="SecPrivilege"/>

<NodeId="Privilege H"Area="Z"Type="SecPrivilege"/>

<NodeId="Role A"Area="X"Type="SecRole"/>

<NodeId="Role B"Area="X"Type="SecRole"/>

<NodeId="Role C"Area="Y"Type="SecRole"/>

</Nodes>

<Links>

<LinkSource="Duty D"Target="Privilege F"/>

<LinkSource="Duty D"Target="Privilege G"/>

<LinkSource="Duty D"Target="Privilege H"/>

<LinkSource="Duty E"Target="Privilege F"/>

<LinkSource="Duty E"Target="Privilege G"/>

<LinkSource="Role A"Target="Role B"/>

<LinkSource="Role B"Target="Duty D"/>

<LinkSource="Role B"Target="Duty E"/>

<LinkSource="Role C"Target="Duty D"/>

<LinkSource="Role C"Target="Duty E"/>

</Links>

<Properties>

<PropertyId="Area"DataType="System.String"/>

<PropertyId="GraphDirection"DataType="Microsoft.VisualStudio.Progression.Layout.GraphDirection"/>

<PropertyId="Layout"DataType="System.String"/>

<PropertyId="Type"DataType="System.String"/>

</Properties>

<Styles>

<StyleTargetType="Node"GroupLabel="Type"ValueLabel="SecPrivilege">

<ConditionExpression="Type = 'SecPrivilege'"/>

<SetterProperty="Icon"Value="pack://application:,,,/Microsoft.VisualStudio.Progression.GraphControl;component/Icons/Key.png"/>

</Style>

<StyleTargetType="Node"GroupLabel="Type"ValueLabel="SecRole">

<ConditionExpression="Type = 'SecRole'"/>

<SetterProperty="Icon"Value="pack://application:,,,/Microsoft.VisualStudio.Progression.GraphControl;component/Icons/Users.png"/>

</Style>

<StyleTargetType="Node"GroupLabel="Type"ValueLabel="SecDuty">

<ConditionExpression="Type = 'SecDuty'"/>

<SetterProperty="Icon"Value="pack://application:,,,/Microsoft.VisualStudio.Progression.GraphControl;component/Icons/kpi_green_sym2_large.png"/>

</Style>

<StyleTargetType="Node"GroupLabel="Type"ValueLabel="SecProcessCycle">

<ConditionExpression="Type = 'SecProcessCycle'"/>

<SetterProperty="Icon"Value="pack://application:,,,/Microsoft.VisualStudio.Progression.GraphControl;component/Icons/Gears.png"/>

</Style>

</Styles>

</DirectedGraph>

The DGML format is supported in Visual Studio 2010 UltimateandPremium and in some other third party tools as well. In this document, Visual Studio is used:

In Visual Studio 2010, there is Directed Graph toolbar and a Legend window that allow you to change the appearance of the graph. For example, this is one graph, rendered in different ways:

There is a context menu, which provides even more options, such as Advanced selection. For example, you can also:

• select all nodes with a specific property value
• group nodes
• hide the nodes in order to simplify the graph
• select all incoming and/or outgoing connections for the currently selected nodes

Before reading any further, we recommend that you watch this 10 minute video for a brief introduction. We also recommend this video which is dedicated to large graphs.

Generating graphs

First of all, import the attached XPO file to Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012.

There are 4 classes in the SecurityToDGML private project. SysDgmlFromSecurity is the main class, which should be run in order to generate the DGML file. The SysDgmlGraph, SysDgmlNode and SysDgmlLink classes encapsulate graph construction logic.

Note: Eventually, you may want to customize the solution by adding more attributes to the nodes and links. For example, objects with a particular prefix may require an additional attribute to make it easier to select them when manipulating the graph.

When you have imported the XPO to AX, run the SysDgmlFromSecurity class. In the dialog, verify the output file name, and then click OK. After several minutes, the file is generated and it opens in Visual Studio (or in the tool that you have assigned to open DGML-files).

Important: The graph is comprehensive so every little change, such as adding a property to the Legend or switching the rendering mode from Left to right to Quick clusters, will take 10 to 20 seconds or more to complete. So avoid any unnecessary clicks on the workspace. The idea is to hide as many nodes as possible and still be able to explore the nodes and relations that you want to focus on. The fewer nodes on the visible graph, the faster it is rendered.

Working with graphs

Scenario 1: Find out what external* roles have access to duties and privileges in your area (in this example, Inventory)

*External roles: In this example, roles from areas other than Inventory, such as Manufacturing. There is some logic in the SysDgmlGraph class that tries to determine the owner team of the object and add an Area attribute to the corresponding graph node. The owner team is determined based on a prefix and/or a suffix of the object name. This is where you may need customization. You can find a sample Excel sheet attached to the this post.

1. Open the DGML-file.

At first, the graph looks like a vertical stripe in the middle of the workspace:

This is because there are too many nodes (while this is being written, about 6000 nodes and 10000 relations).

2. Right-click to select a little area on the stripe.

When you release the button, this part of the graph is zoomed in.

3. Repeat zooming until you see something like the following:

You can see 3 columns of nodes, left to right: roles, duties, and then privileges. There are too many visible relations, so some have to be hidden.

4. Right-click anywhere on the workspace and select Show Advanced Selection in the menu.

A new window will appear on the right side of the workspace:

Area, Type and AOT name are properties of the nodes.

5. Select the nodes that belong to Inventory.

You will notice that some relations and nodes are selected now:

6. Click the I button three times to select incoming connections.
With three clicks you can select a chain of Inventory privileges: For example, a non-Inventory role can have a non-Inventory sub-role which can have a non-Inventory duty which can provide access to the Inventory privileges. By clicking once on the I button you select the duty, with two clicks you also select the sub-role, and with three clicks the whole chain is selected.

At this point, you see all Inventory nodes and all the external nodes that relate to these nodes.

7. Right-clickon any of theselectednodes, and click Selection > Hide unselected in order to hide nodes.

The graph becomes much smaller and all remaining nodes remain selected:

8. Click anywhere on the workspace to clear the selection of the nodes. The Selection window looks as follows:

Note the 600 nodes compared to the 6000 nodes on the original graph.

9. Select all areas in the Selection window except for Inventory to view only the Inventory nodes that are used by external roles and duties.

10. Click the O button three times like you did with the I button in order to select all outgoing connections for the selected (=non-Inventory) nodes.

11. Right-click any of the selected nodes and select Selection > Hide unselected.

12. Click anywhere in the workspace to clear the selection of the nodes. This way you reduce the number of nodes in the graph to about 300.

13. Select Zoom to fit in the toolbar to see the following:

The final graph is not very large. The only thing missing is the set of highlighted external duties and roles.

14. In the Legend window, click the Add button and then select Node Property > Area.

15. Click on the new Area stripe and then select Background.

16. In the Color Set Picker window, click the button at the top and then select one of the predefined color sets.

17. Change the color for Inventory to White to leave only nodes from other areas highlighted.

18. Click OK.
This is the final graph:

19. Select one of the external nodes, such as Maintain BOM master, in order to zoom in and check the external nodes for eligibility to use Inventory privileges.

20. Turn on the Butterfly mode.

The graph now looks as follows:

The product designer has access to 4 Inventory privileges. If something is wrong here, we have an issue.

21. Turn off the Butterfly mode and proceed to the next non-Inventory node. Repeat until you are finished.

Scenario 2: Do the opposite of the first scenario to figure out what external privileges and duties are used by roles in your area

This scenario is similar to the first scenario except for the fact that you should use the I and the O buttons in the reverse order.

Note: If objects are marked with wrong areas, you must update the prefixes in the ownership Excel sheet and generate the DGML file again.

Further information about Security can be found on MSDN

By Sasha Nazarov, SCM, Microsoft Dynamics AX

By using the Item arrival journal in the Inventory and warehouse management module in AX2012 you can ship and receive a transfer order using the same pallet.

In addition to the normal criteria that are used to validate pallet moves, the use of one pallet requires that the pallet is empty. If the pallet is used for receipt, it is automatically moved to the receipt location when the journal is posted.

The validation of the pallet move is implemented in the class WMSPalletMoveValidator.

By Lennart Conrad, Per Lykke Lynnerup and Bibi Christensen

If you are looking for information about inventory close and reconciliation, please check out Tracy Taylor’s post on the AX Support blog.

Enjoy!

What is the purpose of the product number?

This is a common question since the product number is a new concept in Dynamics AX 2012. The main purpose is to have a single, unified identification of a product throughout the entire organization.

In addition to the product number you have a legal entity-specific item number. The item number supports the need to be able to identify products based on numbers that make sense to users within a legal entity.

In this post we will describe the purpose and the use of product numbers and item numbers.

Product number

The new Product information management module in Dynamics AX 2012 allows users to create and manage shared product definition data in a centralized and consistent way. For companies that run a business across multiple legal entities, the concept of shared products can be a help to manage product master data and establish company-wide data governance processes.

For example, consider a company that wants to ensure that the same product data is consistent across different manufacturing plants or retail stores.

The product number is the main product identification (ID) in the system. It helps users to identify or to search for the same product instance across the entire organizational structure. The product number serves as a common reference for company-wide operational and reporting purposes.

In Dynamics AX 2012, a product has to be released to a legal entity before it can be included on a transaction, line or before orders can be created against the product. The release process allows users to control which products become released products in which legal entities.

Item Number

The item number (or item ID) is the legal entity-specific identification of the released product. When a product is released to a legal entity, the item number is aligned with the product number, unless a number sequence exists for the item number in the legal entity.

The system does not validate whether the values are identical or not. So in cases where a specific item number is required in order to identify products within an organization, the item number can be renamed.

For example, some manufacturing companies include the unit of measure in the legal entity-specific item number. In cases where items are consolidated between a legal entity and an acquired organization, it would also be necessary to rename the item number in the legal entity.

Intercompany supply chains and consolidated reporting

For intercompany chains and for consolidated reporting purposes the system always uses a product reference. The system does not take any dependency on the legal entity-specific item numbers. Instead, a shared product reference is used to map intercompany demand and supply during master scheduling or to establish the relationship between the intercompany sales and purchase orders.

Please note that in previous versions of Dynamics AX, the system uses the concept of a company item to allow for intercompany trade between two parties. All items in one company have to be mapped manually to every item in the other company before the intercompany order can be created. With Dynamics AX 2012 there is no longer a need for manual mapping. As long as a product is released to both companies, all intercompany chains can operate smoothly.  

Recommendation regarding intercompany trade

As a general guideline, we recommend that you avoid using the item number for any purposes that are related to intercompany trade. Instead, aim to use the product number for any data consolidation across multiple legal entities.

Please note that in previous versions of Dynamics AX, the system uses the item number as the main reference for entry of orders such as sales orders and production orders. The system also uses the item number to identify inventory transactions. This is unchanged in Dynamics AX 2012.

Ievgenii Korovin and Dynamics AX SCM Team

Process manufacturing adds multiple capabilities to ensure that the inventory that is reserved is the inventory that meets the customer criteria. This capability is useful for any enterprise irrespective of nature of manufacturing environment.

For instance customer could ask for an inventory batch of chocolate bars with cocoa content between 80 and 100. In addition of course, AX should not ship expired batches or batches that are currently unavailable for picking, shipping etc. In previous versions it was possible to apply these criteria of inventory reservation on sales orders and transfer orders but was not possible to apply these criteria if warehouse management was used to pick, ship, stage & load goods. However AX2012 will take all these requirements into consideration when doing warehouse reservations.

In this post, a brief scenario is used to show how warehouse management reservation now works to ensure that customer criteria are met just like as in case of inventory reservation system.

Consider this on-hand information for different batches of chocolate bars

On-hand info for item WMS:

Create a sales order. Add a line for chocolate bars to the sales order with quantity of 1700. On-hand inventory is automatically reserved. You can see here that reservation is only done on batches that are available, is done in FEFO order and the batch outside attribute range (batch B2, requirement: cocoa content must be between 80 and 100) is not reserved.

Release the sales order line and create an inventory order (output order) which is the basis for shipment.

Create a shipment, inventory order created above will automatically be added to the shipment.

Shipment status is registered at this point. If you look at the shipment lines, you will see 1500 reserved on B1 and 200 on B3. As you can see this is not correct according to the WMS reservation policy because we should first create output transports from bulk locations (location 001-01-3) and then pick the rest from the picking location (002-02-1)

Click Functions-> reserve now, shipment will have reserved status now. If you look at the shipment lines now, you will notice that the shipment is reserving according to the WMS reservation principles (First output transport from bulk locations and the pick the rest on picking locations). So 1500 reserved on B3 and then 200 on B1.

Activate the shipment, complete the pallet transport and picking route.
Key thing to note here is that just like inventory reservation, WMS reservation also picks batch B3 and not batch B2 as it did in previous versions.

Contributors: Johan Hoffman, Akshey Gupta

We’ve been working on the import vendor catalogs functionality recently and realized that the ramp up time in this area is quite high. There is a lot of information on MSDN and on InformationSource about the topic but there aren’t any documents which would guide you from the initial setup to creating and importing a sample catalog.

Creating and maintaining procurement catalogs that company employees can use when they order items or services for internal use is one of the major tasks in Procurement and Sourcing. This can be done in several ways. Vendor catalog data can be added to the product master manually; the catalog can be hosted externally or it can be imported from a Catalog Maintenance Request (CMR) file. In this blog post I will focus on the last option: importing vendor catalogs. Before reading this blog post I recommend watching the “How to define procurement categories and catalogs – part 3” video on InformationSource.

Vendor catalog import parameters

The first step will be to setup the Vendor catalog import parameters.

1. Create a root folder where the CMR files will be stored (e.g. c:\temp\CMR).
2. Click Procurement and sourcing> Setup> Vendors> Vendor catalog import parameters.
3. In the Vendor catalog import parameters form, in the Root folder path field, enter the location of the root folder that you created for storing CMR files.
4. The CatalogImportPickup folder is created automatically inside the folder you specified.

Setup AIF

After you set up the vendor catalog import parameters you will need to configure an inbound AIF integration port for catalog import. I will not go into details since the process is very well described in this article.

There are a couple of additional steps which are not mentioned in the article:

1. When setting up the file adapter click the Configure button, mark both checkboxes and specify the administrator user in the lookup. Not doing this will lead to an error during the import.

2. If you can’t see the CatImpService.create in the service selection dialog you can go to the AOT, find the CatImpService under the Services node and click Addins\Register service. The alternative is to go to System administration > Setup > Checklists > Initialization checklist and click Set up Application Integration Framework in the Initialize system group.

You will also need some way of running the catalog import service. Normally this is done by setting up recurring batch jobs responsible for executing business logic through integration ports. To learn more about it read the Configure and start the AIF batch services section of this MSDN article.

This standard approach is intended for production. However it’s not very convenient for testing/learning purposes since the catalog import processing will be done asynchronously and the minimum recurrence interval is 1 minute. So I recommend using the x++ job below which performs the import catalog processing instantly:

 1:staticvoid runAIFReceive(Args _args)

 2: {

 3:new AifGatewayReceiveService().run();

 4:new AifInboundProcessingService().run(); 

 5:  

 6:     info('AIF processing done');

 7: }

Setup workflow

The import vendor catalog functionality is leveraging another powerful feature of AX: workflow processing. You are allowed to setup rules for automated approval of vendor catalogs and specify one or more reviewers if manual approval is required. To enable the vendor catalog import functionality it is required to set up two types of workflows: Catalog import product approval (line-level), Catalog import approval (catalog-level).

Catalog import product approval

This type of workflow processes all the products that are included in the CMR file. Completion of all of the individual line-level workflow completes the overall catalog import workflow. In order to create a product approval workflow:

1. Click Procurement and sourcing> Setup> Procurement and sourcing workflows.
2. On the Action Pane, click New.
3. Select Catalog import product approval and then click Create workflow.

General setup

The common catalog import product approval workflow should look like this:

Set up approvers

1. Double click the Catalog import product approval element.

2. Click the Step 1 element.

3. Click Assignment in the action pane.

4. The simplest assignment would be User->Admin.

Set up automatic actions

Automatic actions allow the workflow framework to automatically approve or reject the products in the imported vendor catalog which meet certain conditions. In order to set up an automatic action you need to:

1. Select the Catalog import product approval element.

2. Click Automatic actions in the action pane.

3. Click the Enable automatic actions check box

4. Setup the conditions for auto approval/rejection

There is one type of condition which I would like to focus on. You can specify Product candidate.Price delta as a parameter of the automatic action. The price delta is calculated as a ratio: (new price – old price) / old price. So if you want to make sure that the price delta is within 20% you need to set the condition to Product candidate.Price delta <= 0.2

5. Select the type of automatic action (approve/reject)

Catalog import approval

This type of workflow is used for setting up the rules for approving the whole catalog. When you configure this workflow, you can reference the Catalog import product approval workflow that you configured earlier. The common setup would be to automatically approve the whole catalog import after all the products have been approved:

In the properties of the Vendor catalog lines (products) element you need to reference the catalog import product approval that you created earlier.

Enable a vendor for catalog import

In order to be able to import catalogs for a particular vendor it has to be enabled for catalog import. There are two ways to achieve that

- Click Procurement\Set up\Configure vendor for catalog import

- If you don’t do this you will be prompted if you want to enable the vendor for catalog import when creating a new catalog for the vendor

After you do this a subfolder in the catalog import root folder is created. The name of the folder is the RecId of the vendor.

Inside the folder you will find an archive folder with all the CMR files that have been imported for this vendor. You will also find a folder that is used for importing images of the vendor’s products.

Setup procurement hierarchy

You won’t be able to import products from categories where the vendor is not approved for procurement. To approve the vendor:

1. Go to Procurement and sourcing/Setup/Categories/Procurement categories.

2. Select the category.

Add the vendor to the list of approved vendors in the Vendors fast tab.

Importing a vendor catalog

Now that all the setup is done we are ready for creating a sample CMR file and importing it. We will write about it the next blog post.

AX2012 Purchasing with: Advanced warehouse management and quarantine management.

If it’s ever been an issue for you that no items in Contoso CEU are set up with both advanced warehouse management and quarantine management this information might be useful to you.

Here you get a cheat sheet that you can use to set up Contoso CEU in order to handle an advanced warehouse procedure like the following in AX2012.

Go to Inventory and warehouse management/Setup/Inventory breakdown/Warehouses

• ·       Select warehouse 28.
• ·       Click Inquiries/Inventory aisles.
• ·       Select Aisle 01, and click Inventory location.
• ·       Click New.
• ·      
• ·       Save to create the location.

The above setup indicates that we do not control each location within the quarantine area separately; we just see the entire quarantine area as one location.

Close the form and go to Product information management/Released products and select item 1601

Navigate to the action pane tab Manage Inventory and click Warehouse items

• ·       Click New and add warehouse items for warehouse 28:
• ·      

Save and close

From the detailed item form open the item model group FRP_Pick.

• ·      
• ·       Select the Quarantine management check box and close the form.

This way you enable quarantine management for the item arrival journal lines. You can also set this parameter for individual item arrival journal lines

Now item 1601 is set up with advanced warehouse management and quarantine order, so try the procedure:

Go to Procurement and sourcing/Purchase orders/All purchase orders

• ·       Create a new purchase order for vendor 1001. Accept the default values.
• ·       Create a purchase order line for item 1601.
• ·       Change the quantity to 24 and click No in the dialog box.
• ·      
• ·       Confirm the purchase order

Close all forms.

Go to Inventory and warehouse management/Periodic/Arrival overview

• ·       Find the purchase order and click Start arrival
• ·       Open the item arrival journal and add a pallet ID.
  • o   You can use the function “Pallet ID”
• ·       The check box “Pallet transport “= selected
• ·       The check box “Check pick location” = cleared
• ·       The  check box “Check bulk location” = selected
• ·       The check box “Quarantine management” = selected

Post the journal and close all forms.

The pallet and the item are now recorded in the inbound location and a pallet transport to the quarantine warehouse is ordered.

Go to Inventory and warehouse management/Common/Pallet transport

• ·       Start the pallet transport
• ·       Complete the pallet transport

The pallet and the item are now recorded in the quarantine warehouse and the quarantine order is created.

Close all forms.

Go to Inventory and warehouse management/Periodic/Quarantine order

• ·       Find the quarantine order
• ·       Click Report as finished.
• ·      
• ·       Click OK

The quarantine order is reported as finished and an item arrival journal is created.

Open the item arrival journal that was created.

Click Post

A pallet transport to the warehouse is ordered.

Close all forms.

Go to Inventory and warehouse management/Common/Pallet transport

• ·       Start the pallet transport
• ·       Complete the pallet transport

Close all forms.

Now the flow is completed.

The previous blog post in this series gave an overview of setting up AX 2012 to enable the Import vendor catalogs functionality. Now it’s time to see how to produce a sample CMR (catalog maintenance request) file and import it into AX using both AX Windows client and the Vendor self-service portal in Enterprise portal.

Create a vendor catalog

First of all a vendor catalog needs to be created.

1. Go to Procurement and sourcing > Common > Catalogs > Vendor catalogs.
2. Create a new record.
3. Select the vendor in the vendor field.

You can enable/disable the catalog for auto approval by clicking the corresponding button in the action pane. This flag can be used to setup workflow automatic actions.

Create a sample catalog maintenance request (CMR) file

CMR file is an XML file which contains the information about the products which are available for purchase from the vendor. You can use the CMR file to create a new catalog, replace an existing catalog, or modify an existing catalog. In order to create a sample CMR file you need to generate a catalog import file template first.

Generate a catalog import file template

The catalog import file template is an industry-standard XSD file that you use to create a CMR file for vendor’s products. In order to create the XSD file you need to:

1. Click Procurement and sourcing> Common> Catalogs> Vendor catalogs.
2. On the Vendor catalogs list page, double-click the catalog that you want to work with.
3. To download a current catalog import template (XSD file), in the Update catalog form, on the Action Pane, on the Catalogs tab, in the Related information group, click Generate catalog template. Select one of the following options:

• Procurement category– Generate a catalog template that includes the procurement categories in which the vendor is authorized to provide products.
• Commodity code– Generate a catalog template that includes industry-standard commodity codes.

1. In the Save as dialog box, select the location where you want to store the catalog file template and save the file.

Generate a sample CMR file

One thing to note about the catalog import template XSD file is that for each procurement category where the vendor is approved there will be a separate product definition with a separate set of attributes so it is important to use the current version of the XSD file for producing the sample CMR file. In order to create a sample CMR file you can:

1. Open the XSD file in Visual Studio.
2. Go to the Schema explorer view.
3. Right click the VendorCatalog node.
4. Click the Generate sample XML item.
5. Modify the auto-generated contents with the valid data: vendor name, product name, price and other attributes. Some of the attributes like product name can be filled with any string value. Other attributes (like currency) will only accept a fixed set of values which can be found by navigating the XSD file.

A sample CMR file will typically look like the one below:

 1:<?xmlversion="1.0"encoding="utf-8"?>

 2:<VendorCatalogVendorName="CatImp2"LoadDate="2012-01-01T01:01:01+01:00"ProductClassification="Procurement Category"xmlns="http://dax.com/vendorcatalog">

 3:<Productxmlns:xsi='http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance'xsi:type='Accessories'Delete='No'ProductCode='ImpCatVend2_1'ProductSearchName='ImpCatVends2_1'>

 4:<PriceInformation>

 5:<PriceCurrency='USD'UnitOfMeasure='Pcs'Value='5000'></Price>

 6:</PriceInformation>

 7:<ProductNameAndDescription>

 8:<NameAndDescription>

 9:<Description>ImpCatVends2_1</Description>

 10:<Name>ImpCatVends2_1</Name>

 11:<Language>en</Language>

 12:</NameAndDescription>

 13:</ProductNameAndDescription>

 14:<ProductAttributes></ProductAttributes>

 15:</Product>

 16:</VendorCatalog>

Upload the CMR file using AX Windows client

Having generated the sample CMR file you can proceed with the import.

1. Click Procurement and sourcing> Common> Catalogs> Vendor catalogs.
2. On the Vendor catalogs list page, double-click the catalog that you want to work with.
3. In the Update catalog form, on the Catalog file history tab, click Upload file.
4. In the Upload file dialog box, browse to the location of the CMR file that you created.
5. Enter an effective date and an expiration date. These dates define the date range in which the pricing for the products in the CMR file is valid.
6. Select one of the following update types for the CMR file:

• Add updates to the existing vendor catalog
• Replace the existing vendor catalog with a new catalog

1. Click OK to start the upload process for the CMR file.
2. To view the details about the processing status of the CMR file, on the Catalog file history tab, click Event log.
3. In the Event log form, the status of the CMR file is updated as the file is processed.
4. The status of the catalog import will be ”New” (unless an error occurred).
5. A new XML file will be placed in the catalog import pickup folder. This file is a WSDL message for the CatImpService.create service for which a file adapter-based inbound integration port has been set up previously (see the previous blog post for details). This message contains all the information from the CMR file that we just uploaded plus the WSDL ”envelope”. Find the sample WSDL catalog import message below:

 1:<?xmlversion="1.0"encoding="utf-8"?>

 2:<Batch>

 3:<Envelopexmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/dynamics/2011/01/documents/Message">

 4:<Header>

 5:<Action>http://schemas.microsoft.com/dynamics/2008/01/services/CatImpService/create</Action>

 6:</Header>

 7:<Body>

 8:<MessageParts>

 9:<VendorCatalog>

 10:                 ...

 11:</VendorCatalog>

 12:</MessageParts>

 13:</Body>

 14:</Envelope>

 15:</Batch>

Process the CMR file

After the WSDL message has been placed in the catalog import pickup folder the catalog import service needs to be called. The service will copy the data from the CMR file to the vendor catalog staging tables.

1. Run the AIF vendor catalog import processing job which has been setup previously (see the previous blog post for details).
2. After you do that the status of the catalog import will change to ”In progress”.

Approve the catalog import

In this example we will assume that the workflow has been set up for manual approval, i.e. there are no automated actions setup in the Catalog import product approval workflow.

1. After the status of the catalog has changed to ”In progress” the workflow bar will appear in the top of the Vendor Catalog form.
2. Click the submit button.
3. Run the workflow processing job (see the previous blog post for details).
4. Refresh the Vendor Catalog form.
5. The status of the catalog import has changed to ”Pending approval”.
6. Click the Details button on the Catalog file history fast tab.
7. Select all products and click the Actions > Approve button in the workflow bar.
8. Run the workflow processing job.
9. The status of the products has changed to ”Approved”.
10. Go back to the Vendor Catalog form.
11. The status of the import has changed to ”Succeeded”.
12. After the imported product candidates have been approved they are added to the product master.
13. After the product candidates have been approved they can be released to legal entities by clicking the Release approved products button on the Vendor Catalog form.

Vendor self-service portal (VSS)

Some of the actions described above can also be performed using the Enterprise Portal (EP). In order to run this scenario it is required to associate the user with a vendor.

Create an AX user for the vendor party

First of all you need to associate an AX user with the vendor account. Large companies will probably take advantage of more complicated workflows available in AX to perform this operation (see the Vendor Management and Collaboration in Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 training materials for more details). Smaller companies can utilize the simplified process described below.

1. Go to System administration > Common > Users > Users.
2. Grant the user that you want to associate with the vendor the Vendor (external) role.
3. Click the Relations button in the action pane.
4. Set the Relation type = Vendor and select the vendor which you want to enable for uploading catalogs using the Vendor portal.

Upload the CMR file using the VSS portal

After setting up the user-vendor association you can proceed with opening the Vendor portal and uploading the CMR file.

1. Go to System administration > Common > Users > Users.
2. Select the user that you have configured to represent the vendor party.
3. Click the profiles button.
4. Click the view role centers button.
5. In the enterprise portal make sure that the correct user is active (if not click the login as a different user button and login as the user which has been configured to represent the vendor party).
6. If you logged on as an admin or have multiple vendors associated with your account then make sure that the correct vendor association is active. The current vendor association can be changed by clicking the vendor dropdown box in the top right corner of the screen.

Now you can navigate to Vendor portal > Catalogs and upload the CMR file. I will not go into more details since the vendor catalogs form in the enterprise portal is similar to the vendor catalogs form in AX Windows client.