BIDA0036 – Navision Excel Dictionary Demo

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Please watch the video in 1080p because it is recorded in High Resolution.
Please note the script of the presentation is below so you can read along with the demonstration if you like.

Hello and welcome to our latest blog post.

I am really pleased you have come back to see our latest news!

I am really pleased to be able to bring you some news that I think will really interest you.

This video is intended for companies who still have Navision 2018 installed on premise.

We are also working on a similar demonstration for Business Central in the cloud.

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1. Why Would You Watch This Video?

This video is a follow up to the prior video demonstration of Meta5 accessing the Navision 2018 demonstration database.

The obvious question that arises from the prior demonstration is this.

“If we have access to so many tables and fields in Navision, how do we make it easier to find those fields because we can’t possibly remember them all.”

And that is where today’s video comes in.

If you are wondering how, you might be able to more easily search all the fields available in Navision, then you should watch today’s video.

So, as ever, on with the demo!

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2. On With The Demonstration

Here we are in a simple Excel spreadsheet.

This spreadsheet has two sides to it, the left and the right.

You can download this spreadsheet using the button on the blog post.

On the left-hand side is a table of categories.

These at the same categories you saw on the prior demonstration.

They are drillable so you can immediately understand that I can click on a drill, and it will open up with the tables.

So, let’s drill on Financial Management.

Please note that the very first time you click Excel will load the power query model so it will take a second or two to respond.

Now you can see all the tables that are listed in the Financial Management Category.

We will scroll down to the GL Account table.

As you would expect, when we click on the GL Account table, we will get all the fields in the GL Account.

As an Excel user the rest would be obvious to you.

Since we would love you to download the workbook and play around with it yourself, we won’t go into too much detail of this simple drill down.

All the categories, all the tables, all the columns are there.

If we ever get good help text and descriptions?

Then we will include them in this workbook.

Now we will scroll back up to the top of the workbook.

We will close the Financial Management Category.

Now we will show you something we think is really pretty cool.

Excel drills and searches are implemented in this workbook.

So, next to Table there is a drill.

I will click on this drill.

Now we can see there is a search option for all the tables in the dictionary.

I will enter GL and it will search for all the tables with GL in the name.

I will click off all “select all search results” to have no tables selected.

Then I will scroll down and select the GL Account table again.

When we click on the GL Account and click OK, we will be returned to the report.

The GL Account table is now selected but it may not be visible in the table.

You might have to click on Financial Management again to have GL Account visible.

Once you do that then you can click on GL Account to make the fields in the table visible.

Please note we have also numbered the columns in the order in which they appear in the tables.

Just like any other Excel report you might create; the dictionary is fully searchable in this table.

Now, we will clear those selections.

Now I would like to draw your attention to the right-hand side of the report.

You can see there is a bubble saying, “search a table”.

This provides a second way of searching for a table that you might like more.

You can see GL Account is selected.

What I will do is go to the search text and enter just GL.

When I press enter the information to the right will disappear and the mouse will go to the next line.

So, I need to click my mouse over GL again to select the cell.

When I select the cell, a drill will appear next to the cell.

When I click on the drill all the tables containing GL will appear in the drop-down box.

I will again select GL Account.

Now it will show me what category GL Account is in and it will show me all the fields in GL Account.

In this way you have a second way to search for tables using this filter and drop down.

We thought that in this first release of this workbook we would give you both options.

Please feel free to let us know which one you prefer in the comments section at the bottom of this blog post.

Of course, the value of this spreadsheet is this.

As you are creating queries on the Navision database using the Meta5 query tool, you can refer to this spreadsheet.

This will help you to easily find the tables and fields that you are looking for.

Then, when you search the spreadsheet and know exactly what fields in what tables you want, you can more easily locate them in the query tool.

In our own development work we have this spreadsheet on our left screen and Meta5 on our right screen.

You might want to try that out for yourself.

If you would like to try this out for yourself on your PC?

Then please contact me to book a time on the evaluation machine.

You can also download this spreadsheet from the button on the blog post.

You can try for yourself how easy it is to query data directly from Navision using Meta5 while also having this dictionary available to you.

Further, if you would like one of these spreadsheets for your company to help you query your Navision system?

We will prepare this spreadsheet for qualified Navision installed companies.

So please feel free to contact me to see if you meet our qualification criteria.

This report takes a little while to create.

So, we will only create a limited number of these reports as “freebies”.

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Summary

So, to summarize what I have shown you today?

In our prior video we showed you that it is now possible to perform direct query to all data in your Navision system using the Meta5 query tool.

However, because there are so many tables and so many columns it’s really handy to have a searchable dictionary right there on your left screen.

We created this report to be a searchable dictionary for any customized Navision system.

It provides two ways to query what tables and columns you have available.

On the left-hand side, it allows you to drill down or to use the excel search and drill functions.

On the right-hand side, it allows you to search for tables containing the search string.

We are finding this very useful in our own development work.

We think you will find it useful too, even if you don’t have Meta5.

And with that?

I would like to say thank you very much for watching our demonstration today.

I really appreciate your time and attention.

We hope you found this video interesting and informative.

We would love to hear your comments so please feel free to use the comments section below.

I wish you a good day.

Thank you.

Mihai Neacsu

Business Development Manager

BIDA

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