How do I become a Dynamics 365 Developer? Article 2 of 5

This the second post of a series of articles that aim to give technology professionals a high-level guideline on "How to become a Dynamics Developer".

On this article I would like to provide an overview of technologies behind Dynamics 365 Customer Engagement (formerly known as CRM Dynamics).

1. In Dynamics terms, the lower level storage unit is called an Entity. An entity can be compared to a table on a relational database. (In fact Dynamics uses SQL Server as its back-end. So, when an entity is created through Dynamics, a table is created on the underlying SQL Server Database).
2. Dynamics is also built and deployed using Microsoft technology. Dynamics 365 CE Client is web based and runs on IIS Web Servers.
3. Dynamics 365 CE can be extended through its UI. System Administrators and Customizers can create new dataelements, and workflows (simple logic) to enhance processes.
4. It can also be extended using the .NET Framework, creating new plugin-ins or custom actions.
5. Dynamics 365 CE can also be extended through Javascript.

To-date, the Dynamics 365 CE offer has five modules:

• Sales: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/dynamics365/sales
• Customer Service : https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/dynamics365/customer-service
• Field Service: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/dynamics365/field-service
• Project Management: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/dynamics365/project-service-automation
• Marketing: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/dynamics365/marketing

These modules have individual entities but also use shared entities. The two core entities in Dynamics are:

• Account - stores information about companies (Customers, Partners, Competitors, etc).
• Contact - stores information about a person (The main contact at company "A", or partner "Z", etc).

Other important entities are :

In the Sales module: Leads, Opportunities, Sales Order, and Invoice.

In the Customer Services module: Case (Incident), and Knowledge Base articles.

Before advancing into more technical details please take the time to view the following videos:

On the next article, we will dive into what components/tools you will need to setup your Dynamics 365 CE development environment.