NET·Conductor
NET·Conductor Overview
The NET·Conductor is the missing puzzle between Microsoft Dynamics NAV and Microsoft's .NET world.
Seamless sharing of business logic and data structures
NET·Conductor provides the ability to fully utilise the Dynamics NAV business logic embedded in the various applications and seamlessly request and pass information to and from Dynamics NAV. This means that new applications, such as Web, Mobile, Handheld and Windows applications and services, can be written to utilise business logic and data structures that are already in place within Dynamics NAV.
Start providing Dynamics NAV logic and data today
Dynamics NAV developers need no .NET or XML training to start providing Dynamics NAV logic and data to .NET applications. Dynamics NAV developers write the provisioning in Dynamics NAV’s Integrated Development Environment. You can therefore start delivering .NET capable Dynamics NAV solutions today.
Start building Dynamics NAV based .NET applications today
Because the NET·Conductor XML Web Services provides a standard .NET interface to Dynamics NAV, the .NET developer needs no Dynamics NAV knowledge to start accessing Dynamics NAV logic and data. You can therefore start delivering Dynamics NAV based .NET solutions today.
Implementing a .NET strategy is not a "Big Bang"
With NET·Conductor, Dynamics NAV developers can make selective parts of their applications available to .NET applications. This means that implementing a .NET strategy does not have to be a "Big Bang" approach but can be done gradually, starting today.
About .NET
.NET is the Microsoft Web services strategy to connect information, people, systems, and devices through software. Integrated across the Microsoft platform, .NET technology provides the ability to quickly build, deploy, manage, and use connected, security-enhanced solutions with Web services. Web services are revolutionising how applications talk to other applications by providing a universal data format that lets data be easily adapted or transformed. Based on XML, the universal language of Internet data exchange, Web services can communicate across platforms and operating systems, regardless of the programming language in which the applications are written.
By providing standard interfaces between the .NET environment and widely used applications we can assist organizations in implementing the .NET strategy gradually and without the need to replace existing business applications.
Using the NET·Conductor
The standard NET·Conductor Web Services are used to pass parameters to Microsoft Dynamics NAV. These parameters are then used within Dynamics NAV to run selected business logic. The reply is defined in the business logic and passed back to the NET·Conductor where it is mapped into a standard XML document and returned to the caller of the Web Service.
Invoking Web Service
To try out running a Dynamics NAV CodeUnit the RunCodeUnit operation can be called using a Web Browser. Simply provide the number of the CodeUnit to run, the parameters to pass into Dynamics NAV and press the ‘Invoke’ button.
NET·Conductor mapping
The NET·Conductor Web Service will receive the call, process the parameters and call the appropriate CodeUnit in Dynamics NAV. The NET·Conductor can also be called using other operations such as SelectFromTable, InsertIntoTable, ModifyInTable and DeleteFromTable.
Running Dynamics NAV CodeUnit
The CodeUnit being run can verify the parameters and return an error message if the call is not appropriate.
If there is NO error then a RecordSet can be defined and returned back to the NET·Conductor, which will construct the XML and relay it back to the caller.
NET·Conductor mapping
The NET·Conductor will receive the reply, process it and wrap the result into XML. The NET·Conductor can return replies of the form Strings, Hashtables (key/value pairs), Recordsets, a combination of those or an error.
Receiving the Result
When the client receives the reply it is always in the form of an XML document. This document could contain an error response or a valid response from Dynamics NAV. A valid response can contain Strings, Hashtables, RecordSets or combination of these.
Partner cases
After becoming a Rue de Net partner the time of integrating Dynamics NAV applications into the customers' environments of web applications and handhelds begins. Some of the integration work done by our partners is described below.
Portfolio Valuations
This on-line client and portfolio valuations for fund managers is a web-based application that allows the manager to follow their portfolios on-line. The Dynamics NAV part was developed at our partner, Landsteinar (CI) in Jersey, but the web application was done by a customer selected .NET development center in England. NET·Conductor was used to join the two efforts and then the application was hosted at a hosting service.
Warehouse solution
This is a complete warehousing solution for a global medical supplier. All the warehouse needs is a scanner and a connection with the Internet. In this case our partner was providing the customer with the complete solution, including the warehouse web application. They used the NET·Conductor to provide general information to the web application as well as the warehouse scanner files.
Retail queries
One of our partners, K3 Landsteinar in England, have included a NET·Conductor based solution in their retail product. The solution allows Dynamics NAV based stores to query and update information at the head office. For this solution the partner uses the NET·Conductor to communicate between two Dynamics NAV installations, at the store and at the head office. For such communication, the partner wrapped the NET·Conductor Web Service access into a single CodeUnit used throughout the solution.
B2B ordering
A global distributor of medical equipment uses NET·Conductor to automatically create sales orders at factory. When goods have been sent to warehouse, the factory updates the purchase order at the distributor, also using NET·Conductor. In this case our partner was providing the distributor with a Dynamics NAV solution, based on NET·Conductor he was also able to provide the factory with Dynamics NAV and the communication between the two.
