Microsoft Announce New Extender

Microsoft announces major enhancements to Microsoft Dynamics GP Extender

During Convergence, held in New Orleans earlier this month, Microsoft and eOne jointly announced major enhancements to the Microsoft Dynamics GP Extender product.

The new features were first introduced to the GP Partner community by Errol Schoenfish (Director Product Management, Microsoft Dynamics GP) during the Partner briefing day held the day before Convergence officially began. This gave the partner community a chance to absorb the changes and be in a position to share them with their customers over the following 4 days. Extender was again a highlight during the main GP session, with the product specialist Trevor Gilchrest, showing how easy it was to build new applications within Extender and how easy it is to include this custom in Smartlists, in Report Writer and in SRS reports, etc.

Roughly 700 people also attended two concurrent sessions dedicated to Extender features, and were taken through the full product features including the newly added functions. The response was fantastic from both existing users and those that had not yet put Extender to use. Pam Misialek from Microsoft said "The eXtender sessions rated as one of the best concurrent sessions at convergence. Our partners are really excited about having this functionality all under the Microsoft banner".

Timing:
The new features will be released in conjunction with Dynamics GP 10 Service Pack 4, due to be released in June/July this year. These features will only be available for clients that upgrade to SP4 of V 10, and not backwards compatible to previous versions of Dynamics GP.

What are the new Features:
Forms and Detailed Forms: These new features have been available with the big brother of GP Extender, eXtender Enterprise for some time but "Microsoft and eOne both decided that it is was time for this functionality to form part of the core Microsoft Extender solution" explains Simon Butler, eOne CEO.

These additions allow users to build custom stand alone data entry screens for Dynamics GP without writing a single line of code. GP users are now able to completely customize their data capture to match their specific business needs. Users are able to build complete mini applications with many interconnecting data entry screens. After seeing the new features customers said "this is what we have needed all along, this makes GP the most flexible ERP products on the market. We loved Extender windows, but having this new functionality really takes things to a different level."

What impact does this have on existing Extender Customers?
All existing Microsoft Dynamics GP customers will receive the new functionality automatically, when they upgrade to V10 SP4 of Dynamics GP. For those customers that have not purchased this module there is a small window from now through to the release of SP4 where you can purchase at current pricing US$1,750. Following the release of SP4 the price of Extender will jump to US$2,450.

There will be no changes for all the existing eXtender Enterprise customers, and you will continue to benefit from the additional features in your version including interfaces, logic and linked forms.

What's all the talk about SmartConnect and eXtender?:
Use SmartConnect to create any record or transaction in GP, based upon the data you enter in an eXtender screen. SmartConnet will work with both Microsoft Dynamics GP Extender and eXtender Enterprise. This means you can create any data capture you screen you can dream up in eXtender - then have this data flow seamlessly to any GP screen you like. Together SmartConnect and eXtender make Microsoft Dynamics GP the most configurable ERP on the market - bar none.

So when do I sell Extender Enterprise?
Resellers are in an ideal position following these changes, in that you have a lost cost - highly featured version of Extender available from Microsoft, and then eXtender Enterprise for those clients that always want more. Do not ignore eXtender Enterprise, as you will win more GP deals by including this upscale tool in your offering.

Here are a few of the key reasons to move up to eXtnder Enterprise:

• Logic: Logic allows you to make the eXtender screens you build 'do things'. Logic puts the business logic and business process behind the screens you build. Logic allows simple configuration by enabling or disabling fields to full sanscript coding to make your application work exactly the way you ned it to.
• Linked Forms: Linked forms are one of the form types that has remained in eXtender enterprise only. This allows you to create new screens that work just like the customer address screen in GP (one to many links).
• Navigation Lists: Create you own search and lookup screens for all your eXtender form data.
• Interfaces: Use the native eXtender interfaces to create transactions in GP form the data you enter into eXtender. Many of our partners are replacing this function with SmartConnect - and taking advantage of the SmartConnect/Extender bundle promotion.