With AX 7, the development has moved back to file system, any technical change we make in the application is saved into an XML file.
What does development environment include?
The development environment is the one box deployment of AX 7 with its own local SQL database installed.
What is the format of the source code files?
Source code (Technical changes) are the set of XML files (model elements) onto your disk.
Does AOS require to be running during development?
Visual Studio user interface communicates with source files (XML files) with metadata API. When you build from Visual Studio, you are compiling into assemblies and other binaries that runtime. Through this whole process of development and build, you are working against files and as we all know Visual Studio works very weel with files so technically there is no need for AOS to be running during design and compilation.
Is there any AOS service running anywhere for AX 7?
No, there is no AOS service running into you box for AX 7, unlikely we have had in AX 2012. AOS service is actually a Web Service in IIS and there is a separate service for Batch processing in IIS called Microsoft Dynamics AX Batch Management Service.
What is a Deployment Package?
This is a compiled binary version of the model(s) and Package(s) that can be deployed to Cloud (UAT or Production). Once development or stage or development is complete and you are requires to moved these changes to UAT or to Production, this is where you create deployment package to move your changes.
How X++ code is executed in AX 7?
Executing X++ code, displaying a from, or running a report is integrated with Visual Studio debug (F5, Ctrl-F5) experience. This execution is through the AOS Web Application that is running into the local IIS.
What is model element in AX 7?
Model element (A Class, a table or a form) is simply an XML file sitting onto your disk and they are organized in folders per model.
How Model, Package and a Project related in AX 7?
Several models constitute a Package. A project always belongs to one model, it cannot belong to more than one model.
Where does the Package sit in disk?
Package are folders located in the model store folder of the Dynamics AX 7 Application. Packages can be seen from following path;
Where does the model sit in disk?
Model folders are contained in their Package folder. Each model folder contains type-specific folders, for example; all table in a model belong to the folder AxTable. Models can been seen from following path;
What is a model descriptor?
A Package folder contains a descriptor folder that lists all model that belong the package. A model descriptor file contains metadata about a model’s properties.
Why is there a need for Visual Studio for whole development?
Visual Studio is simply a user interface on top of this architecture it allows you to be more productive and to only do things with the metadata that you are supposed to do instead of basically editing them in XML or in the text editor.
Stay tuned! There is more to cover in future parts of this post…
Happy Dax!ng…
