This part (as I said in my previous blog), will contain some more new tools and features focusing on NAV Development and Administration areas. I will start here with the Development and IDE changes and additions. 

2.     Development/IDE Enhancements

• XMLPort is runnable from Object Designer

You can now run XMLPorts directly from Object Designer through Dynamics NAV Server. This means that we don’t have to write code to test the XMLPort import/export result contrary to the practice we had to follow in earlier versions, like 2009 and 2990 R2.

Also, we now have the ability to update existing records by specifying the new properties: AutoSave, AutoReplace, and AutoUpdate.

• Table Key List in C/AL Symbol Menu (Shortcut Key F5 in C/AL Editor)

I have often found it difficult to find the keys in a table while I am writiing a code using the specified table. I had to go back to the Object Designer, open the table in design mode and check the keys. Now this is all accomplished by just hitting F5 and by clicking Ok. The key is copied over to your code and current key is set to the selected key.

• Page Preview while designing

Quite a handy option given in 2013 is the ability to see a preview of a Page while designing it. Now you can click on View --> Preview inside the page designer and see a preview of your page without having the need to run the page to see how it looks like, again contrary to the earlier versions. 

• Save as Word (Report)

The new reporting in 2013 has seen a lot of changes from the convertional NAV reporting techniques. A new feature added to 2013 reports is the ability to save a report as a word document. 

3.     Administration Enhancements

• NAV Server Administration Tool

A new GUI Server Administration tool is introduced in NAV 2013 to configure the Dynamics NAV Server. It’s an MMC (Microsoft Management Console) snap-in, which is familiar to most of us. This makes it very handy for us to quickly change the server parameters and restart the services on the fly.

Edit settings:

• Windows PowerShell

Now as an Administrator you can manage the server in the following ways through the Windows PowerShell CommansLets: 

• Get-NAVServerUser
• New-NAVServerUser
• Remove-NAVServerUser
• Rename-NAVServerUser
• Get-NAVServerPermission
• New-NAVServerPermission
• Remove-NAVServerPermission
• Set-NAVServerPermission
• Get-NAVServerRole
• New-NAVServerRole
• Remove-NAVServerRole
• Get-NAVServerUserRole
• New-NAVServerUserRole
• Remove-NAVServerUserRole
• Rename-NAVServerRole
• Export-NAVServerLicense
• Import-NAVServerLicense
• Get-NAVServerClientConnection
• Remove-NAVServerClientConnection
• Get-NAVServerInstance
• New-NAVServerInstance
• Remove-NAVServerInstance
• Set-NAVServerInstance
• Get-NAVServerSettings
• New-NAVServerSettings
• Set-NAVServerSettings

There are a lot of new features and tools added in the 2013 version, the ones I have talkied about are some which are quite handy and useful, but don't get their mentions highlighted anywhere. I have tried to put the ones which can help us do things in a way which we are not habituated to do in the previous versions, but the change is welcome, as all these features and tools are intended to make our jobs easier!