A Guide to Utilizing Microsoft Dynamics GP eConnect - Part 1

Companies get the most out of Microsoft Dynamics GP when they can connect its operational and financial data back to the other parts of the business.  Once an organization begins to experience the value of integration, leaders often want to push forward with more.  But unless you have the tools to plan and build out the right access to your Dynamics GP data, efforts can become frustratingly slow. Fortunately, Dynamics GP includes a powerful, yet under-utilized set of features for accessing data: eConnect.

eConnect is a collection of tools, components, and interfaces that allow applications to interact with all areas of Microsoft Dynamics GP.  If a particular integration point doesn't already exist, a custom one can be created within the eConnect .NET API. The business logic utilized in eConnect consists of a series of SQL stored procedures.

In a new five article series, we will examine a range of fundamental eConnect principles:

1. Pre-requisites for and installation of eConnect (which we explore in this article)
2. An integration using the managed code assembly in .NET API with Visual Studio
3. An integration using direct SQL Stored Procedure calls
4. Extending the default eConnect business logic with "Pre" and "Post" Stored Procedures
5. Creating a custom XML node in an existing eConnect schema

A Few Notes on Access to Stored Procedures

Working with eConnect requires access to your company's SQL Enterprise Manager and security access to the Dynamics system (usually with the database DYNAMICS but you have multiple instances with GP 2013) and company databases.  As always, insure you have a restorable backup, although in this case, it's probably better to begin your development in a prototype environment within a ...