An Advance Peek at Dynamics AX 5.0—and the Emergence of Role Tailored User Experiences (UX)

Dynamics AX 5.0 isn't due out until this summer, so there is a lot we don't know about it. But one thing we do know is that the UI will be getting a lot of changes.

What is key is that the UI changes won't be purely cosmetic in nature. No, the goal here will be to seek a more productive experience for the different user roles that will make demands of Dynamics AX.

The new User Experience (UX) will be known as "Role-Tailored" user interfaces, which are very much aligned with the Windows Vista and Microsoft Office System 2007 look-and-feel.

This new user interface design will revolve around an SDI, or Single Document Interface. This translates into a new page loading into the same space in which the old one was loaded, instead of opening into a new window.

This entire new design of Dynamics AX 5.0 will be centered around the Role-tailored user experience. The idea behind this approach is to have the entire application specifically targeted to given specific roles. Some of these roles will be predefined, and some can be modified or created by the user.

Feeding this Role-Tailored user experience (UX) will be something that will be known as 'Role Centers.' These are being designed to be the 'start' page for a given user, based on the role that user has been slated for. From what I have found out about the Role Center concept, the goal for setting up the correct role for the user should be driven by a few topics:

- Workload

- Task / To-Do List

- Urgent Actions / Attention Alerts

- Status message of user's concentrated areas of work

Microsoft has really ...