Introduction
Kingswaysoft is a popular tool used with Microsoft Dynamics CRM SSIS data integrations. There are quite a few convenient features of Kingswaysoft that can speed up development time.
Some of these features are buried and not widely used so I thought it might be useful to highlight some of the best features I have come across that have been beneficial to me in the recent past.
1. Fallback Lookup Option
One great feature that is not well documented is using a NULL value as a backup when a lookup is not found. It allows the record to get updated without failing on a lookup. It is useful when a lookup value is only of use for a subset of data.
Example: In one of our recent projects, records were not updating because of one lookup which was failing as particular user was not present in the system. We still wanted to update the rest of the fields on an entity and fallback lookup option allowed us to achieve it. Below screenshots will help you understand how to use fallback lookup option.
2. Manually Specifying Lookup Options
If you want lookups not to collide in CRM (where the same value exists in different defined lookup fields), you can quickly specify to only lookup one field on an entity. This allows for targeted lookups without the need to worry about looking up on an incorrect field (like the primary lookup).
Example: Sales Rep codes being used in multiple fields. This option allows you to focus on only one of those fields to get the expected results. Below is the demonstration.
3. Ignore Unchanged Fields Option
If it is hard to get an exact data for records being updated/upserted into CRM this feature works wonders to only update records that have changed and not flipping the modified-on flag for those values that were changed. So, CRM will truly show those modified-on fields that have been changed. This feature can come in handy and is more informative than showing a modified-on for every record touched even though no data was updated. It also will speed up the integration process run time due to skipping unnecessary updates.
Example: All Products are synced with the CRM everyday (~80k) but only a few (~1k) are shown as modified. This shows that only ~1k had any data changes while the rest had nothing to update even though they were considered for update.
BONUS TIP: Looking up values without knowing the integer value of an OptionSet in Kingswaysoft.
If the string matches exactly to an optionset value in CRM, then you do not need to know the associated integer value for that record. There is no need to look up and associate strings to optionset values in this process!
Example: Every time I need to work with optionset values I try to keep them the same as the source system, so I do not have to know the associated optionset integer value or change anything if I add new optionset values. This saves a ton of time and it makes integrations simple!
Conclusion
The Kingswaysoft extension for Dynamics CRM SSIS integration seems simple and limited at first use, but when utilizing the often-overlooked features you can see this tool is very powerful in terms of what it can accomplish without a lot of work from the developer. This is a great tool that can speed up development and integration work to create a Minimum Viable Product that the business and users can appreciate quickly! Please feel free to use this tool in your next project if any of these features stand out as useful to your unique scenario. Also, feel free to give your input below or to share these tips with others.
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Interesting blog
Thanks