Are you ready for your CRM 2016 U1 upgrade?

CRM 2016 U1 is here and it’s full of new enhancements!  If you currently work in Dynamics CRM Online, then you’ve most likely received a notification to schedule your upgrade. I’ll bet you can’t wait to upgrade and take advantage of all the new features … but should you? Microsoft goes out of their way to ensure a smooth transition between their versions, but there is some deprecated functionality that will affect your system.

Deprecation means that Microsoft intends to remove the feature or capability in a future “major” release of CRM. The feature or capability will continue to work and is fully supported until it is officially removed. These deprecation notifications can span a few years. After removal, the feature or capability will no longer work. Microsoft notifies you now so that you have sufficient time to plan and update your code before the feature or capability is removed.

Deprecation of Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 Endpoint

Any code developed after CRM version 2011 Rollup 12 will continue to work with CRM 2016 U1, but the CRM 2011 endpoint is now officially deprecated. Microsoft will remove this endpoint sometime after version 9, which may be as early as 2017. If you’ve had any CRM applications developed or upgraded over the past five years, I suggest you plan an upgrade path to the new endpoint soon.

Read more here: https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/mt593051.aspx

Deprecation of knowledge management areas

Some knowledge management entities are now deprecated: KbArticle, KbArticleComment, and KbArticleTemplate. You should plan on migrating that data to the newer KnowledgeArticle entity.

Read more here: https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/gg309378.aspx

Deprecation of legacy forms

One of the biggest struggles in earlier versions of Dynamics CRM was the painfully slow form load time. Microsoft addressed this issue by introducing a faster form rendering engine, also known as “turbo forms”. Microsoft now gives you the choice to choose which form rendering engine you can use, but be aware that turbo forms do not support all of the functionality allowed by the legacy engine. The legacy engine is now deprecated, and will not be available in future versions. You should plan on reviewing your forms, and determine if they are fully compliant with the new turbo forms.

Read more here: https://www.beringer.net/beringerblog/crm-2015-update-1-legacy-code-rendering-engine

Updates to the CRM SDK assemblies

Do you have any custom applications that were created with either the 2011, 2103 or 2015 SDK? With some of the new updates in 2016 U1, they may stop working. Any applications that depend on these assemblies will need to be relinked and redeployed to the newest assemblies to ensure they will continue to run without interruption. You should plan on downloading the latest CRM SDK and redeploying your applications.

Are you ready for the CRM 2016 U1 upgrade? If you are looking for a certified Microsoft solution partner to help you with your CRM upgrade, make sure you pick the one that keeps in sync with all of the latest technologies.

Beringer Associates, a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner, is here to support all of your CRM technology questions and issues. Please contact us today!

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