Introduction of AX

Introduction

Dynamics AX includes a set of tools, the MorphX development tools, that allow developers to build and modify Dynamics AX business applications.The MorphX tools enable developers to create, view, modify, and delete the application model elements, which contain metadata, structure (ordering and hierarchies of elements), properties (key and value pairs), and X++ code. For example, a table element includes the name of the table, the properties set for the table, the fields, the indices, the relations, the methods, and so on.

You can find additional information and an overview of other MorphX tools in the MorphX Development Tools section of the Microsoft Dynamics AX software development kit (SDK) 2009 on MSDN.

Tip

To enable the development mode of Dynamics AX 2009, press Ctrl+Shift+D. Ctrl+Shift+D is a toggle key that also returns you to content mode.

Table 1 lists the MorphX tools.

Table 1. MorphX Tools

Tool	Use This Tool To:
Application Object Tree (AOT)	Start development activities. The AOT is the main entry point for all development activities. It is the repository for all elements that together comprise the business application. You can use the AOT to invoke the other tools and to browse and create elements.
Project Designer	Group related elements into projects.
Property sheet	Inspect and modify properties of elements. The property sheet shows key and value pairs.
X++ Code Editor	Inspect and write X++ source code.
Label Editor	Create and inspect localizable strings.
Visual Form Designer and the Visual Report Designer	Design forms and reports in a What You See Is What You Get (WYSIWYG) fashion.
Compiler	Compile X++ code into an executable format.
Best Practices tool	Automatically detect defects in both your code and your elements.
Debugger	Find bugs in your X++ code.
Reverse Engineering tool	Generate Microsoft Office Visio Unified Modeling Language (UML) and Entity Relationship Diagrams (ERDs) from elements.
Table Browser tool	View the contents of a table directly from the table element.
Find tool	Search for code or metadata patterns in the AOT.
Compare tool	See a line-by-line comparison of two versions of the same element.
Cross-reference tool	Determine where an element is used.
Version Control tool	Track all changes to elements and see a full revision log.
Unit Test tool	Build automated tests that can exercise your code and detect regressions.

You can access these development tools from the following places:

• The Development Tools submenu on the Tools menu. From the Microsoft Dynamics AX drop-down menu, point to Tools, and then point to Development Tools.
• The context menu on elements in the AOT.

Note

The Microsoft Dynamics AX SDK contains valuable developer documentation and is updated frequently. Find it in the Microsoft Dynamics AX Developer Center on msdn.microsoft.com.

You can personalize the behavior of many MorphX tools by clicking Options on the Tools menu. Figure 1 shows the Options dialog box.

Figure 1. Options dialog box, in which development options are specified