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Microsoft Dynamics NAV Overview

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Welcome to the Microsoft Dynamics NAV TechNet Wiki. The purpose of this wiki is to provide a comprehensive guide for IT professionals to learn about then implement, configure, customize, maintain and support Microsoft Dynamics NAV.

What is Microsoft Dynamics NAV?

Microsoft Dynamics NAV is an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) business application developed by Microsoft. Initially, it was application developed by Danish firm Navision Software A/S and later was been acquired by Microsoft.

The product is part of the Microsoft Dynamics family of business applications that includes Enterprise Resource Planning products such as Microsoft Dynamics AX, Microsoft Dynamics GP, Microsoft Dynamics SL and Microsoft Dynamics NAV. Also, part of family are Microsoft Dynamics CRM, Microsoft Dynamics RMS and MarketingPilot. Application intended to assist with finance, manufacturing, customer relationship management, supply chains, project and resource management, analytics and electronic commerce for small and medium-sized enterprises.

Value-added resellers (VAR)s can have full access to the business logic source code, and it has a reputation as being easy to customize. Because of that, there many partner AdOns or vertical solutions.

If you are a Microsoft partner, to learn more about Microsoft Dynamics NAV consider downloading the free trial, visit this page.

If you are new to Microsoft Dynamics NAV, you can read more about its history here below.

The company was founded in 1983 in Denmark as PC&C A/S (Personal Computing and Communication) by Jesper Balser, Peter Bang and Torben Wind. In 1984 they released their first accounting package called PCPlus. It was for its time a very user-friendly single user package with all the basic accounting functionality. In 1987 the first version of Navision was released. This was also their first client/server based package allowing multiple users to access the system simultaneous.

Until 1990 the system was primary sold in Denmark, Iceland and Germany. But with the release of Navision version 3 (of the character-based system) a heavy international expansion was initiated and distributors and localized versions became available in many other countries.

In 1995 their first Microsoft Windows 95 based version was released.

In 2000, Navision Software A/S merged with fellow Danish firm Damgaard A/S (founded 1983) to form NavisionDamgard A/S. Later the name was changed to Navision A/S.

On July 11, 2002 Microsoft bought Navision A/S to go with its previous acquisition of Great Plains. The new division in Microsoft was named Microsoft Business Solutions and also included Microsoft CRM, and later is added Solomon to the same group.

All four ERP systems will be launched with the same new role based user interface, SQL based reporting and analysis, SharePoint based portal, Pocket PC based mobile clients and integration with Microsoft Office.

In September 2005 Microsoft re-branded the product and re-released it as Microsoft Dynamics NAV.

In December 2008 Microsoft released Dynamics NAV 2009, which contains both the original "classic" client, as well as a new three-tier GUI called the RoleTailored Client (RTC).

The product itself has gone through several name changes over the time. Initially Navigator was used in Denmark, although most Danes knew it as IBM-Navigator, as IBM was the distributor. Internationally it was sold as Navision, except for the US where it was called Avista. The names "Navision Financials", "Navision Solutions", "Navision Attain", "Microsoft Business Solutions - Navision Edition", and the current "Microsoft Dynamics NAV" (pronounced N-A-V, except in the U.S. where most customers simply say, "nav" which is short for Navision) have all been used to refer to this product.

Versions

DOS based Navision version were:

  • [[MS Dynamics NAV (PC Plus)|PC Plus]] (1984.)
  • [[MS Dynamics (Navigator)|Navigator]]: 1.xx, 2.xx, 3.xx (1987-1990.)

Windows based Navision versions from 1.00 onwards were:

  • [[MS Dynamics (Navision Financials)|Navision Financials]] 1.00: 1.00, 1.00A, 1.00B, 1.10, 1.10A, 1.20, 1.30
  • [[MS Dynamics (Navision Financials)|Navision Financials]] 2.00: 2.00, 2.00A, 2.00B, 2.00C, 2.01, 2.01A, 2.01B
  • [[MS Dynamics (Navision Financials)|Navision Financials]] 2.50: 2.50
  • [[MS Dynamics (Navision Financials)|Navision Financials]] 2.60: 2.60, 2.60A, 2.60B, 2.60C, 2.60D, 2.60E
  • Navision Solutions 3.00: 3.00
  • [[MS Dynamics (Navision Attain)|Navision Attain]] 3.01: 3.01, 3.01A, 3.01B
  • [[MS Dynamics (Navision Attain)|Navision Attain]] 3.10: 3.10, 3.10A, 3.10B
  • [[MS Dynamics (Navision Attain)|Navision Attain]] 3.60: 3.60, 3.60A
  • [[MS Dynamics (MBS Navision)|Microsoft Business Solutions]] Navision 3.70: 3.70, 3.70A, 3.70B
  • [[MS Dynamics (MBS Navision)|Microsoft Business Solutions]] NAV 4.00: 4.00, 4.00 SP1, 4.00 SP2, 4.00 SP3
  • [[MS Dynamics (NAV 5)|Dynamics NAV]] 5.00: 5.00, 5.00 SP1
  • [[MS Dynamics (NAV 2009)|Dynamics NAV 2009]]: ("6.00") 2009, 2009 SP1, 2009 R2
  • [[MS Dynamics (NAV 2013)|Dynamics NAV 2013]]: ("7.00") 2013, [[MS Dynamics (NAV 2013R2)|2013 R2]] (October 2013)
  • [[MS Dynamics NAV 2015|Dynamics NAV 2015]] (October 2014)
  • [[MS Dynamics NAV Corfu|Dynamics NAV Corfu]] (Q4 2015)

Overview of Microsoft Dynamics NAV wiki

The Microsoft Dynamics NAV wiki is organized into the following high-level chapters

  • [[Architecture and Features of Microsoft Dynamics NAV|Architecture & Features]] – articles about architecture, features and licensing models for Microsoft Dynamics NAV
  • [[Learn Microsoft Dynamics NAV|Learn]] – articles and resources to help you get started with Microsoft Dynamics NAV if you are an employee with a Microsoft customer or partner
  • [[Microsoft Dynamics NAV Installation|Install]] – technical content about installing Microsoft Dynamics NAV
  • [[Implement Microsoft Dynamics NAV|Implement]] – technical content about process implementation of Microsoft Dynamics NAV
  • [[Configure Microsoft Dynamics NAV|Configure]] – articles and resources to help you with NAV configuration
  • [[Customize Microsoft Dynamics NAV|Customize]] – articles and resources to help you with NAV customization
  • [[Deploy Microsoft Dynamics NAV|Deploy]] – plan your NAV project, train users, maximize user adoption
  • [[Data migration Microsoft Dynamics NAV|Data migration]] – learn how to import/migrate data into Microsoft Dynamics NAV
  • [[Support Microsoft Dynamics NAV|Support]] – find out how to maintain Microsoft NAV and troubleshoot common issues
  • [[Upgrade Microsoft Dynamics NAV|Upgrade]] – overview on upgrading to the current version of Microsoft Dynamics NAV from earlier versions
  • [[Enterprise Resources for Microsoft Dynamics NAV|Enterprise Resources]] – overview of a series of whitepapers and tips and tricks.
  • NAV Developers Community - start here to learn about the resources that the NAV Developers Community can bring to bear.
  • NAV Community Forum – start to learn about resources that the NAV Community Forum can bring to bear

Books

Contributions

The Microsoft Dynamics NAV TechNet Wiki is a community effort combining unique content written by expert NAV contributors and pointers to useful resources found elsewhere. You can provide rate and tag articles, provide your feedback, edit and revise most articles or contribute or suggest new articles. We look forward to your participation.

Terminology

To maintain consistency of articles on NAV TechNet Wiki the following naming convention has been adopted.

  • Microsoft Dynamics NAV. Official product name and preferred way to refer to the product in the article title. When reference to a specific version is required, add version number after the name, e.g. Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2013.
  • Dynamics NAV. Preferred short form of reference to the product in the article body. Shortest reference form, NAV, can also be used. When version disambiguation is required, add version number after word NAV, e.g. NAV 2013.
  • NAV TechNet Wiki. Reference to Dynamics NAV ecosystem on TechNet Wiki. We do enjoy patronage of TechNet Wiki and its enormous search juice pulling power so when we publish an article about Dynamics NAV, it ends up being a part of NAV TechNet Wiki.
  • Always add nav tag to NAV-related articles. If article is version specific, also add nav 5 or crm 2009 tags including the space (i.e. avoid nav5 and nav2009 tags). Add other tags as required. Hint: to avoid saving a "friendly" suggestion from the tag editor, always follow your tag by a comma, even the last one.
  • Last but not least: If you want to follow news about NAV on Twitter, you can use #MSDynNAV hashtag. Thank you!

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