May 2010 Archives

This is my first attempt at synchronizing all the files between MS Dynamics AX and Salesforce.com, they must be synced a first time before the normal processing can begin.

The process is as follows
1. Process all the records out of AX as files = 7hrs
2. Let Cast Iron process the 78,000 files as updates or inserts to salesforce.com
 - Started processing at 6pm and as of midnight there are 10000 files remaining = 8hrs
3. Pull all the records down from Salesforce.com to a local MSSQL DB. = 2hrs
4. Run stored procedure to update all ax records with salesforce record id / parent salesforce record id / parent ax account num = 5min
5. Take delta of which accounts have not been created in AX roughly 20,000 = 5min
6. Process those through stored procedures directly into AX DB and Update local Salesforce.com DB with which accounts updated. = ?
7. Produce files for those from local Salesforce.com DB = 1hrs
8. Let Cast Iron process the 20,000 files as updates 2hrs
9. Pull all the records down from Salesforce.com to a local MSSQL DB. = 2hrs
10. Run stored procedure to update all ax records with salesforce record id / parent salesforce record id / parent ax account num
11. Run stored procedure to show all accounts are synced from both systems
12. Test sync is working
13. Sing and Drink
14. Finish Sales Quotations

Yeah I know, its the longest title I could possible come up with. For the last 9+ months I have been working, in addition to my normal MS Dynamics developer position, on a project to integrate MS Dynamics AX with SalesForce.com. I have been developing this primarily using an integration appliance from Cast Iron Systems. This project was originally slated to take a month, maybe a few, but never going on a year. The primary problems lie in what was trying to be accomplished, lack of planning and physical limitations of the systems, but the project is working great thus far aside from the time line disaster and will soon be finished. I have plans to document many of the problems/hurdles I have run into. It maybe a slow process as the integration is just finally starting to be released into production, but this maybe of assistance to any integration into MS Dynamics. This has been the largest project I have ever been the Lead and well only developer working on for its entirety and I am proud of where it has come to this point.

I'm going to try to do some documenting of the different problems and issues I have while integrating different systems. I spend my days working through issues that do not have solutions on the internet. I always intend to post the little odds and ends that when found make life so much easier, but alas I never get around to it. This has always been primarily due to the complexity of posting on the cms system I had designed over the last few years. It was a great learning experience, but in the end the system was not up to snuff. I am in the process of trying different cms systems. Currently as you see I am trying Movable Type, which seems easy to use, but customization is a nightmare and features appear limited.