@erpthoughts profile picture
Alexander Drogin @erpthoughts

A Navision/NAV/Business Central developer. I enjoy coding, testing, exploring the depths of code, and writing about my findings.

Joined July 2022
  • Tweets 301
  • Following 65
  • Followers 151
57 Photos and videos
I almost never use the return value of the Insert function in AL, but recently I found it useful in avoiding a specific deadlock situation. And the deadlock itself was a very curious one. keytogoodcode.com/post/buffe…

Buffered inserts and deadlocks

Recently I was debugging a very interesting deadlock case which I want to share in a blog post now. It was especially curious because, as it turned out, it was caused by the Business Central's bulk...

keytogoodcode.com
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Did you ever get confused with Business Central's temporary tables and the way temp tables are passed to procedure parameters? I did too, so I wrote a post as a memo. #businesscentral #dyn365bc keytogoodcode.com/post/tempo…

Temporary tables in procedure parameters

When we declare multiple instances of a record variable referencing the same table in AL code, we essentially receive different instances of the active record, but the same underlying database table...

keytogoodcode.com
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This post is an attempt to summarize my experience in using columnstore indexes in Business Central: possible use cases and some performance analysis. What is your experience in using columnstore indexes? #dyn365bc #businesscentral keytogoodcode.com/post/anoth…

Another alternative to SIFT: Columnstore indexes

According to this article on Microsoft Learn portal, non-clustered columnstore indexes (or NCCI) are seen as a possible replacement for Business Central's SumIndexFields (SIFT views) in the future....

keytogoodcode.com
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I went as far as doing another post on the "if not IsEmpty then FindSet" pattern. Don't beat me too hard for reviving the topic again, but I think this query can shed some light on the old urban legend of the "second roundtrip" of the FindSet function. keytogoodcode.com/post/if-no…

if not IsEmpty then FindSet... again

Yes, I'm back again on this inexhaustible topic.The question of weather the call of IsEmpty before FindSet in AL can have a positive effect on the application performance, or on the contrary, it is...

keytogoodcode.com
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In a couple of my previous blog posts I was reviewing the benefits and dangers of SIFT views in Business Central. Now I want to take a look at a possible alternative - how indexes with included fields perform compared to SIFT. #dyn365bc keytogoodcode.com/post/cover…

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Recently, I've been practicing my TypeScript skills, and now ʧarm is the result of my exercises. This is a tool allowing intuitive graphical presentation and editing of timelines. github.com/adrogin/tscharm
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An example of a negative configuration option at its finest. So I need to set "modules" to false and "node" as the target to use ESM modules instead of Node's CJS. Makes perfect sense.
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Operation is successful. Just stay cool and keep trying.
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Finally ready to publish my test results on the hot topic of the week: if not IsEmpty then FindSet wix.to/Q1FoxUz

if not IsEmpty then FindSet... Or not?

This post is a result of one very fruitful discussion with many knowledgeable Business Central enthusiasts in a long LinkedIn thread. Now I want to start the post by saying big thank you to everyone...

keytogoodcode.com
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I did it! I did it! 10 sessions in a deadlock chain. ☠️☠️
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Let us step to the dark side and see how Business Central's SumIndexFields, so efficient in reads, can wreak havoc on updates. #dyn365bc #businesscentral #sqlserver wix.to/tU6PUOZ

The dark side of SumIndexFields. Concurrency.

My previous post was dedicated to an overview of Business Central's SumIndexField Technology, or simply SIFT, which helps us collect aggregated data extremely fast by creating an indexed view,...

keytogoodcode.com
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SIFT, or SumIndexField Technology, dr. Jekyll and mr. Hyde of Business Central. Let's have a look at its benevolent personality before exploring the dark side of our hero (with I will save for the next post). wix.to/M3OU2SI

SIFT

SIFT, which stands for Sum Index Flow Technology, used to be a know-how in the Navision database, a data structure that stored precalculated summed amounts directly in index nodes, so that aggregated...

keytogoodcode.com
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AL language allows external diagnostic analysers. Thanks to this, we have the community-driven LinterCop. But the code action service does not load external libs, so no quick fixes for custom rules. No ReSharper for AL either. Is it a worthy BC idea to make it extendable?🤔
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Worst kind of randomisation in test fixture is one that defines the whole test flow rather that the outcome of a specific calculation. Something like: Contact."Business Relation" := Random(5) - 1; What the heck?! What do we even want to test here?

ALT I Dont Know Whats Going On Herbert Garrison GIF

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One impractical blog post. Rather a reminder that some AL functions still exist for backward compatibility with code decades old. wix.to/URtmt7n #dyn365bc #businesscentral #sqlserver
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In this blog post, I am exploring one curious method of presumed performance enhancement of SELECT queries, just to demonstrate why it is not going to work. wix.to/Hxpq3Ia #dyn365bc #businesscentral #sqlserver
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Unfortunately, I am not attending BC Tech Days this year, but this is definitely a session not to be missed.
Mads Gram@PhDuck2
10 Jun 2024
I would argue the perfect last session for your #BCTechDays conference is to join Torben Meyhoff and I, for our session: Tri-State Locking: Reducing locking in the runtime We will explain AL's locking scheme in-depth and explore recent improvements in the area.
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Resuming my "SQL Server for Business Central" blog series. Let's talk about deadlocks: what it is and some examples of potentially deadlocking code. #businesscentral #dyn365bc #sqlserver
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Not quite my usual BC blog post, but an interesting spin-off in my dev experience. My findings from configuring a very helpful #Azure service. wix.to/z8dHeFL
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The weirdest thing I've seen in Azure. Two users open a function app config. One can set TLS version to 1.3, the other does not have this option. Same subscription, same app, users in the same AAD. Does it have any reasonable explanation except different screen resolution?
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