This blog is part one of a multi-part series on managing views, charts, and dashboards in Dynamics 365. This blog will review the types of views as well as how to create a personal view in Dynamics 365. The next parts will cover creating charts and dashboards as well as sharing them with others in your organization.
In November 2020, as part of the renaming of the Common Data Service (CDS) to the Dataverse, Microsoft also renamed several terminologies. For example, an entity is now called a “table.” Attributes are now called “columns.” Records are now called “rows.” Option sets, multi select option sets, and picklists are now called “choices.” We will use the most current terminology throughout this blog.
Types of views
Dynamics 365 Views display multiple rows of data in an Excel-like interface. These views can be filtered, sorted, and exported to Excel for further analysis. A view has a definition which manages what columns are displayed, the width of those columns, and how those records are sorted.
There are two types of views in Dynamics 365 – system views, and personal views.
System views
System views are views that are included with the app or designed by your system administrator. Some examples of system views are: Quick Find, Advanced Find, Associated, and Lookup.
- Quick Find – This is the default view used when searches are performed using Quick Find. This view also defines which fields are searched when using search capabilities of Quick Find and Lookup views.
- Advanced Find – This is the default view used to display results when using Advanced Find. This view also defines the columns used by default when new custom public views or personal views are created without defining a view to use as a template.
- Associated – This is the default view that lists the related entities for a record.
- Lookup – This is the view you see when a record is selected to set for a lookup field.
System views are owned by the organization and are visible to everyone. System views are special views that the application depends on and they exist automatically. A system administrator may choose or edit the system view. These views have specific purposes and some additional functions.
To open a system view:
- Select Sales Settings in the site map.
- Under Customization, select Views.
- To open the view – In the Name column, select the desired view.
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- If you want to search for a view, under List of system views in the upper-left corner, in the Search for records box, enter all or part of the name of the view you want to search for, and then choose the magnifying glass icon
System views can not be deleted or deactivated. Public views, on the other hand can be deactivated or deleted. Public views are views that are general purpose views that can be customized. Public views are available in the view selector and can be used in sub-grids as a list in a dashboard or in a form. Any public view can be set as your default view. It is important to note that system defined public views, however, can not be deleted.
Personal Views
Personal views are views that are created by individual users in an organization. Personal views are only visible to the user that created them unless they choose to share them with other users.
Personal views can be created by anyone who has “user-level” access to actions for the saved view entity. Only system administrators can modify the access level for each action in the security role to control who can create, write, delete, assign, or share personal views.
How to Create a Personal View in Dynamics 365
It is simple to create a personal view in Dynamics 365. There are basically five simple steps to follow when creating a brand new personal view:
- In the upper right hand corner, go to Advanced Find
- Select the table (entity) you would like to create a view for
- Set the criteria for the new view. You can use an existing saved view or create one completely from scratch. From the editor, you have the ability to modify the filters, columns displayed, and sorting.
- Click Save As, give your new view a Name and a Description
If an existing System or Personal view has a majority of the information you are looking for, you might choose to start from there. This will save you a lot of work. To do this, follow the directions to edit a view, but instead of choosing Save and Close, select Save As and enter a new name and description.
- Start by applying a filter to the Status Reason column.
- The filtered view will give you a new list. From there, navigate to Create a View in the ribbon – from the dropdown, select Save Filters as New View
- Give your new view a Name and click Save.
Sharing personal views will be covered in part four of this blog series.
Deleting a Personal View
You may be asking why you would want to delete a personal view. While a personal view might be relevant at a certain time, clientele changes and you may no longer need a particular personal view any more. In order to de-clutter your Dynamics 365, you may want to delete or deactivate irrelevant views.
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If you would like additional information about how Dynamics 365 benefits your business and how Dynamics 365 helps build customer relationships, visit our blog.
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