The first comparison we will look into is how we can remove sections of the application or functionality that a business is currently not using or plans on never using within Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0. 

Removing Unused Entities via SiteMap vs. Security

Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 has a full CRM suite of functionality built in out of the box encompassing Sales, Service, and Marketing. Most implementations of Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 will not use the entire set of the CRM functionality, and in many cases, exposing unused functionality to the users can reduce the usefulness of the overall system. Removing unused areas or entities within MS CRM can make the MS CRM application much easier for a user to grasp.

Figure 1: User sees all links in the main navigation and the related section of the Account, which can be very distracting to users.

Figure 1

Figure 2: Shows the links pared down to the three they use currently in Sales and removed all the sections they do not use on the account related form.  This was done quickly through security.

Figure 2

SiteMap customization is a tool in Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 that allows you to customize the main navigation pane by modifying XML. The good part about editing the SiteMap is that you can quickly remove areas of the application so that users do not see those pieces of the application in their clients. This can be really helpful within the outlook client because you can limit the CRM folders to only display the folders users will use. The big drawback to removing unused areas or entities via the SiteMap is that it applies to all users in the application, regardless of role. This means you cannot use the SiteMap to hide the Sales area for the Service team and hide the Service Area for the Sales team. Another drawback to using the SiteMap to remove certain entities is that it removes them from the main application navigation, but they will still show up on related entity forms.

Using Role Based Security to limit access by itself or in conjunction with SiteMap modifications is usually a better route to remove unused entities from users' views. Building security roles allows for differences among groups/users regarding which pieces of functionality are displayed in CRM forms as well as in the main navigation.

When deciding how to hide pieces of functionality in Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0, the first question to ask yourself is will a currently-unused piece of functionality be useful sometime in the future. Where possible, it is usually preferable to take away the right to see an object via security rather than just removing it from the sitemap. This is especially is true if you try to add the functionality back in later since users with the System Administrator role will still have access to the hidden entities and can quickly extend visibility to other roles.

In addition to hiding CRM functionality, SiteMap customization can be used to add new links to external systems or to rearrange the main application navigation to group things together to better fit your business processes.

Note: This only looks at two ways, which tend to be most often used, to accomplish removing/hiding functionality within Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0.   Other options exist such as unsupported JavaScript, unsupported base CRM page modification, rebuilding system entities using custom entities to not have related items you do not use and many others options.  Each option has different Pro’s and Con’s that you need to think about.  We will look into some of these other options in future posts.

- Hoss Hostetler