Glossary
130 definitions for the acronyms, products, and concepts that keep cropping up in the Dynamics 365 world.
A
- Access teamA lightweight Dataverse team that grants ad-hoc record-level access — typically auto-created per record for collaboration.
- Accounts payableThe function and ledger that tracks what a business owes to suppliers — vendor invoices, payments, and credit terms.
- Accounts receivableThe function and ledger that tracks what a business is owed by customers — customer invoices, payments, and credit management.
- ActivityA Dataverse record type representing an interaction — phone call, email, appointment, task — typically attached to a customer-side record's timeline.
- Agent (Copilot)A configured AI assistant built in Copilot Studio — combines an LLM with knowledge sources, actions, and channels to act on Dynamics 365 data.
- AI BuilderMicrosoft's no-code AI model library inside the Power Platform — pre-built and trainable ML models for citizen developers.
- AL LanguageMicrosoft's programming language for building extensions to Business Central, the successor to the older C/AL language.
- Alternate keyA Dataverse uniqueness constraint on business-meaningful columns — enables external systems to identify records by natural keys rather than GUIDs.
- API Management (APIM)Azure's managed API gateway — provides rate limiting, authentication, transformation, observability, and a developer portal in front of Dataverse and other APIs.
- App registrationA Microsoft Entra ID registration that represents an application — generates client credentials, OAuth scopes, and the basis for service principals.
- Approval workflowStructured routing of documents through approvers before posting — built-in in Business Central, F&O, and Power Automate.
- AppSourceMicrosoft's online marketplace for business apps, extensions, and add-ons for Dynamics 365 and the Power Platform.
- AzureMicrosoft's public cloud platform — the infrastructure Dynamics 365 runs on.
- Azure FunctionMicrosoft's serverless compute platform — used heavily for Dynamics 365 integrations, webhook receivers, scheduled jobs, and custom code beyond Power Automate.
B
- BOM (Bill of Materials)The list of components needed to make a manufactured item — production BOMs, assembly BOMs, and formula BOMs.
- Business CentralMicrosoft's cloud ERP for small and mid-sized businesses, successor to Dynamics NAV.
- Business process flow (BPF)The staged progress-bar guidance pattern in Dynamics 365 model-driven apps — guides users through multi-step processes.
- Business Process Modeller (BPM)Lifecycle Services' library of standard business processes for Dynamics 365 Finance and SCM implementations — used for fit-gap analysis and process documentation.
- Business ruleA no-code field-level logic mechanism in Dataverse — set value, lock field, show error, recommend value, with conditions and triggers.
- Business unitsThe hierarchical scope unit in the Dataverse security model — every user and record belongs to one.
C
- Calculated columnA Dataverse column whose value is computed at read time from a formula — real-time but not indexable for filters.
- Canvas appA Power Apps application type with pixel-perfect drag-and-drop UI — built from a blank screen using Power Fx, connecting to many data sources.
- Cascading deleteThe Dataverse relationship setting that controls what happens to child records when their parent is deleted — cascade, restrict, or remove link.
- CaseThe core record in Dynamics 365 Customer Service — one unit of customer trouble, with status, priority, owner, SLA, and resolution lifecycle.
- Chart of accountsThe structured list of accounts a business uses in its general ledger to categorise financial transactions.
- Child flowA Power Automate flow invoked by another flow — for decomposing complex flows into reusable units.
- Classic workflowThe Dataverse-internal workflow engine that predates Power Automate — still functional for in-transaction synchronous logic but mostly superseded for new builds.
- CoE Starter KitMicrosoft's free, open-source toolkit for governing the Power Platform at scale — inventory, monitoring, compliance, nurture components.
- Common Data ModelMicrosoft's standard schema for business entities, used as the starter data model for Dataverse and Dynamics 365.
- Connection referenceA Power Platform solution component that abstracts a connector type from a specific connection instance — enabling solution portability across environments.
- CopilotMicrosoft's brand for AI-assisted experiences across Microsoft 365, Dynamics 365, and the Power Platform.
- Copilot StudioMicrosoft's low-code platform for building AI agents that read and write Dynamics 365 and other systems.
- CRMCustomer Relationship Management — software for managing customer interactions across sales, service, marketing, and field operations.
- Custom actionA Dataverse-defined named operation with typed inputs and outputs — callable from the Web API, plug-ins, JavaScript, and Power Automate flows.
- CutoverThe structured sequence of activities that transitions from legacy systems to a new Dynamics 365 environment at go-live.
D
- Data entityDynamics 365 Finance and SCM's denormalised, versioned view of one or more underlying tables — the unit of bulk integration.
- Data gatewayThe on-premises data gateway — a Windows service bridging cloud Power BI / Power Automate / Logic Apps to on-prem data sources.
- Data Management Framework (DMF)Dynamics 365 Finance and SCM's framework for bulk data import, export, and recurring integration.
- DataflowA Power Query-based ETL pipeline that ingests and transforms data into Dataverse on a schedule.
- Dataverse searchThe modern global search in Dataverse — Azure-Cognitive-Search-powered, fast, fuzzy-matching, relevance-ranked, indexes across tables and columns.
- DimensionsAnalytical tags attached to every ledger transaction in Business Central and Dynamics 365 Finance — the alternative to thousands of GL sub-accounts.
- DLP policyData Loss Prevention policy for the Power Platform — classifies connectors as Business, Non-Business, or Blocked to prevent inadvertent data leakage.
- Dual-writeMicrosoft's near-real-time integration framework between Dynamics 365 Finance/Supply Chain and Dataverse.
- Duplicate detectionDataverse's mechanism for identifying potential duplicate records at creation, update, or import — rules, matching algorithms, and merge actions.
- Dynamics 365Microsoft's family of cloud-based ERP and CRM business applications, launched in 2016.
- Dynamics NAVMicrosoft's on-premise ERP for small and mid-sized businesses, the predecessor to Business Central.
E
- Electronic Reporting (GER)Dynamics 365 Finance and SCM's configurable engine for generating structured outputs — statutory filings, e-invoices, bank files — and consuming the same.
- Environment variableA Power Platform solution component that abstracts configuration values — URLs, API keys, thresholds — so they can differ per environment.
- EnvironmentsIsolated instances of a Dynamics 365 tenant — typically a production environment plus one or more sandboxes for development and testing.
- ERPEnterprise Resource Planning — software that runs a company's core operational and financial processes.
- Event GridAzure's lightweight pub/sub eventing service — for high-volume fan-out of Dataverse change events to many subscribers.
- Eventual consistencyThe property of a distributed system where related data reaches a consistent state over time, not immediately — a fundamental trade-off in Dynamics 365 integration architectures.
- ExtensionsSide-by-side customisations to Business Central or Dataverse that don't modify the base application, enabling clean upgrades.
F
- FastTrackMicrosoft's customer-facing engineering and advisory program for Dynamics 365 implementations.
- FetchXMLDataverse's XML-based query language — used for views, advanced find, plug-ins, and complex analytical queries.
- Field-level security (FLS)Dataverse's mechanism for restricting access to specific columns within a row — through field security profiles assigned to users and teams.
- Fiscal periodAn accounting period in Business Central or Dynamics 365 Finance — month, quarter, year — with control over what can post, close, and lock.
- Fit-gap analysisThe structured comparison of customer requirements against an ERP/CRM's standard capabilities to identify gaps requiring customisation.
- Formula columnA modern Dataverse column type using Power Fx for richer formulas than calculated columns — real-time evaluation, same trade-offs.
G
- General ledgerThe central accounting record that holds every financial transaction in an organisation, organised by chart of accounts.
- Go-liveThe moment a Dynamics 365 system goes into production use — when migrated data is loaded and users start posting real transactions.
- Graph connectorA Microsoft Graph mechanism for indexing external system content into Microsoft 365 search — including Dataverse and Dynamics 365 data.
I
- IdempotencyThe property of an integration operation where running it multiple times produces the same result as running it once — essential for safe retries in distributed systems.
- ImplementationThe project that takes a Dynamics 365 product from purchase to production use — typically led by a Microsoft partner.
- IntercompanyTransactions between two legal entities of the same group, accounted for separately in each company's books and eliminated on consolidation.
- InventoryThe stock of physical goods a business holds for sale, production, or consumption — tracked by item, location, and quantity in an ERP.
- Inventory dimensionF&O's structural concept giving each physical unit of inventory its identity — product, storage, and tracking dimensions combined.
- ISVsIndependent Software Vendors — partners that build and sell packaged products on top of Dynamics 365 and the Power Platform.
J
L
- LeadAn unqualified prospect record in Dynamics 365 Sales — typically created from inbound inquiries, before becoming a Contact and Opportunity.
- Lifecycle ServicesMicrosoft's operational portal for Dynamics 365 Finance and Supply Chain Management implementations.
- LiquidThe templating language used by Power Pages for rendering content — variables, tags, filters with safe sandboxed evaluation.
M
- Managed solutionA solution in a read-only deployment state — installed in target environments without allowing component-level edits.
- Manufacturing ordersThe documents that authorise and track the production of finished goods from raw materials in an ERP.
- Many-to-many (N:N) relationshipA Dataverse relationship pattern where records on both sides can relate to many on the other — implementable as native N:N or via a custom intersection entity.
- Microsoft 365 CopilotThe AI experience embedded across Microsoft 365 — Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Teams — with extensibility to Dynamics 365 via plugins.
- Microsoft DataverseThe shared data platform under Dynamics 365 CRM apps and the Power Platform — tables, relationships, security, and APIs.
- Microsoft Entra External IDMicrosoft's customer identity platform — successor to Azure AD B2C — for authenticating external users to Power Pages portals and customer-facing Dynamics 365 resources.
- Microsoft Entra IDMicrosoft's cloud identity service — formerly Azure Active Directory — that authenticates every Dynamics 365 user.
- Microsoft FabricMicrosoft's unified analytics platform — lakehouse, data warehouse, real-time analytics, and Power BI on a shared storage layer called OneLake.
- Model-driven appA Power Apps application type generated from a Dataverse schema — site map, forms, views, charts, dashboards over tables and relationships.
- MRP (Material Requirements Planning)The algorithm that compares demand against supply to suggest the purchase, transfer, and production orders needed to keep stock balanced.
O
- ODataThe standard REST query syntax exposed by the Dataverse Web API — used by modern integrations, Power Automate, and JavaScript on forms.
- One VersionMicrosoft's policy of running every Dynamics 365 Finance and Supply Chain customer on the current platform version, updated continuously.
- OpportunityA qualified sales pursuit in Dynamics 365 Sales — moves through stages from qualify to close, with estimated revenue and probability.
- Owner teamA Dataverse team that owns records and has security roles assigned — for shared ownership of records by groups of users.
P
- Permission setBusiness Central's unit of security — a named bundle of object-level rights (read, insert, modify, delete, execute) assigned to users.
- Plug-inServer-side .NET code that runs in response to Dataverse events — the most powerful customisation mechanism in the CRM-side Dynamics 365 stack.
- Plug-in trace logDataverse's diagnostic trace mechanism for plug-ins — runtime context, timing, errors captured to a queryable table for debugging.
- Posting groupBusiness Central's mechanism for mapping sub-ledger transactions to GL accounts — general business, general product, VAT, customer, vendor, inventory, bank, FA.
- Power AppsMicrosoft's low-code platform for building custom business apps on top of Dataverse and connected services.
- Power AutomateMicrosoft's workflow and RPA platform, used to automate business processes across Dynamics 365 and the wider Microsoft cloud.
- Power BIMicrosoft's self-service business intelligence and analytics platform — dashboards, reports, and data modelling on top of any data source.
- Power PlatformMicrosoft's low-code suite for building apps, automations, dashboards, and AI agents on top of Dataverse.
- Preview buildAn early Dynamics 365 release wave build available roughly six weeks before general availability — for sandbox testing against the upcoming version.
Q
R
- Release waveMicrosoft's twice-yearly platform update cadence for Dynamics 365 — Wave 1 in April, Wave 2 in October, with preview, GA, and mandatory upgrade phases.
- Retry policyThe configurable behaviour of an integration on transient failure — how many retries, with what backoff, and on which error conditions.
- Ribbon (command bar)The row of action buttons at the top of model-driven Power Apps pages — customisable per app, per table, per context, increasingly called the command bar.
- Role centerBusiness Central's home-screen concept — a curated workspace per user role with cues, charts, and shortcuts to relevant work.
- Rollup columnA Dataverse column that aggregates across related records — count, sum, average, min, max — and persists the result on a scheduled refresh.
S
- SaaSSoftware-as-a-Service — software delivered as a managed cloud subscription rather than installed and run by the customer.
- SagaA pattern for multi-system business transactions that need atomic success-or-rollback across systems without shared transactions — typically with compensating actions.
- SandboxA non-production Power Platform or Dynamics 365 environment for development, testing, training, and demos — isolated from production data.
- Security rolesNamed bundles of privileges in Dataverse and the Dynamics 365 CRM-side apps that grant users access to tables and records.
- Service BusMicrosoft's durable, queued messaging service in Azure — used for reliable, decoupled integration with Dataverse and Dynamics 365.
- Service principalAn identity for non-human callers in Microsoft Entra — used by integrations and automated processes to authenticate to Dataverse and other services.
- Site mapThe navigation structure of a model-driven Power App — areas, groups, subareas that define what users see in the left navigation.
- SLA (Service Level Agreement)Time-based commitments to customers — response time, resolution time — tracked, enforced, and reported in Dynamics 365 Customer Service.
- Solution CheckerMicrosoft's static-analysis tool for Power Platform solutions — flags performance, security, accessibility, and platform-misuse issues.
- Solution patchA delta solution containing only the changes since a base solution version — faster to deploy than full upgrades, layered on top of the base.
- SolutionsVersioned, deployable containers of Power Platform and Dynamics 365 customisations — the unit of application lifecycle management.
- Success by DesignMicrosoft's current implementation methodology for Dynamics 365, replacing the older Sure Step.
- Synapse LinkMicrosoft's managed pipeline that streams Dataverse and Finance/SCM data into a lakehouse for analytics.
T
- Task RecorderDynamics 365 Finance and SCM's tool for capturing user actions in the application as reusable scripts for training, documentation, and testing.
- TDS endpointDataverse's SQL Server-compatible read-only endpoint — lets SQL-aware tools query Dataverse with T-SQL syntax.
- TenantThe top-level container for a customer's Microsoft cloud — one tenant holds one Entra ID directory, all environments, and all licences.
- ThrottlingRate-limiting of API calls in Dataverse, Power Platform, and Microsoft services — protects platform capacity; integrations must respect 429 responses with backoff.
- TimelineThe chronological view on a Dynamics 365 record showing all related activities and notes — the central history view for customer-side records.
- Trade agreementDynamics 365 Finance and SCM's pricing and discount rule model — item-customer combinations with dates, conditions, and pricing logic.
U
V
W
- Warehouse managementThe processes and software that control the physical movement of inventory inside a warehouse — receipts, put-aways, picks, and shipments.
- Web APIThe HTTP REST endpoint for programmatic access to Dataverse — supports OData queries, CRUD operations, batch requests, and authenticated calls.
- WebhookAn HTTP POST pattern for receiving real-time notifications from Dataverse or Business Central when records change.
- WIP (Work in Process)The cost of partially-completed work — production orders in progress, project costs before revenue recognition — held as a balance-sheet asset.
- Work orderThe core record in Dynamics 365 Field Service — represents on-site work to be performed at a customer location.