Microsoft Dynamics AX 2009 : The MorphX Tools - Table Browser Tool & Find Tool

You can access the Table Browser tool from the Add-Ins submenu in the AOT on:

• Tables

• Tables listed as data sources in forms, reports, Web forms, and Web reports

• System tables listed in the AOT under System Documentation\Tables

Figure 1 shows the Table Browser tool started from the CustTable table. In addition to the querying, sorting, and filtering capabilities provided by the grid control, the Table Browser tool allows you to type an SQL SELECT statement directly into the form using X++ SELECT statement syntax and see a visual display of the result set. This tool is a great way to try out complex SELECT statements. It fully supports grouping, sorting, aggregation, and field lists.

Figure 1. Table Browser tool, showing CustTable from demo data

The Table Browser tool also allows you to choose to see only the fields from the auto-report field group. These fields are printed in a report when the user clicks Print in a form with this table as a data source. Typically, these fields hold the most interesting information. This option can make it easier to find the values you’re looking for in tables with many fields.

Note

Find Tool

Search is everything! The size of Dynamics AX applications calls for a powerful and effective search tool.

You can start the Find tool, shown in Figure 2, from any node in the AOT by pressing Ctrl+F or by clicking Find on the context menu. The Find tool supports multiple selections in the AOT.

The Name & Location tab defines what you’re searching for and where to look:

• In Search, the menu options are Methods and All Nodes. When you choose All Nodes, the Properties tab appears.

• The Named text box limits the search to nodes with the name you specify.

• The Containing Text box specifies the text to look for in the method expressed as a regular expression.

• When you select the Show Source Code check box, results include a snippet of source code containing the match, making it easier to browse the results.

• By default, the Find tool searches the node (and its subnodes) selected in the AOT. If you change focus in the AOT while the Find tool is open, the Look In value is updated. This is quite useful if you want to search several nodes using the same criterion. You can disable this behavior by clearing the Use Selection check box.

In the Date tab, you specify additional ranges for your search, such as Modified Date and Modified By.

On the Advanced tab, you can specify more-advanced settings for your search, such as the layer to search, the size range of elements, the type of element, and the tier on which the element is set to run.

The Filter tab, shown in Figure 3, allows you to write a more complex query by using X++ and type libraries. The code written in the Source text box is the body of a method with the following profile.

boolean FilterMethod(str _treeNodeName,
                     str _treeNodeSource,
                     XRefPath _path,
                     ClassRunMode _runMode)

Figure 3. Filtering in the Find tool

The example in Figure 3 uses the class SysScannerClass to find any occurrence of the TTSAbort X++ keyword. The scanner is primarily used to pass tokens into the parser during compilation. Here, however, it detects the use of a particular keyword. This tool is more accurate (though slower) than using a regular expression, because X++ comments don’t produce tokens.

The Properties tab appears when All Nodes is selected in the Search menu. You can specify a search range for any property. Leaving the range blank for a property is a powerful setting when you want to inspect properties: it matches all nodes, and the property value is added as a column in the results, as shown in Figure 4. The search begins when you click Find Now. The results appear at the bottom of the dialog box as they are found.

Figure 4. Search results in the Find tool

Double-clicking any line in the result set opens the X++ code editor with focus on the matched code example. When you right-click the lines in the result set, a context menu containing the Add-Ins menu opens.