Today we continue with the blog series D365 V9.0 – A Feature a Day, and I am enjoying the self-discovery process of all the new improvements that have been made to the V9.0 platform. Today’s feature will be focusing on the newly introduced MultiSelect Option Sets.
Today’s Feature – Multi Select OptionSets
MultiSelect Option Sets have been one of the top requested features of Dynamics for quite some time now. And now they’re finally here! So, what are some things you need to know about MultiSelect Option Sets?
- MultiSelect Option Sets are a new attribute type
- They are available on the Unified Interface as well as the Web Client
- They are available for Main Forms, Quick Create Forms, and Quick View Forms.
- They are not supported on legacy forms (i.e. mobile form)
- They support all client APIs such as set attributes and controls, and will return an array instead of a single value.
Next we’ll take a test drive of this new feature – how to create a MultiSelect optionset and how to use one.
Creating a Multi Select OptionSet
- Open your Form Designer
- Create a New Field
- Create a new MultiSelect Option Set (in this case I’ve called this attribute Areas of Interest)
* Note you can use an existing option set also - Save and Close
- Add this field to your form
- Add this field to a view
Testing out the MultiSelect Option Set
Once you have published your configuration, when you open the contact form once again you will see the newly created MultiSelect Option Set. When you click on the OptionSet you will have the ability to enter free form text to quickly find the option value you’re searching for.
And also the ability to multi select items from the list.
Once saved, the selected items appear as a semi-colon delimited list.
Now we’ll look at the behaviour from the system view. When you navigate to your My Active Contact view you will see the newly created attribute.
Additionally, when you click on the Filter icon, you can see the filtering behaviour has also been refreshed to suit multiselect option sets.
The same behaviour can be applied for Advanced Find also.
Final thoughts
I am impressed by the implementation of this control. Multiselect Optionsets are now treated as first class attributes within Dynamics 365 with behaviours that you would expect from other attributes such as filtering on views, advanced find, auto fill values, select all and so on. In the past, ISVs have developed their own tagging solutions that often required the creation of separate intersect entities for reporting, I’m glad to report this feature from V9.0 does away with all of that.
Stay tuned for my next blog in the V9.0 series! Until then, thanks for reading.
If you’re keen on trying this new feature out yourself, head on down to https://trials.dynamics.com/Dynamics365/Signup