With Commerce Gateway for Microsoft Dynamics NAV, companies can use Microsoft Dynamics NAV to electronically exchange trading documents with business partners regardless of conversion requirements and data formats. This helps streamline business processes and reduce transaction costs. Commerce Gateway also makes it easier for companies to meet the changing demands of their trading partners, regardless of the industry they are in, the system that they use, or the standards that their partners require.
As some of you may have noticed, Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2013 shipped without Commerce Gateway. We have explored a number of different options for enabling Commerce Gateway. This blog post describes the recommended upgrade path for users of Commerce Gateway to make their solution compatible with Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2013.
We are currently working on a sample application that will demonstrate how to upgrade the Commerce Gateway solution. The sample will show how you should set up the connection between Microsoft BizTalk and Microsoft Dynamics NAV using a web service. The sample will be shipped through the hotfix process, after it has been through testing. For now, we expect to release the sample at the end of March.
New customers that need Commerce Gateway will have to upgrade their solutions from Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2009 to Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2013. For more information, see Upgrading to Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2013.
Commerce Gateway is still included in the license as part of the product and can be purchased as normal.
Architectural changes
In architectural terms, the Commerce Gateway solution consists of an application part, a communication part, and a BizTalk part. The communication part is the part that requires the most changes to be able to run with Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2013. We recommend that you change the communication part to use a web service connection instead of using the Request Client and the Request Server. For this to work, it is also required that you make a few changes to the Microsoft BizTalk configuration. There are minor changes to the application part.
The main reason changes to Commerce Gateway were required for it to work on Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2013 are the architectural changes that were introduced with this version, such as the 64-bit Microsoft Dynamics NAV Server, as well as the removal of COM support on the server. Both changes require a change in the Commerce Gateway implementation, since it relies on a 32-bit COM implementation for the Request Server and the Request Client.
Summary of recommended changes
- Upgrade application code to Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2013. The application code is impacted by the removal of support for forms.
- Change the connection between the Microsoft BizTalk server and Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2013 to use a new web service, which will be defined in the sample. Changing your solution to use web services will simplify the Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2013 installation, as you will no longer be required to use the Commerce Gateway Request server and the Commerce Gateway Request Client.
- The Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2013 architecture does not allow the use of automation on the server. Consequently, we have changed five objects to use the .NET Framework XML Document Object Model (DOM). You will have to upgrade your solution to merge in these changes.
- Change the connection setup on the Microsoft BizTalk Server to use the web service. You will need to create a new Send port and to reconfigure the orchestrations.
All of the above changes will be described and implemented in the code sample that will ship at the end of March.
Senior Program Manager