Posts on Wingate365

How AI Rebuilt This Blog: Blogger to Hugo in One Sitting

Sat, 18 Jul 2026 09:00:00 +0000

This blog has been running on Blogger since 2005. That is not a typo. Twenty-one years of posts about BlackBerry keyboard shortcuts, Ubuntu upgrades, NAS backups, and eventually Business Central, all sitting on a platform Google has clearly stopped caring about. If you are reading this on blog.wingate365.com, you are reading it on a site that did not exist a few hours ago, built almost entirely by an AI agent while I sat next to it working on another project .

Graph API Email account types for D365 BC

Sun, 07 Jun 2026 10:13:30 +0000

Previous post in this series: Fixing Email for Guest Users in D365 Business Central

Back in April I wrote about a long-standing gap in Business Central: guest users can't send email from their own home tenancy address. BC's built-in connectors simply don't work for Entra B2B guests. I built an open source extension to fix that, and Phase 3 is now complete - with some significant changes since that first post.

Mission Implementation - post go-live stabilisation

Wed, 29 Apr 2026 07:47:00 +0000

This was fun - Mission Implementation - post go-live - be sure to check out the other videos from the series also.. Microsoft Dynamics 365 Community: Posts | LinkedIn

In this latest #MissionImplementation episode, Microsoft #MVP Andrew Wingate focuses on one of the most critical - and often underestimated - phases of any #ERP project: post go-live stabilization. While many projects are delivered on time and on scope, long-term success often breaks down in the months that follow, when ownership is unclear, adoption stalls, and confidence in the system begins to slip.

Andy walks through practical strategies to help organizations move from go-live into a stable, sustainable business-as-usual state. From defining ownership and structuring hypercare to improving user adoption and maintaining governance, this session reframes #go-live not as the finish line, but as the true starting point for realizing value.

Fixing Email for Guest Users in D365 Business Central

Sun, 26 Apr 2026 20:41:00 +0000

If you manage any Dynamics 365 Business Central clients where users sign in as Entra B2B guests (aka M365 Guest Users) you've probably hit this issue: the built-in email connectors don't work properly for guest users.

The use of guest accounts in BC is becoming more common due to organisations with a multi-tenancy strategy or where companies are looking for very clear separation of data access & governance. The expectation is simply that users email will just work in BC guest or not!

Trying out GitHub Copilot Agent for a Functional Task?

Sun, 19 Apr 2026 14:35:00 +0000

I've been using GitHub for a while https://github.com/andywingate but had never touched its agentic features. Working on the Nubimancy project gave me a good excuse. This is a practical breakdown of what I used, what it saved me, and where human judgement still mattered.

Full context is in the Nubimancy project log - this post is about the tools and the approach.

The Task

Validate ~75 CSV schema files against Business Central master data import requirements. Check field names, required fields, data types, and format compatibility. Important, methodical, time-consuming if done manually. There are a number of extensions in the mix also on top of the standard BC tables. I gave it to a GitHub Copilot agent. Here's exactly what I did.

AI context is king - BC MCP for MCS Agents - London D365PPUG - Feb 2026

Wed, 18 Feb 2026 19:31:00 +0000

What if your AI tool understood your business data, would you get a better output from it? In short yes - context is king when dealing with AI.

AI Context is King - D365PPUG London, February 2026

I had a great evening presenting at D365PPUG London last night - thanks to the organisers for having me, brilliant crowd as always.

The session was about Business Central's built-in MCP (Model Context Protocol) server, and why I think it's one of the more exciting developments in the BC ecosystem right now.

The core problem: generic AI doesn't know your business. Ask it about your customers, your open orders, your stock levels - it can't help. MCP fixes that. It's the standard that lets AI tools connect to external systems, and Microsoft have built an MCP server directly into Business Central. No custom development, no third-party tooling - it's there today.

The demo gods were mostly kind 😅 and the audience questions were fantastic - lots of interest in security, licensing, and whether you can build custom MCP tools (yes, you can - that's a whole other session).

Here is a copy of the slides shared.

Brautag / Brew Day 2025/26 (Non-BC Holiday Post)

Tue, 30 Dec 2025 23:09:00 +0000

Non-BC Holiday Post...

This Christmas saw my families biannual trip to Bavaria to visit the German side of the family. One of the highlights of these visits is spending a day at the Schlicki Bauernhof in a small rural Dorf in the Bavarian countryside, where my brother-in-law Schlicki and his friends host their traditional winter Brautag.

This year I was glad to join Schlicki, Michi, Zwergi, and Harri for the brewing day. Here is a rough summary of the events of the day.

Ask AI about Dynamics Licensing

Sun, 14 Dec 2025 09:53:00 +0000

What's New in Dynamics 365 Licensing: December 2025 Update

A comprehensive guide to the latest changes in Microsoft's Dynamics 365 Licensing Guide, with special focus on Business Central

Microsoft has released the December 2025 update to the Dynamics 365 Licensing Guide, and it brings some significant changes—particularly for Business Central users.

I've asked AI to do a detailed comparison with the July 2025 version to identify what's changed, and the results are quite interesting. Let's dive in.

BC Community 2025 Wrapped - Blogs, Videos, etc

Sun, 07 Dec 2025 17:25:00 +0000

The Power of AI-Assisted Data Analysis

How good is AI at helping with data analysis?

Last year, I explored this question by analysing blog activity in our BC RSS WhatsApp Community -check out that post here.

Delivering BC in the Age of AI - Which Soft Skills Still Matter?

Fri, 21 Nov 2025 08:12:00 +0000

Some do matter more that others now with AI tools levelling the playing field - but what is the right balance for you (or your team?)

.. Just dropping this placeholder here for now...

Session Slides Link: Delivering BC in the Age of AI - Which Soft Skills Still Matter - Phil and Andy

South Coast Summit 2025 - AI-Driven Page Scripting: Practical Use Cases for Dynamics 365

Sat, 18 Oct 2025 21:12:00 +0000

At South Coast Summit 2025, JosÃ© Miguel Azevedo and I had the opportunity to share something we've been working on since our last Page Scripting talk at Dynamics Minds. Using AI to transform how we work with page scripting in Dynamics 365 ERP.

The Core Idea

Page scripting and task recording have been around for a while in Business Central and Finance & Operations respectively. They're powerful tools for capturing business processes, automating testing, and documenting workflows. But creating and maintaining these scripts? That's always been the tedious part or cost prohibitive part if you really wanted to scale the volume of test scripts.

Looking for a BC MVP?

Tue, 09 Sep 2025 15:55:00 +0000

Did you ever wonder where all the BC MVP are? wonder no more when you check out this very cool Power BI map created/curated by AJ Ansari - AJ Ansari | LinkedIn

Here it is: https://bit.ly/d365bcmvp

DynamicsMinds 2025 - PortoroÅ¾, Slovenia

Sun, 31 Aug 2025 17:52:00 +0000

Back in May I presented two collaborative talks at Dynamics Minds;

The 4 Pillars Of BC To PP Integration - together with Phil Kermeen
Page Scripting Tool for Acceptance Testing - together with Jose Miguel Azevedo

Andy and Phil

Andy and Jose

Both talks were on the last day - one in the 1st slot and one in the last slot of the day/conference! But someone has to do it :)

DynamicsMinds is a standout event in the tech communityâ€™s calendar. Nothing short of extraordinary. A combination of a phenomenal organising team, a breath taking Adriaticâ€‘sea setting, and an exceptional breadth of content spanning the full MS Business Applications stack from Powerâ€¯Apps, Businessâ€¯Central, Finance & Operations, and beyond.

Held in PortoroÅ¾, Slovenia, in a fairy-taleâ€‘like convention centre overlooking the Adriatic Sea, DynamicsMinds 2025 brought over 1,000 attendees, more than 200 sessions, close to 200 speakers, and 80+ MVPs into one vibrant, communityâ€‘powered gathering.

Beyond the sessions, the charm of Dynamics Minds lies in its atmosphere of warm hospitality and the openness of fellow participants giving a unique sense of camaraderie.

Here is a short summary of my talks

The 4 Pillars Of BC To PP Integration - together with Phil Kermeen

In this session we had a high level look through a number of integration techniques, starting with a simple lo-code approach and ranging up through Virtual Tables, BC Data Sync and onto Calling the API in code, giving you the reasoning behind why you'd want to use the various techniques.

What I learned

This was the 3rd and final time giving this introductory level 101 session; as we were on the last day attendance was a bit thin on the ground - non-the less some good post talk chat was had!

Page Scripting Tool for Acceptance Testing - - together with Jose Miguel Azevedo

In this session we showed how the page scripting tool in the Business Central web client lets users record interactions with the user interface (UI), such as opening pages, selecting actions and filling in fields. We went on to look at how can then replay the recording to show the exact actions in the UI and as the recording is replayed, how you receive real-time status feedback for success or failure.

What I learned

This was also on the last day, in the last session of the day! But none the less some great chat at the end of the talk that gave us the idea to use AI to create the page script YAML files - which we planned to present at the next conference.

Downloads

You can grab a copy of these presentations here.

Letâ€™s setup the Sales Order Agent in Business Central - Experts Live UK User Group

Sat, 03 May 2025 11:12:00 +0000

This week I presented at Experts Live, big thanks to the team for having me along to this event.

The session was mostly focused on a demo of the Sales Order Agent - which went as well as you can expect any live demo! But we did have fun with it!

Letâ€™s setup the Sales Order Agent in Business Central

In this session we have a look at the new Copilot powered Sales Order Agent thatâ€™s part of the Dynamics 365 Business Central feature set for 2025 release wave 1.

As part of the session I will show the steps to setup the agent and we can try some live processing of orders through the agent! What could possibly go wrong?? ðŸ˜…

At the end of the session you will know how to setup the agent and have a better understanding of the capabilities of this new tool.

What I learned

As always more prep time is better than less prep time! Demos can and do often go wrong - unless you do the screen shot demo you are never safe from the Demo Gods! Keep Calm and Carry On is the mantra ðŸ˜…

Session Survey

What is your current role?

How well do you know these D365 tools?

Business Central + Power Pages = TRUE - ColorCloud 2025

Sat, 03 May 2025 10:23:00 +0000

What an amazing conference ColorCloud was https://colorcloud.rocks/

I was thrilled to present a join session with Ulrikke AkerbÃ¦k https://www.linkedin.com/in/ulrikke/

Here is a copy of the slides for download PDF or PPTX format.

With the introduction of Virtual Tables in Dataverse and the support for them in Power Pages, came a new opportunity to connect with an let an external audience interact with Business Central through Power Pages.

Andy and Ulrikke set out to learn together with you what these two products can be used for. We will simply follow explorative logic, asking each other questions on the fly and answering them as they go.

Getting Started with Page Scripting - Days of Knowledge UK - 2025

Tue, 15 Apr 2025 20:01:00 +0000

I was very pleased to speak at the Days of Knowledge UK conference in recently. Here is a copy of the session details and slides for download.

Getting Started with Page Scripting - Andrew Wingate's Speaker Profile @ Sessionize

Page Scripting is a powerful recent feature in Dynamics 365 Business Central. It has the potential to enhance productivity for consultants and end users for data entry, testing and some automation capabilities.

Master Data Management Dynamics 365 Business Central - Just a few Setup Fields only

Sun, 23 Mar 2025 13:34:00 +0000

If you are managing multiple companies in a single BC environment you can use master data management (MDM) to sync your, as the name suggests, master data like Customers and Vendors.

Not every organisation needs to do that, but it's still worth remembering you can use the MDM feature to sync any table or field that's not posted data.

In the example below I show a simple setup to use MDM to sync key fields from the General Ledger Setup table - to manage the Allowed Posting Dates centrally.

Notifications for Approvals Made Easy

Sat, 01 Mar 2025 15:56:00 +0000

Here is a video to show the step-by-step process to check and modify the notifications that are sent at different stages of an native BC approval workflow. Inspired by listening to Steve Endowâ€™s latest podcast, his team are trying out both Power Automate Approvals and Native Approvals to meet various client requirements.

Step-by-Step: Setting Up General Journal Batch Approval in Business Central

Approvals are a critical part of any financial process, and Business Central provides a robust General Journal Batch Approval workflow right out of the box. However, a common request from users is to notify the requestor once their batch has been approvedâ€”so Iâ€™ve added that as well!

Mastering Dynamics 365 BC Security - License Security Groups

Sun, 16 Feb 2025 18:36:00 +0000

This short video is the 2nd in this Mastering Security for BC mini-series. Here I'm looking at the use of Entra Security Groups to manage license assignment. Not something restricted D365 BC licenses, but important to understand none the less!

Assigning Licenses in Business Central Using Security Groups

Managing user licenses efficiently is crucial for maintaining a streamlined Business Central environment.

In this short video I look at how to use security groups for license assignment, ensuring a controlled and scalable approach to user access management.

Mastering Dynamics 365 BC Security - Admin Center

Sat, 08 Feb 2025 11:48:00 +0000

This short video covers two important security settings in the Business Central Admin Center. Learn how to configure these settings to enhance security and protect your system!

Essential Security Settings in the Business Central Admin Center

Securing a Business Central environment is crucial to protecting company data and ensuring only authorised users have access.

This guide outlines two key security settings in the Business Central Admin Center that help enhance system security.