All New Dynamics CRM 2011 Stencils, Cutting Development Time in Half

Paul Nieuwelaar, 17 November 2010

Over the next couple of weeks I will be creating a set of Dynamics CRM 2011 stencils to be used inside of Microsoft Expression Blend 4 Sketchflow, so that you can design your customizations with the stencils before actually performing the customizations inside of CRM.

Microsoft Expression Blend 4

This means that if you are designing a form for a customer, and need them to check and approve the form constantly, you will not need to keep performing the customizations in CRM each time something needs changing, you can just make the changes easily in Expression Blend 4 until the customer is happy, then you can finally perform the customizations on CRM, saving you hours of development time.

If you are familiar with Magnetism’s 2007 Visio Stencil Set, then you will know how valuable Dynamics CRM stencils can be. However unlike the Visio stencils, the Blend Sketchflow stencils will not only have the look and feel of Dynamics CRM 2011, but it will have the sketchy black and white look that comes with Expression Blend 4 Sketchflow, so that it looks as if you have drawn the whole thing with paper and pencil.

 
Expression Blend 4 Design View

Once you have made your customizations and are ready to show your customer, you can package your project so that they can preview the form and fill in the fields as if it was the real thing. This way your customers can get an exact feel of what the entity should look like, so you won’t need to keep going back and making changes to the form.

Expression Blend 4 Preview Mode

The Expression Blend 4 Sketchflow Stencils will include a blank entity form, where you can add fields to the form such as text fields, lookups, picklists, radio buttons, checkboxes, and even money fields. They will also include premade forms for all the main entities, so if you only need to make a few small customizations on the Account form, you won’t need to redesign the whole form in Blend.

As I start building these stencils I will be posting my progress on my blog, so stay tuned for some sneak previews of the stencils over the next few weeks. The stencils are expected to be available on our website from December 1^st 2010, but if you are interested then contact us today, or leave a comment on this post, and I’ll make sure you’re the first to know when they become available.