Workflow in GP 11
With GP 11 set to release just around the corner, we’ve dedicated a number of blog posts to telling you about the new features that will be coming up in GP 11. Today’s post will discuss some of the new features that will be in the new release of Workflow for Dynamics GP.
Probably the single biggest change to Workflow for Dynamics GP will be the technology that Workflow sits on. With Workflow for Dynamics GP 10, users were able to install Workflow for free, provided that they had the high-end version of SharePoint, Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 Enterprise. Although some organizations either had a need for this or already had it implemented, for the smaller organizations that could really take advantage of Workflow in GP, it presented a huge obstacle.
With GP 11, Workflow no longer needs to reside on the high-end version of SharePoint. Instead, it can now be installed on Windows SharePoint Services (WSS), the free version of SharePoint that you can download and install as long as you are running Windows Server 2003 or newer. This clears the way for a number of organizations who want to utilize Workflow, but do not have a need or budget to go with a full Microsoft Office SharePoint Server implementation.
Along with the change to the foundation of Workflow for Microsoft Dynamics GP, Microsoft will be introducing a number of new workflows for GP 11. Among them are a Customer Approval workflow, a Vendor Approval workflow, and workflows for the addition or removal of employees from the Dynamics GP system. The new version will also include functionality for what is called a “step workflow”, in which the user to whom the task is assigned must complete a number of steps for the workflow to move on, rather than having approval workflows only.
Some good changes coming for Workflow in GP 11. The addition of Windows SharePoint Services functionality and some new workflows are going to make this product well worth the upgrade.