This walkthrough shows how to publish and consume a Microsoft Dynamics NAV page as a web service and how you can extend the Basic Page Operations.

About This Walkthrough

This walkthrough illustrates the following tasks:

  • Registering and publishing a page as a web service.
  • Creating an extension codeunit.
  • Connecting the extension codeunit to the published page.
  • Verifying the service's availability.
  • Calling the web service from a console application that you create in Visual Studio.

Prerequisites

To complete this walkthrough, you need:

  • Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2013 R2 with a developer license.
  • CRONUS International Ltd. demonstration database.
  • Visual Studio 2012 or Visual Studio 2010. You can use any edition of Visual Studio that supports adding web references. In this walkthrough, you will use Visual Studio 2012. You also have the option of using service references instead of web references, or of using the web service proxy generating tools svcutil.exe and wsdl.exe, which are included in the Microsoft .NET Framework SDK.

Publishing a Page as a Web Service

You publish a web service using the RoleTailored client.

To register and publish a page as a web service

  1. Open the RoleTailored client, and then connect to the CRONUS International Ltd. demonstration database.

  2. In the Search box, enter Web Services, and then press Return.

  3. In the Web Services page, choose New.

  4. In the Object Type column, select Page, then enter 21 in the Object ID column and then enter PageWithCapitalization in the Service Name column.

  5. Choose to select the field in the Published column.

  6. Choose OK to close the New - Web Services page.

    Do not close the RoleTailored client or navigate away from the Web Services page.

Creating an Extension Codeunit

After you publish the page, you create a codeunit that extends its functionality. Follow the steps in this procedure to create a codeunit called CapitalizeName, which takes a customer name as input and outputs the same customer name capitalized. The codeunit must take the record type of the page as the first parameter.

To create an extension codeunit

  1. Open the Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2013 R2 development environment, and then connect to the CRONUS International Ltd. demonstration database.

  2. On the Tools menu, choose Object Designer.

  3. In Object Designer, choose Codeunit, and then choose New.

  4. On the View menu, choose C/AL Globals.

  5. In the C/AL Globals window, choose the Functions tab, and then enter CapitalizeName in the name column.

  6. In the C/AL Globals window, choose the Locals button.

  7. On the Parameters tab, enter Cust in the Name field, and then select Record in the DataType field.

  8. In the SubType field, choose the arrow to open the Table list window and select Customer.

  9. Choose OK to close the Table list window.

  10. Close the C/AL Locals window, and then close the C/AL Globals window.

  11. In the CapitalizeName method, insert the following lines of code:

     Copy Code
    Cust.Name := UPPERCASE(Cust.Name); 
Cust.MODIFY(TRUE);

  12. Close the C/AL Editor.

  13. When prompted, enter 50012 in the ID text box, enter CapitalizeName in the Name text box then select the Compile check box and then choose OK.

Connecting the Codeunit to the Exposed Page

After the codeunit is created and saved, register it under the published page so that the codeunit extends the published page. The codeunit itself should not be marked as Published.

To connect the codeunit to the exposed page

  1. Navigate to the RoleTailored client again, and on the Web Services page, choose New.

  2. In the Object Type field, select Codeunit, and then select object ID 50012. In the Service Name field, enter PageWithCapitalization, which is the same name that you gave the page web service.

  3. Clear the Published check box.

  4. Choose OK to close the New - Web Services page.

Verifying Web Services Availability

Note
When exposing a web service, you must open the port for other consumers of your web service to access it. You can have your system administrator add the port through Windows Firewall on the computer running Microsoft Dynamics NAV Server. The default port for SOAP web services is 7047. Use the Microsoft Dynamics NAV Server Administration Tool to configure the port for the Microsoft Dynamics NAV Server instance; the option is on the SOAP Web Services tab.

To verify availability of the web service

  1. Start Windows Internet Explorer.

  2. In the Address field, enter the following address where the keys are replaced with the values that are specified in the CustomSettings.config file: http://<Server>:<WebServicePort>/<ServerInstance>/WS/<CompanyName>/services.

    For example:

    http://localhost:7047/DynamicsNAV/WS/CRONUS%20International%20Ltd./services

    Note
    The company name is case-sensitive.

    The page should list the page web service that you have published: Page/PageWithCapitalization.

  3. Close the browser.

Calling the Web Services

Now you can create an application that uses both the page and the codeunit web services. When you add a reference in Visual Studio, methods from both the page and the extension codeunit are available.

To call the web services

  1. In Visual Studio, on the File menu, select New, and then choose Project.

  2. Under Installed Templates, expand the Visual C# node, select Windows, and then, select Console Application.

  3. Enter the name UsingExtensionCodeunit for the application.

    Note
    The sample code in this walkthrough expects this exact application name, so do not change it.

  4. Choose OK to close the New Project page.

  5. In Solution Explorer, right-click the References node in the project, and then choose Add Service Reference.

  6. In the Add Service Reference dialog box, choose the Advanced button, choose the Add Web Reference button, in the URL text box, type or paste the URL that you used when checking the WSDL, such as http://localhost:7047/DynamicsNAV/WS/Services, and then choose Go.

  7. When the services are displayed, select the Page service (Page/PageWithCapitalization. Then choose View Service.

    Note the first service listed: CapitalizeName. This is the codeunit you have created to enhance the basic functionality available with a page web service.

  8. In the Web reference name text box, rename localhost to WebService, and then choose Add Reference.

  9. If the program.cs file is not already open, choose the Program.cs tab, to open the code editor and replace the existing code with the following code:

    C# Copy Code
    using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Text;
namespace UsingExtensionCodeunit
{
    using WebService;
    class Program
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            // Creates instance of service and set credentials.
            PageWithCapitalization_Service service = new PageWithCapitalization_Service();
            service.UseDefaultCredentials = true;
            
            // Creates instance of customer. 
            PageWithCapitalization cust = new PageWithCapitalization();
            cust.Name = "Louis Taylor";
            
            // Inserts customer using the default operation.
            service.Create(ref cust);
            Console.WriteLine(cust.Name);
            // Calls extension codeunit to capitalize customer name.
            service.CapitalizeName(cust.Key);
                    
            // Refreshes customer.
            cust = service.Read(cust.No);        
            Console.WriteLine(cust.Name);
            Console.ReadLine();
            service.Delete(cust.Key);
        }
    }
}

  10. On the Build menu, select Build Solution to build your project and then, from the Debug menu, choose Start Debugging to run the application in debug mode. You should now see a console window that creates a new customer using a default page operation and then capitalizes the customer name using the extension codeunit.

See Also