How to Create a New Role Center in Dynamics AX 2009

How to Create a New Role Center in Dynamics AX 2009

One of the most talked about features of AX 2009 is Role Centers… I thought Microsoft did a
phenomenal job by packaging SharePoint and AX in one box… which resulted in really cool
technology.
As complex as they might seem role centers are actually very simple to use.. and its actually even
simpler to create new one..
This is a step by step guide to help users/developers to create and deploy new role centers..
In this example we are going to create a Merchandiser Role Center

Step 1:
Log in as an Admin and open up EP in internet explorer..

Well you actually don\’t need to be an admin.. but you need site creation rights in SharePoint and also access
to the AOT in AX.

Then click on ‘Site Actions’ and select the ‘Create’ option

Step 2: select Basic Page..

Note: you might be better of select ‘Web Part Page’.. as a basic page would not have any web parts
on it… all the standard role center pages are Web part pages… I will show you both examples in
this article .. hence I started with the basic page. (see the Additional info section below)
Also I like the basic page because it loads up a lot faster!

 Step 3: in the next page, type in the Name of the Page (please use good Naming Convention
Standard)… also make sure that the Document Library is set to Enterprise Portal

Step 4: as I choose to create a Basic Page a Text editor will pop up. if I would choose the Web
Part pages option then this editor would not appear.

Simply type something and click Save… now you would be directed to the new page.

Step 5: open the AOT in AX and browse down to the Web Menu Item Node .. right click and
select New URL.

Step 6: Give the URL a name and a Label (please follow std naming conventions) and then click
on the brose icon on the URL Property (the browse icon is represented by 3 dots).. as shown in
picture

Then expand the Enterprise Portal folder and find the new Page you created. Select and click OK

Step 7: make sure that you set the Home Page Property to Yes..
If you dont set this to yes, then the page will not be available is the role canter page list on the
User profile form (next step)

Save and close the AOT.

Step 8: in AX browse to Administration > Setup > User profiles
Create a new record, set the Profile name and description and then select the new Page as the role
centre page
Assign users to the role and your done.

Additional Info:
 You can also export the role centre (user Profile > Export and Export AOT).. the export
AOT options make the role centre a part of the AOT resource node.. this is helpful if you
want to migrate the role centre from say a dev environment to a Test Environment.
 To create a Web Part Role centre

Rather than selecting the Basic page option ..select the Web Part page option

Then give a name and select EP as the Document Library
Notice I choose to overwrite the role page .. this way I dint have to change my url to
point to the Web part page.

References: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc558235.aspx

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