Access token endpoint versions in Azure AD

You might have noticed that there are two different urls that you can use for retrieving an access token in Azure AD:

• https://login.microsoftonline.com/<tenantid>/oauth2/token
• https://login.microsoftonline.com/<tenantid>/oauth2/v2.0/token

And although most of the time it is better to use the more recent version, I did wanted to know the difference between both. After deciding that in this case google was not my friend I reached out a colleague @KevinDockx  (Definitely check out his Pluralsight training Microsoft Azure for .NET developers - Building secure services and applications )

Evolution of Microsoft identity platform explains how Azure AD developer platform evolved towards the new Microsoft identity platform. In short the /oauth/token endpoint is part of Azure AD for developers and /oauth2/v2.0/token is linked to Microsoft identity platform.

If you need to decide whether to use Microsoft identity platform (v 2.0) or Azure Active Directory (v1.0) endpoints - definitely take a look at Why update to Microsoft platform (v2.0) and check out the limitations section as well.

In short try to use the v2 as much as possible since it provides more features and is more in line with common standards. The v1 endpoints will still exist for quite a while and as far as I know there is no end of life announced (yet) but Microsoft did already announce the deprecation of the Azure Active Directory Authentication Library (ADAL) - see Migrate applications to Microsoft Authentication Library (MSAL). Everything evolves quite fast and there even is a newer alternative for MSAL called Microsoft Identity Web 

You might also take a look at OpenID Connect (OIDC) which is an authentication protocol built on OAuth 2.0 since Microsoft Identity platform is compliant with this standard as well - see Microsoft identity platform and OpenID Connect protocol for more details

References:

• OAuth with Azure - the just make it work edition
• Microsoft identity platform and the OAuth 2.0 client credentials flow
• Get auth tokens - get access without a user (client credential flow)  walkthrough with examples for Microsoft Graph API
• Azure AD Endpoint v1 vs v2 - notes - older article so not sure if everything is still up to date but still contains some valuable links

Improve your quality assurance using the Power Platform webinar

On November 3th, the Realdolmen Power Platform team organizes a free webinar on how you can leverage Power Apps, Power Automate and Power  BI to support quality assurance processes.

Improve your quality assurance using the Power Platform webinar registration link (November 4th  - 14:00-15:15 CET) .

Session description: With low-code platforms being a trendy topic of 2020, chances are that this isn’t your first invite for a webinar on this topic. But how about a real use-case in action? Let us show you a practical approach on how to combine the ease of use of the Power Platform with common Quality Assurance tasks. We take you through the process of digitizing a paper process for quality assurance, automating manual tasks to optimize efficiency and displaying interactive overviews for audit purpose.

Understanding Dynamics 365 Power BI Template Apps vs Power BI Content Packs

Content packs were used in the past to package and share Power BI objects like datasets, reports and dashboards.  Microsoft initially also used content packs to build their own Dynamics 365 solution templates, these solution templates were made available on Microsoft AppSource. 

But in 2019, Microsoft introduced the concept of Power BI template apps (See Announcing Power BI template apps general availability) - this also meant that all previous content packs/solution templates became deprecated and some of them got replaced by the template app experience.  

Microsoft indeed converted some of the Dynamics 365 content packs into modern Power BI apps and published the updated Power BI apps for Dynamics 365 platform to the Microsoft AppSource.  Some of these Power BI apps are tied to a specific Microsoft first party app like Sales Analytics for Dynamics 365 Sales, others can be used by multiple first party apps like Process Analytics for Dynamics 365.

Microsoft partners  also build their own Power BI apps for the Dynamics 365 platform and published these to  Microsoft AppSource e.g. Microsoft Customer Engagement - Sales Analytics from FuturIT 

It is  important to understand that you can not modify the Power BI Template Apps easily - the pbix files which drive these Power BI Apps are not downloadable so you can not change the standard reports delivered with these Power BI Apps. Users can however change some parameters in the web view - see Let users personalize visuals in a report - this is however on a per user basis. I however was looking for a way to modify the reports in a similar way which was possible with the content packs.

The workarounds that my colleague @bennidejagere suggested for exporting the underlying model using the XMLA endpoint in Power BI is a little bit out of my comfort zone and does not allow me to get at the report files so I looked at little further.

However the existing solution templates from Microsoft were moved to open source end 2018 (See Power BI solution templates moving to open source) and added to the BusinessPlatformApps github repo. Microsoft however stopped maintaining the original reports but you can still find the original Power BI reports which were part of these packs. 

Important: The Power BI template apps for Dynamics 365 Sales and the Process Analytics for Dynamics 365 are also available for download from the Microsoft site on Customize Power BI template apps for Dynamics 365

References:

• Microsoft Power BI: Introducing Power BI template apps - BRK2043 (Youtube)
• Create a template app in Power BI
• Install and distribute template apps 
• Connect to the services you use with Power BI
• Insights made easy with Power BI Template apps

Dynamics 365 and Power Platform monthly reading list September 2020

Technical topics (Configuration, customization and extensibility)

• Improve FetchXML request performance using the LateMaterialize option
• Introducing action analytics in Power Automate
• Receive a weekly summary email of new Dynamics 365 opportunities by @D365Goddess
• Gartner Magic Quadrant names Microsoft Power Apps a leader for low code application platforms
• Exploring the Common Data Service (current environment) Connector by @MagnetismXrm
• How to get rid of More information required screen after spinning up a new trial - by default new trial instances have MFA enabled by default - follow this post from @inogic to change this behavior
• For a select Microsoft Teams message - new trigger in Power Automate by @TomaszPoszytek
• Load data from SQL on-premise to CDS (Common Data Service) using Power Platform dataflows by @nishantranaCRM
• Append and merge to combine data from multiple data sources in Power Platform dataflows
• Mailbox alerts hide/show behavior in Dynamics 365 (CRM)
• Insights on building robust process orchestrations using Power Automate, Logic Apps and Azure Functions
• 2020 Release Wave 2 - Let's look at CDM and data integration highlights
• How to do sales forecast projection in Dynamics 365 CRM using Trend charts and Flow snapshots
• Configure display activities in UCI with the card form
• Power Apps and Automate Architecture series
• Timeline control enhancements in Dynamics 365 - 2020 release wave 2
• Dynamics 365 task completion reminder using Flow bot in Microsoft Teams Power Automate by @D365Goddess

Topics for Dynamics 365  Business Application Platform consultants, project managers and power users

• Dynamics 365: this new feature could help bring an end to another big business headache  - Dynamics 365 is getting a true omnichannel system, thanks to a voice channel built on Azure Communication Services
• Innovation on the service suite of Dynamics 365 applications
• Digital selling and customer engagement with Dynamics 365 Sales updates
• Announcing new innovations in the Microsoft Customer Data Platform

Quick fix: SQL Server Management Studio 18.0 not installing

 My installation of SQL Server Management Studio 18.0 last week always got stuck on the initial "Loading packages. Please wait..." screen. The solution which worked for me was deleting the registry key underneath "HKLM\SOFTWARE\WOW6432Node\Microsoft\Microsoft SQL Server Management Studio" as outlined in Installing SSMS 18 won't go past loading packages phase.

Project Oakdale - the product formerly known as DataFlex

Project Oakdale (at that point Dataflex) was first announced by @clamanna at Microsoft Inspire as a low-code data platform built-into Microsoft Teams and it immediately drew a lot of attention in the community. The idea behind it - as articulated quite aptly by @Jukkan in his post Dataflex is more (and less) than CDS - is to deliver an application platform for the masses. But to be honest, Microsoft only lifted the tip of the veil at that point in time. 

Fast forward, to Microsoft Ignite only two weeks ago with  a number of big announcements with regards to Project Oakdale:

• Now in Preview: customize Teams with built-in Power Platform Capabilities - Project Oakdale went in public preview with the ability for everyone to try it out.

• Public preview of Power Virtual Agents within Microsoft Teams -  the ability to build bots using Power Virtual Agents with the bot creation experience embedded within Teams itself. The most exciting part of this announcement is  that PVA for Teams is included with your existing Teams licenses. If you are new to PVA, check out the PVA webinars and video gallery

• Azure API Management connector on the Power Platform - interesting note here "Citizen developers can use these API Management backed connectors in Power Apps hosted in Teams through the existing Teams licensing" ... Watch the session Build Power Apps within Microsoft Teams and get to the next level with Azure APIs and the Power Platform for more details

References:

• Build custom apps to drive productivity in the remote work world with PowerApps and Teams  session at Microsoft Ignite about Project Oakdale - must watch and great intro
• Why should I consider using Project Oakdale in Teams (Youtube)
• Power Apps and Microsoft Teams (Microsoft documentation)
• Announcing Microsoft Power Platform and Dynamics 365 updates at Microsoft Ignite
• Microsoft Teams as platform
• Overview of Project Oakdale (Microsoft docs)
• How are Project Oakdale and Common Data Service different? (Microsoft docs)
• How Power Platform now empowers all Teams users
• Build and customize your first Teams App with Power Apps - Full training (Youtube 00:43:04) 

Old articles (Released in July after initial announcement on July 21th):

• Introducing Project Oakdale, a low code data platform for Microsoft Teams
•  A closer look at Data Platform Capabilities in Project Oakdale
• Microsoft Dataflex questions and answers
• What is Microsoft Dataflex
• Dataflex is more (and less) than CDS
• Dataflex for Teams: limitations and opportunities
• Four things to know and five things to do following the big Microsoft Dataflex + teams announcement