Microsoft Dynamics CRM Outlook Client synchronization rules

When you are working with Microsoft Dynamics CRM and CRM Outlook Client you need to remember the following rules regarding Editing, deleting and assigning contacts:

Editing

• When  editing contact in outlook it will immediately update the CRM contact
• When editing contact in the CRM it will update the outlook contact in the next time the CRM and outlook sync or you can press the "Sync with CRM" button then it will sync immediately

Deleting

• When you delete an Outlook contact than has been tracked in CRM will not delete the contact from the CRM and it wont sync back to the Outlook Client
• When you delete a contact you own in the CRM that was previously synced to Outlook, will not delete the contact from the Outlook

Assign

• When you assign a contact that was created in the CRM and sync to Outlook will remove the contact from the Outlook
• When you assign a contact that was created in Outlook and tracked into the CRM will keep the contact in Outlook. note that all changes to the contact in Outlook will update the contact record in CRM and visa versa.

Fredy Opaets
Soft-Pro
Fredy@soft-pro.co.il

Setting that must be changed at your Home CRM Outlook Client

This few step will allow you to work with the CRM Outlook Client Out of office.

There are several Settings that must be checked and changed before you install the CRM Outlook Client. 

Follow the next Steps:

1) In the Address of CRM server DON'T Write http://crm as it is in your office, Instead write the FULL path to the CRM for Example : http://crm.ABC.co.il

2) Place the the URL : http://crm.ABC.co.il that we have just spoke about to "Trusted Sites" in the Computer you'r installing the CRM Outlook Client. in order to do so follow the next steps :

A) Open Internet Explorer

B) Go to Tools Choose Internet Options

C) Go to Security Tab, Choose Trasted Sites and then Press the SITES Button

D) Place the Address *.ABC.co.il to the Websites list, and uncheck the check button

E) Press the Custom Level Button to get into the Advanced Policy of Trasted Sites Scroll till the end of the list mark the "Automatic logon with the current user name and password" then press OK. if you get an alert that wants you to confirm the change, Press YES to confirm it.

F) Press OK to Confirm the changes that were made and to close the window.

G) On the Internet Explorer go to the server with your address : http://CRM.ABC.co.il

H) In the authentication popup window your name : DOMAIN\USER

and the Password you use in your office. Check the Save password checkbox then Prees OK

I) Now you can close the CRM window, your password is saved in the system

J) If you have Installed The CRM Outlook Client Before you have made those changes remove the CRM Outlook Client and reinstall it.

Now The CRM Outlook Client Suppose to Work Just Fine.

Improving the Outlook Client User Experience

Sometimes a Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0 Laptop Client for Outlook (hereafter referred to as the CRM Outlook Laptop Client) user can experience a hang or bad performance when using the tracking functionality. In this case just setting 'Regarding' field information for an email to be tracked in CRM or viewing regarding information for an email that is tracked in CRM causes the Server to not respond. If you've run into this problem read on.

What is the Cassini Hoster Process? 
The Cassini Hoster process is a substitute for IIS on the CRM Outlook Laptop Client that handles all the Web page processing on the client.

Why does this happen? To keep the ASP.Net running, which improves performance, the Cassini Hoster Process sends heartbeat pings based on the time set in registry key CassiniPollingPeriod.

The ApplicationHost.CreateApplicationHost is used to create an application domain to host ASP.Net. Every time the Cassin Polling period (milliseconds) expires we re-issue a heartbeat ping to the homepage.aspx to keep the ASP.NET running. This heartbeat ping is issued using the BeginGetResponse asynchronously. The problem is, we do not call “EndGetResponse” for the response got from the Server in the Response callback function. This causes, Cassini Server thread to just be held up in a wait state waiting for the client to invoke “EndGetResponse”.

As time passes, the heartbeat pings are accumulated and can depending on the machine configuration and settings exhaust all the worker threads. The server uses up all the threads and reaches a state where it no longer has any more threads to process genuine client requests coming from the CRM Outlook Laptop client. The user can then experience a hang or maybe reduced performance.

Okay, how do I fix this? 
The hunt to identify the locking up of threads waiting on client’s invocation of “EndGetResponse” was the most difficult part of figuring this out. Once this was identified, the fix was very simple. This is where KB 938574 comes into picture and this hotfix resolves the problem by calling the EndGetResponse in the Response callback function.

You can download the fix to resolve the Cassini hang issue from the link below:
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;938547

Thank and enjoy.