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D365 F&O — Development Environment Basics
Dynamics 365 (D365) can be a beast — at least, it has been for me. I was unexpectedly put in charge of maintaining and developing our small D365 code base, with almost no training and little guidance. Trying to learn on the fly has been tough, especially since a lot of the documentation out there is either overwhelming or just hard to digest.
Recently, I got the chance to talk to two full-time D365 developers. The conversation was incredibly eye-opening. Below are my biggest takeaways — things I wish I’d known when I started.
Preparing a Development VM
Building a new development environment can be a slow, tedious process. For us, it takes about 2–3 days end-to-end. Here are a few tips that have helped us avoid mistakes and keep things moving:
💾 Don’t Forget the Backup (Trust Me)
After importing your database — but before syncing models or building anything — make a SQL backup.
I learned this the hard way. Rebuilding our custom indexes takes 35+ hours, and one small mistake during VM prep caused us to lose our custom tables. Having a backup right after the index rebuild would’ve saved us days of recovery time.
📂 Create a “Scripts” Folder for New Dev VMs
