Walkthrough 1: Build a simple agent application

This walkthrough demonstrates how to set up a basic agent application from scratch using Unified Service Desk that can connect to Microsoft Dataverse. This agent application provides you with an empty desktop without any functionality, and you can use it when you go through the rest of the walkthroughs in this section. In this walkthrough, you’ll use the Unified Service Desk configuration to filter out existing controls in the "New Environment" sample application package from appearing in your agent application.

Prerequisites

In This Walkthrough

Step 1: Create the basic hosted controls

Step 2: Add the hosted controls to a configuration

Step 3: Assign users to the configuration

Step 4: Test the application

Conclusion

Step 1: Create the basic hosted controls

Create the following three types of hosted control so that the application can connect to an instance of a model-driven app: Connection Manager, Global Manager, and Panel Type.

  1. Sign in to the Dynamics 365 instance.

  2. Go to Settings > Unified Service Desk.

  3. Click Hosted Controls.

  4. Click New.

  5. On the New Hosted Control page, specify the following values.

    Field Value
    Name Contoso Connection Manager
    Sort Order 1
    USD Component Type Connection Manager

    Connection Manager hosted control.

  6. Click Save.

  7. Click New to create another hosted control.

  8. On the New Hosted Control page, specify the following values.

    Field Value
    Name Contoso Global Manager
    Sort Order 2
    USD Component Type Global Manager

    Global Manager hosted control.

  9. Click Save.

  10. Click New to create another hosted control.

  11. On the New Hosted Control page, specify the following values.

    Field Value
    Name Contoso Main Panel Layout
    USD Component Type Panel Layout
    Panel Type Standard Main Panel
    Application is Dynamic No
    User Can Close Unchecked

    Panel Layout hosted control.

  12. Click Save.

Important

If you don’t create a Panel Layout type of hosted control in your agent application, the default panel layout, Standard Main Panel, is created automatically when you run the client application.

Step 2: Add the hosted controls to a configuration

A configuration in Unified Service Desk helps you filter access to components that are displayed in the agent application to a user. In this step, create a configuration, and then add the hosted controls created earlier to the configuration.

  1. Sign in to the Dynamics 365 instance.

  2. Go to Settings > Unified Service Desk.

  3. Click Configuration.

  4. Click New.

  5. On the New Configuration page, type Contoso Configuration as the name of the configuration, and click Save.

  6. After the new configuration is saved, on the nav bar, click the down arrow next to the configuration name, and then select Hosted Controls.

  7. Click Add Existing Hosted Control, type Contoso in the search bar, and then press ENTER or click the search icon.

  8. The three hosted controls added earlier display in the search results. Click the Look up more Records link.

  9. Select the three hosted controls, click Select, and then click Add.

    Add the hosted controls to the configuration.

  10. The hosted controls are added to the configuration. Click Save.

Step 3: Assign users to the configuration

In this step, assign users to the configuration so that when they sign in using the Unified Service Desk client application, they can only access the three hosted controls that are added to this configuration. For this walkthrough, assign only a single user to the configuration who will be testing the application at the end of the walkthrough.

  1. On the nav bar, click the down arrow next to the Contoso Configuration, and then select Assigned Users.

  2. On the next page, click Add Existing User, type the name of the user in the search bar, and then press ENTER or click the search icon.

  3. From the search result, click the user name that you want to be assigned to the configuration. The user is added to the configuration. In this case, assign Randy Blythe to the configuration. Click Save.

    User added to the configuration.

Step 4: Test the application

Start the Unified Service Desk client application, and sign in to the Dynamics 365 instance where you configured Unified Service Desk using the same user credentials that you assigned to the Contoso Configuration in the previous step. More information: Connect to a model-driven app instance using the Unified Service Desk client.

Your agent application will look like the following.

Basic agent application without any controls.

The desktop in the agent application is empty because no other controls were added to Contoso Configuration apart from the hosted controls required for setting up a basic agent application. In the rest of the walkthroughs, you’ll see controls appear in the agent application as you progressively configure and add controls to Contoso Configuration.

Conclusion

In this walkthrough, you saw how to quickly build a basic agent application that can connect to an instance of Dataverse. You also learned how to filter access to Unified Service Desk controls using configuration.

See also

Walkthrough 2: Display an external webpage in your agent application
Walkthrough 3: Display records in your agent application
Walkthrough 4: Display a Microsoft record in a session in your agent application
Walkthrough 5: Display enhanced session information by displaying session name and overview data
Walkthrough 6: Configure the Debugger hosted control in your agent application
Walkthrough 7: Configure agent scripting in your agent application
Unified Service Desk Configuration Walkthroughs