Integration design review workshop overview

  • 15 minutes

Integration design review is a workshop that can be conducted remotely, typically in a single session for 90 to 120 minutes.

Integration strategy

Integration strategy considers the design of communication and connectivity between the various components of the solution. This strategy includes the application interfaces, the middleware, and the processes that are required to manage the operation of the integrations. This topic will focus on answering questions, such as:

  • Are plans for integrations with other Dynamics 365 applications in place? If so, are they aligned with standard Microsoft integration patterns, such as dual-write?
  • Who is responsible for delivering the integration scope?
  • Where and how is message-format transformation being handled?
  • Would the same message-format transformation approach apply to existing and new systems?
  • Has the integration architecture been defined? If so, does it reflect the planned solution landscape?

Integration patterns

Integration patterns consider the patterns that are used for inbound and outbound communication and the interface models that are used for each. This assessment includes standard interface choices, including real time (synchronous), batch data API (asynchronous), and business events (event-based) interfaces. It also covers standard integration options, including dual-write and bring-your-own-database integration. This topic will focus on answering questions, such as:

  • Have you defined and mapped integration patterns for all scenarios? If so, do they fall under standard patterns?
  • Is authentication done through a registered Microsoft Entra ID application (SPN) or normal user account?
  • Do you have real-time integrations with external systems that could result in UI thread blocking?
  • Is real-time integration used for high volumes? If so, can you share the peak hourly volumes for top integrations?
  • Does the customer have high-volume integration scenarios that they plan to use dual-write for?
  • When the endpoint goes down, how are retries handled?

Middleware

Middleware considers the aspects of middleware usage within the integration landscape and how it will be used for transformation, communication, error handling, retries, and monitoring and alerting. However, the workshop is not intended for discussing or validating the internal design of the middleware of choice. This topic focuses on answering questions, such as:

  • Are you planning to use middleware for integrations? If so, what's the middleware scope for this project?
  • How are you planning to mitigate errors and provide logging?
  • Is transformation done in the middleware level? If so, to what extent?
  • Are you planning to use Azure services for integration? If so, have you planned to host the Azure services in the same data center as your Dynamics 365 environments?
  • Are you using Microsoft Power Platform connectors for your integrations, or do you plan on using custom connectors?
  • Do integrations with on-premises or line-of-business applications exist?

Business critical integration scenarios

Business critical integration scenarios cover all integrations that are critical to continuous operation of the solution. This topic focuses on answering questions, such as:

  • What happens when integrated systems are offline?
  • Are built-in retry mechanisms and user notifications in place?
  • Can integrations automatically recover from failures and network connectivity issues, or is human intervention required to recover the integrations?

Monitoring and alerting

The monitoring and alerting process covers the design within your overall solution architecture. This topic focuses on answering questions, such as:

  • What is the overall approach to monitoring and alerting for integrations?
  • Are you planning to use tools for monitoring and alerting? Are you familiar with the analytics that are available in Microsoft Power Platform admin center?
  • What is your approach to error handling?

Microsoft 365

Microsoft 365 covers integrations with other Microsoft products and cloud services. This topic focuses on answering questions, such as:

  • Are you integrating with SharePoint on-premises? If so, how are you planning to complete this task?
  • Are you planning to integrate with Exchange on-premises for server-side sync? Have you considered the requirements and limitations for this integration versus integration with Exchange Online?
  • Are you planning integration with Microsoft Teams? Are you aware of the capabilities, limitations, and additional considerations?
  • Are you planning a collaboration structure before enabling the collaboration between Dynamics 365 and Teams?