Using empty tables NAV 2009 R2

Question

I'm no NAV professional nor got any experience with NAV. Since 1 week I'm working with NAV and I got several questions about it, but I think that those "Microsoft specialized" experts my new employer is working with are just fooling us.

They for example said that it is not possible to autonumber items, and thats its never ever possible to import tables from Excel, thus I managed it with a plugin I got from mibuso.com

NOW they told my boss, that we have to buy new tables because we got nothing left. We are using only 1/3 of the whole NAV and we got many empty tables we dont use and we never will use ever! For example the module fpr "service" or "production".

as you can see there are many Tables empty. Is it possible to use them for other things than they are made for? Like I said i have no idea about NAV but when I think about usual SQL tables, I though that we can of course use them for other purposes (In this case we want to have programmed a storage for old bills)

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

Well... I can't tell that they totally fooling you, I'd suppose there is some misunderstanding between you and "experts".

1. There is a way to automatically assign numbers to such entities like Items, Orders, Invoices etc. If that is what you mean by "items". It is standard functionality and work across whole system. Its called No. Series. For example when you create new Item in Item table it will have next number from corresponding series: I0001, I002, I0003 and so on. If that is what you asking.
2. There are number of ways to integrate Nav with Excel and hell of other systems. But most of them requires development. So if your experts don't have development license - they can't do it.
3. Now... the tables. It is normal situation then you're not using whole system. I think it is practically impossible to use all of Nav granules. But that does not mean that you can use those table for your needs, thats why:
   1. Not all tables can be altered by MS Partners (your experts).
   2. Not all tables can be used by you (limited by granules you bought in your license).
   3. If one changes the definition of a standard table (all that is not "Customer design area", see link below) in most cases it will brake some standard functionality somewhere else in the system, so it needs to be changed as well. It may require a lot of work.
   4. If standard objects are changed you cant safely apply application updates (hotfixes) released by MS to your system.
   5. No guarantee that you will not want to use those standard objects in the way they suppose to in the future.
4. There is a "Customer design area" - objects with ID's in range 50,000 - 99,999. This is where development goes specially for you by your experts. And that is where they are asking you to buy additional tables (forms, reports, etc). It is common practice because in this area object can be modified in any way you desire.

Object Numbering Conventions

Answer 2

With "empty tables" those experts meant: Table numbers that don't have a table assigned yet. They did not mean tables without records.

If you want a custom table you must buy a table number from Microsoft. The experts told "you have nothing left", this probably means you already have bought table numbers. You should check which numbers you bought and wether they have a purpose.

Using a table outside the range you bought for some other purpose is bad practice (like storing Archived Bills in a table called Service Item). One problem you will encounter is that you can not easily upgrade your Nav installation anymore. Besides your license will not allow you to change the name nor the columns of such a table.

I hope this helps.