Setting a DLL to be the default "Log me in to" screen.

1 minute read time.

A customer had the need to use a DLL to bring together and display data as the first screen that the user saw when they logged on into Sage CRM.

Below is a simple screen shot that shows a DLL built using the Sage CRM .NET API as the first screen a user sees when they open Sage CRM.

In this case the DLL is displaying data drawn from another database. But it could be doing anything the business needed.

It is not possible to directly set a DLL as a users default first screen in Sage CRM BUT it is possible to extend the default todo actions to call ASP pages. The article "Extending the DefaultToDo options" that explains how translations can be used to add the option to the 'Log me in to' drop down in the user preference screen.

This trick is accomplished by 2 steps.

  1. Create an ASP page that redirects to the DLL.
  2. Create the translation that adds the ASP option to the interface.

The ASP structure

The ASP page uses the same include files as a normal Sage CRM ASP page but only contains one line of code.


<%
Response.Redirect(CRM.Url(432)+" &dotnetdll=PanoplyList &dotnetfunc=RunContactsList")
%>

In this case the DLL being called is 'PanoplyList' and the method invoked is 'RunContactsList'.

The Translation

Assuming that the ASP page created is called 'RedirectToDLL.asp' then the translation needs to be defined as follows

  • Caption Code: RedirectToDLL.asp
  • Caption Family: DefaultToDo
  • Caption Family Type: Choices
  • US Translation: DLL Redirect

The User Preferences

The user preferences can then be set.