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Dimensions

Dimensions

Owned by jonathan.pritchard
Last updated: Dec 07, 2022

Introduction

Dimensions help you categorize, track, and analyze information. This document will show you how to view and assign dimensions. Dimensions are attributes and values that categorize entries and make them easier to track and analyze. Dimensions can indicate information such as the project or department an entry came from.

You can find more info from Microsoft about dimensions here:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/dynamics365/business-central/finance-dimensions

WORKING WITH DIMENSIONS

Analyzing by Dimensions

The Dimensions functionality plays an important role in business intelligence, such as when defining analysis views

Setting Up Dimensions

You can define the dimensions and dimension values to categorize journals and documents, such as sales orders and purchase orders. You set up dimensions in the Dimensions window, where you create one line for each dimension, such as Project, Department, Area, and Salesperson.

You also set up values for dimensions. For example, values might be departments in your company. Dimension values can be set up in a hierarchical structure similar to the chart of accounts, so that data can be broken down into various levels of granularity, and subsets of dimension values can be totaled. You can define as many dimensions and dimension values as you need, and everyone in your company can use them.

You can also set up some global and shortcut dimensions:

  • Global dimensions are used as filters, for example, on reports and batch jobs. You can use only two global dimensions, so choose dimensions you will use often. Global dimensions will be the same across all of the companies that you set up in NAV. You will want to choose two categories that you will wish to report on across all companies.

  • Shortcut dimensions are available as fields on journal and document lines. You can create up to six of these.

Setting Up Default Dimensions for Customers, Vendors, and Other accounts

You can assign a default dimension for a specific account. The dimension will be copied to the journal or document when you enter the account number on a line, but you can delete or change the code on the line if appropriate. You can also make a dimension required for posting an entry with a specific type of account.

Translating the Names of Dimensions

When you create a dimension, and especially a shortcut dimension, what you're actually creating is a custom field or column heading. If your business is international, you can provide translations for the name of the dimension. Documents that include the dimension will use the translated name, where applicable.

Example of Dimension Setup

Let's say that your company wants to track transactions based on the default properties provided in your 365 Cannabis system. To do that, you can look at the dimensions in the Dimensions window:

  • DEPARTMENT

  • PRODUCT

  • STORE

To view the values associated with a specific dimension, highlight the dimension you want to view and select Dimension > Dimension Values.

NOTE: To set up a hierarchy, the codes must be in alphabetical order. This includes the codes of the dimension values that are provided in Dynamics NAV.

 

 

Using Dimensions

In a document such as a sales order, you can add dimension information for both an individual document line and the document itself. For example, in the Sales Order window, you can enter dimension values for the first two shortcut dimensions on the individual sales lines, and you can add more dimension information if you choose the Dimensions button.

 

If you work in a journal instead, you can add dimension information to an entry in the same way, if you have set up shortcut dimensions as fields directly on journal lines.

You can set up default dimensions for accounts or account types, so that dimensions and dimension values are filled in automatically.

 

Once Dimensions and their Dimension Values are created (these can be added, changed, and blocked at any time later), the next step is to assign them. Dimensions and Dimension Values are assigned to master data in order to facilitate data entry. For example, if a user assigns Dimension Value “Medium” to a Customer, this is going to save time whenever this Customer is used on a transaction since this eliminates the necessity of assigning this Dimension Value on every occasion.

 

How to Assign Dimensions to Master Data

This section explains how a user can assign Dimensions to master data. Any user who has the right Permissions can do this. I would like to start with the assumption that the related Dimensions and Dimension Values have already been set up (article “How to Create Dimensions and Dimension Values” explains how to do this).

 

The next thing we should do is to locate the Customer List which can be done clicking on Customers in the top navigation menu of the screen or by clicking on the search icon and typing customers in the search field.

 

It is possible to assign Dimension Values either to one particular Customer or to a group of Customers at a time.

In order to assign Dimensions and Dimension Values, select the desired customer in the list and click on the Customer > Dimensions-Single.

This will open the Default Dimensions page. Select the desired Dimension/s and the related Dimension Value/s on this page:

 

What does the “Value Posting” field do? The best way to explain what this field does in general is to explore it on one particular example. Let’s say you would like to assign Dimensions and Dimension Values to Customer 10000 (see Figure 1 above) and you have already assigned the Dimensions and Dimension Values as shown in Figure 2 above – let’s look into this setup:

Default dimensions, at any level, use the same value posting rules. They are listed as follows.

Blank – There is no posting restriction. The default dimension for this account or account type can be posted with any dimension value or with no dimension value.

Code Mandatory – The default dimension for this account or account type must have a dimension value when you are posting, but any dimension value is acceptable.

Same Code – The default dimension for this account or account type must always have the same dimension value code as that selected in the Dimension Value Code field.

No Code – Dimension value codes must not be used with this account or account type.

So far, the way of assigning Dimensions and Dimension Values to one Customer at a time has been discussed. In order to assign Dimensions and Dimension Values to multiple Customers at the same time, it is necessary to highlight multiple Customers. You can do so by clicking on the … button and then click on the Select More option.

Next, select the customers that you want to select from the list. If you would like to select them all, click on the box at the top of the list.

Once all the required Customers are selected, Select Customer > Dimensions-Multiple choice from the dropdown menu:

 

When the “Default Dimensions” page opens, follow the same steps as the steps required for assigning Dimensions and Dimension Values to one Customer at a time.

This section has briefly discussed how to assign Dimensions to Customers. This method is applicable to other master data records (Vendors and Items).