Set up data models
Activity Flow

In the Data modeling studio, a data model defines the data to be exported, how to export the data, where to export the data to, and when to export the data.

For each data model, define these settings:

• Identification: The identification of the data model.
• Model: How the data is exported and how the target database is configured.
• Destination: The schema that is used to create the table in the target database on deploy.
• Metadata: Which metadata is included added to the target database on deploy.
• Scheduling: How the data export is scheduled for the data model.
• Update information: The contact info of the data model owner.
• Connection: The connection to the target database.

You can enable a data model export to be scheduled by export group. To export by export group, for each data set or data entity, as added to the data model, define the applicable export group.
On export, the data sets and data entities with the same export group defined, are combined in one batch job.
If you schedule export by export group, for one data model, you can schedule export for several data subsets in a different recurrence.

Export groups are defined by data model. To be able to use export group, create the export groups for the data model.

In the Data modeling studio, a data model defines the data to be exported. For each data model, you define the applicable:

• Data sets: You can add the data sets as defined in the Data modeling studio. An added data set gets the mode 'Unmanaged'.
• Data entities: You can add standard or custom data entities as available for D365 FO. An added data entity gets the mode 'Managed'.

You can use a template to easily add data sets and data entities to a data model.

You can use templates that are created from the:

• Data models page. Before you apply a template that is created from the Data models page, make sure that the data sets and data entities, as saved in the template, already exist in your D365 FO environment.
• Data sets page. If a data set in the template:
  • Does not exist, the data set is created with the settings and fields as defined in the template. Also, the data set is added to the data model.
  • Already exists and the template has (several) other fields than the data set, these fields are added to the existing data set. The existing data set fields that are not in the template are not removed from the data set. So, you can only use a template to add fields to a data set and not to remove fields from a data set.

If you add a data set to a data model, by default all data set fields are included in the data export. For a data model, you can select a subset of the data set fields to be included in the data export.

Note: If a data set is used in a data model, you can still add fields to the data set. These newly added data set fields are not added automatically to the selected fields for the data model. So, if fields are added to a data set, and these must be included in the data export, manually select these fields for the data model.

In Data modeling studio, several metadata tables exist, which are used:

• On deploy.
• On deploy or export.
• In data modeling.

For the Data modeling studio metadata tables, the data is collected in D365 FO and stored in these metadata tables in D365 FO.
On deploy or export, for some of these metadata tables, the data is taken from these metadata tables in D365 FO. For other metadata tables, the data is used in data modeling.

It is important to keep the data in the metadata tables up-to-date. Make sure to update the metadata tables after each creation or change of a data model.