Working With Smartlist Options

Hopefully most of you, as Dynamics GP users, are taking advantage of SmartList to create customized inquiries to provide access to information stored in Microsoft Dynamics GP. This includes information about accounts, customers, employees, vendors, items and related transactions. A number of products that integrate with Microsoft Dynamics GP also include SmartList objects that allow you to search data from those applications. SmartList uses sets of predefined search criteria, called favorites which are used to create default searches or views. You can modify and save the views to create a variety of customized views.

SmartList Favorites can be accessed from the Navigation Pane, and you can view, print, or modify them from here. Favorites can also be used as a search method in Lookup windows throughout GP.

Since Smartlist has the potential to be used so heavily, I have found some features that may be beneficial to you…

Here is a little known trick:  The SmartList Options window can be used for changing SmartList Defaults and Go To’s. When a record on a SmartList object is double-clicked, a window associated with that record is opened. This window can be a drill-down inquiry window, a transaction processing window, or a maintenance window, allowing the record to be edited. The default window on all of the standard SmartLists can be changed to better meet your firm’s needs. With the appropriate security in Microsoft Dynamics GP, go to > Tools -> Setup -> System -> SmartList Options, and this opens the SmartList Options window. Select the SmartList object (called a Category here) such as Accounts, Customers, Vendors, et cetera, and then select the Default Go To window from the list of available windows in the pull down list.

While you are in this window, you can also change the maximum number of records to display for each category and mark the fields to be displayed when the default view is selected or the order of those fields! The pane in the middle of the window will display a list of the fields available.  The ones displayed by default are checked.  You can mark more fields to be displayed by default and, using buttons on the right, highlight a field and move it up or down on the display.  This will change the sequence of the fields on the default SmartList!  Keep in mind though that this changes the defaults for all users in that GP company database.