Business rules were first introduced in Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2013. Since then, Microsoft has made many enhancements in business rules. The following are some of the key changes that have been brought in:
- In Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2013, we could only write business rules on entity forms. We could not apply them on the server side. This was changed in Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2015, wherein we could write the scope of the business rule as an entity. This implies that the rule will be triggered during all the operations related to the entity.
- When business rules were first introduced, we could only write if statements. There was no provision to write rules concerning Else If and Else. This was rectified in Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2015.
- There were some issues in writing business rules and JavaScript events on the same entity field. This issue was also rectified in Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2015.
- With Microsoft Dynamics 365, Microsoft has introduced a more user-friendly interface to the business rule designer. It makes it more easy for people to write the business rules.
- A new Recommendation action was also introduced in Microsoft Dynamics 365.
Note that, as Microsoft Dynamics 365 has introduced a new UI designer for business rules, all the following scenarios will showcase the business rules in the new UI designer. However, it's very similar to the designer that is present in Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2016.