I’ve received a lot of requests for a good guide on how to modify the ISV.config file in CRM 4.0. Although there are quite a few postings on this in the CRM web realm, I wanted to give readers an easier guide to follow along with and fully understand the ISV.Config for CRM 4.0
To work with the ISV Config, you have to understand a few things:
- What does it do?
- How do you customize it?
- How do you turn it on?
- How to people see it?
Lets look at the first item of, what does it do? Its a bit of a loaded question, because the ISV config can change a lot of stuff inside of CRM. Most importantly, it adds buttons to the toolbars of CRM. You could add a button to the Main Application toolbar.. also known as the “Menubar” like so: 
In addition to the MenuBar, you could also change any Grid toolbar for a CRM entity like the below: 
With the ISV Config, you have the ability to also modify those pesky names like Sales, Service, and Marketing on the left hand navigation of every single CRM form, and you don’t have to do it with JavaScript (which is unsupported anyway). You could have a nice looking form like the following:
Lastly, you can add buttons to a specific CRM entity form that provides additional functionality to the form that you wouldn’t be able to do without it like the following:
So that’s all great, but how do you customize the ISV.config to perform all those functions? Well you have to write a little bit of XML code is all. To begin customizing your ISV.config you have to get it off the server first, and then you can start working through the examples. The following will be a step by step guide to extract, download, save, customize, import, and implement the ISV.config into Microsoft CRM 4.0
- Open CRM (easy enough)
- Navigate to Settings, Customization
- Click “Export Customizations”
- Scroll down and single click (highlight) ISV Config
![image]( "image")
- Press the “Export Selected Customizations” button
![image]( "image")
- Press OK to the pop-up that follows:
![image]( "image")
- Press the Save button (this is important if you ever want to keep and original copy)
![image]( "image")
- Save it to a place you will remember (I prefer my desktop)
- Open the Zip you just downloaded
- Press the “Extract all Files” option and press next until its extracted to a location of your choosing
- Open the folder you saved the file to, you should only see “customizations.xml” in this directory
- Right click on this file and choose “Edit..”
![image]( "image")
- You should see code that looks pretty similar to the following:
- You could now spend a few hours editing this file to match exactly what you wanted, but you have to understand that this is a full sample of examples that Microsoft has provided to you to work with. The biggest problem with this sample code, is that it doesn’t really give you a great baseline to start with. So I will provide you with the sample from the four examples I have above, this way you will have a better understand of what I did to provide the code, and a better jumping off point on how to begin coding your own ISV config. This code is listed below:
- Now that we have a working ISV config, we need to import it into CRM. To do this Open CRM
- Navigate to Settings > Customization
- Choose “Import Customizations”
- Press “Browse”
- Choose your Customizations.xml file that you have customized, press OK
- Press “Upload”
*SIDE NOTE*If you get an error right now, that says the following:
![image]( "image")
You screwed up the format of the XML file. And if you think “Oh, my code is perfect, I checked everything” check it again because its not validating properly. I can’t tell you how many times I get this error, no one is perfect and it happens to the best of us; but check it again, fix it and press Upload until it doesn’t error anymore
- Press Import Selected Customizations
![image]( "image")
- Press Ok to the really annoying pop-up box
![image]( "image")
- You should now see the following, if so, press OK
![image]( "image")
- Now that you’ve imported everything, you’re still not done yet. Now you have to allow everyone to see your customizations (you thought you were done, that’s funny). Open CRM
- Navigate to Settings > Administration
- Click “Security Roles”
- *Important* For every security role (that isn’t System Administrator) you need to follow steps 28 thru 31
- Open the Security Role in question
- Select the Customization Tab
![image]( "image")
- Click “ISV Extensions” until it turns green like so
![image]( "image")
- Save and Close the Security Role
- Still not done yet, Now you have to “Turn On” your ISV configurations
- Navigate to Settings > Administration
- Click “System Settings”
- Navigate to the Customization tab
- In the “Custom Menus and Toolbars” section click the little … button
![image]( "image")
- Make yours look like this:
![image]( "image")
- Press OK
- Now you’re done! To get everything to show up, press F5 or just close and re-open CRM
<ImportExportXml version="4.0.0.0" languagecode="1033" generatedBy="OnPremise">
<Entities>
</Entities>
<Roles>
</Roles>
<Workflows>
</Workflows>
<IsvConfig>
<configuration version="3.0.0000.0">
<Root>
<!-- This section describes how to customize the area labels in left-pane in forms
<NavBarAreas>
<NavBarArea Id="Sales">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Customized Sales Label" />
<Title LCID="1031" Text="Deush Sales Label" />
</Titles>
</NavBarArea>
<NavBarArea Id="Service">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Customized Service Label" />
</Titles>
</NavBarArea>
</NavBarAreas>
-->
<!-- The main Global Menu Bar located at the top of all root level areas -->
<MenuBar>
<!-- Custom Menus that appear between the Goto Menu and the Help Menu -->
<CustomMenus>
<Menu>
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="ISV" />
</Titles>
<MenuItem Url="http://www.microsoft.com">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="New Window" />
</Titles>
</MenuItem>
<MenuSpacer />
<!-- A horizontal drop down menu spacer -->
<SubMenu>
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="ISV Tests" />
</Titles>
<MenuItem Url="http://www.microsoft.com" WinMode="2">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Modeless Dialog" />
</Titles>
</MenuItem>
<MenuSpacer />
<MenuItem Url="http://www.microsoft.com" WinMode="1">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Modal Dialog" />
</Titles>
</MenuItem>
<MenuSpacer />
<MenuItem JavaScript="alert('test');">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Custom JavaScript" />
</Titles>
</MenuItem>
</SubMenu>
</Menu>
</CustomMenus>
</MenuBar>
<!--
Application Level Tool Bar
-->
<ToolBar>
<Button Icon="/_imgs/ico_18_debug.gif" JavaScript="alert('test');">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Test" />
</Titles>
<ToolTips>
<ToolTip LCID="1033" Text="Info on Test" />
</ToolTips>
</Button>
<ToolBarSpacer />
<!-- A vertical toolbar spacer -->
<Button Icon="/_imgs/ico_18_debug.gif" JavaScript="alert('test');" Client="Web">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Web Only" />
</Titles>
<ToolTips>
<ToolTip LCID="1033" Text="Web client only. This will not show up in any outlook pages." />
</ToolTips>
</Button>
<Button Icon="/_imgs/ico_18_debug.gif" JavaScript="alert('test');" Client="Outlook" AvailableOffline="true">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Outlook Only" />
</Titles>
<ToolTips>
<ToolTip LCID="1033" Text="Outlook Only - This is available offline also." />
</ToolTips>
</Button>
<Button Icon="/_imgs/ico_18_debug.gif" JavaScript="alert('test');" Client="Web, Outlook" AvailableOffline="true">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Both" />
</Titles>
<ToolTips>
<ToolTip LCID="1033" Text="Both Clients - This is available for both Web and Outlook Clients" />
</ToolTips>
</Button>
</ToolBar>
</Root>
<!-- Microsoft Customer Relationship Management Entities (Objects) -->
<Entities>
<Entity name="account">
<MenuBar>
<!-- Custom Menus that you may add -->
<CustomMenus>
<Menu>
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="ISV.NEW" />
</Titles>
<MenuItem Url="http://www.microsoft.com" PassParams="0" WinMode="1">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Coming Soon..." />
</Titles>
</MenuItem>
<MenuSpacer />
<SubMenu>
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Sub Test" />
</Titles>
<MenuItem Url="http://www.microsoft.com" PassParams="1">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Test Sub 1" />
</Titles>
</MenuItem>
<MenuSpacer />
<MenuItem>
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Test Sub 2" />
</Titles>
</MenuItem>
</SubMenu>
<MenuSpacer />
<MenuItem Url="http://www.microsoft.com" PassParams="0">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Coming Soon..." />
</Titles>
</MenuItem>
<MenuItem Client="Web">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Web Only" />
</Titles>
</MenuItem>
<MenuItem Client="Outlook" AvailableOffline="true">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Outlook Only" />
</Titles>
</MenuItem>
<MenuSpacer />
<MenuItem ValidForCreate="0">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Valid For Update Only" />
</Titles>
</MenuItem>
<MenuItem ValidForUpdate="0">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Valid For Create Only" />
</Titles>
</MenuItem>
</Menu>
</CustomMenus>
</MenuBar>
<!-- The Account Tool Bar -->
<ToolBar ValidForCreate="0" ValidForUpdate="1">
<Button Icon="/_imgs/ico_18_debug.gif" Url="http://www.microsoft.com" PassParams="1" WinParams="" WinMode="0">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="asdf" />
</Titles>
<ToolTips>
<ToolTip LCID="1033" Text="Info on Test" />
</ToolTips>
</Button>
<ToolBarSpacer />
<Button Icon="/_imgs/ico_18_debug.gif" Url="http://www.microsoft.com" PassParams="1" WinParams="" WinMode="1">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Test" />
</Titles>
<ToolTips>
<ToolTip LCID="1033" Text="Info on Test" />
</ToolTips>
</Button>
<Button Icon="/_imgs/ico_18_debug.gif" JavaScript="alert('test');" Client="Web">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Web Only" />
</Titles>
<ToolTips>
<ToolTip LCID="1033" Text="Web client only. This will not show up in any outlook pages." />
</ToolTips>
</Button>
<Button Icon="/_imgs/ico_18_debug.gif" JavaScript="alert('test');" Client="Outlook" AvailableOffline="true">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Outlook Only" />
</Titles>
<ToolTips>
<ToolTip LCID="1033" Text="Outlook Only - This is available offline also." />
</ToolTips>
</Button>
</ToolBar>
<!-- The Account Left Nav Bar -->
<NavBar>
<!--
Valid Areas Include
===================
Sales
Marketing
Service
Info
-->
<NavBarItem Icon="/_imgs/ico_18_debug.gif" Url="http://www.microsoft.com" Id="navItem">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="ISV Default" />
</Titles>
</NavBarItem>
<NavBarItem Icon="/_imgs/ico_18_debug.gif" Url="http://www.microsoft.com" Id="navItemWeb" Client="Web">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="ISV Web Only" />
</Titles>
</NavBarItem>
<NavBarItem Icon="/_imgs/ico_18_debug.gif" Url="http://www.microsoft.com" Id="navItemOutlook" Client="Outlook" AvailableOffline="true">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="ISV Outlook Only" />
</Titles>
</NavBarItem>
<NavBarItem Icon="/_imgs/ico_18_debug.gif" Url="http://www.microsoft.com" Id="navSalesItem" Area="Sales">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="ISV Sales" />
</Titles>
</NavBarItem>
<NavBarItem Icon="/_imgs/ico_18_debug.gif" Url="http://www.microsoft.com" Id="navInfoItem" Area="Info">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="ISV Info" />
</Titles>
</NavBarItem>
<NavBarItem Icon="/_imgs/ico_18_debug.gif" Url="http://www.microsoft.com" Id="navMarketingItem" Area="Marketing">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="ISV Marketing" />
</Titles>
</NavBarItem>
<NavBarItem Icon="/_imgs/ico_18_debug.gif" Url="http://www.microsoft.com" Id="navServiceItem" Area="Service">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="ISV Service" />
</Titles>
</NavBarItem>
</NavBar>
<Grid>
<MenuBar>
<ActionsMenu>
<MenuItem Url="http://www.microsoft.com" WinMode="1">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Coming Soon..." />
</Titles>
</MenuItem>
<MenuSpacer />
<SubMenu>
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Sub Test" />
</Titles>
<MenuItem Url="http://www.microsoft.com">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Test Sub 1" />
</Titles>
</MenuItem>
<MenuSpacer />
<MenuItem>
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Test Sub 2" />
</Titles>
</MenuItem>
<MenuItem Client="Web">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Web Only" />
</Titles>
</MenuItem>
<MenuItem Client="Outlook" AvailableOffline="true">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Outlook Only" />
</Titles>
</MenuItem>
</SubMenu>
<MenuItem Client="Web">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Web Only" />
</Titles>
</MenuItem>
<MenuItem Client="Outlook" AvailableOffline="true">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Outlook Only" />
</Titles>
</MenuItem>
</ActionsMenu>
<Buttons>
<Button Icon="/_imgs/ico_18_debug.gif" Url="http://www.microsoft.com" WinParams="" WinMode="2">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Test" />
</Titles>
<ToolTips>
<ToolTip LCID="1033" Text="Info on Test" />
</ToolTips>
</Button>
<ToolBarSpacer />
<Button Icon="/_imgs/ico_18_debug.gif" Url="http://www.microsoft.com" WinParams="" WinMode="1">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Test" />
</Titles>
<ToolTips>
<ToolTip LCID="1033" Text="Info on Test" />
</ToolTips>
</Button>
<Button Icon="/_imgs/ico_18_debug.gif" JavaScript="alert('test');" Client="Web">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Web Only" />
</Titles>
<ToolTips>
<ToolTip LCID="1033" Text="Web client only. This will not show up in any outlook pages." />
</ToolTips>
</Button>
<Button Icon="/_imgs/ico_18_debug.gif" JavaScript="alert('test');" Client="Outlook" AvailableOffline="true">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Outlook Only" />
</Titles>
<ToolTips>
<ToolTip LCID="1033" Text="Outlook Only - This is available offline also." />
</ToolTips>
</Button>
</Buttons>
</MenuBar>
</Grid>
</Entity>
<Entity name="contact" />
<Entity name="lead" />
<Entity name="opportunity" />
<Entity name="list" />
<Entity name="campaign" />
<Entity name="campaignactivity" />
<Entity name="campaignresponse" />
<Entity name="incident" />
<!-- Case -->
<Entity name="quote" />
<Entity name="salesorder" />
<!-- Order -->
<Entity name="invoice" />
<!-- Custom Entities -->
<!-- <Entity name="new_myentity"/> -->
<!-- End Custom Entities -->
</Entities>
<!-- Microsoft Customer Relationship Management Service Management Customization -->
<ServiceManagement>
<AppointmentBook>
<SmoothScrollLimit>2000</SmoothScrollLimit>
<TimeBlocks>
<!-- All CSS Class mapping for Service activities -->
<TimeBlock EntityType="4214" StatusCode="1" CssClass="ganttBlockServiceActivityStatus1" />
<TimeBlock EntityType="4214" StatusCode="2" CssClass="ganttBlockServiceActivityStatus2" />
<TimeBlock EntityType="4214" StatusCode="3" CssClass="ganttBlockServiceActivityStatus3" />
<TimeBlock EntityType="4214" StatusCode="4" CssClass="ganttBlockServiceActivityStatus4" />
<TimeBlock EntityType="4214" StatusCode="6" CssClass="ganttBlockServiceActivityStatus6" />
<TimeBlock EntityType="4214" StatusCode="7" CssClass="ganttBlockServiceActivityStatus7" />
<TimeBlock EntityType="4214" StatusCode="8" CssClass="ganttBlockServiceActivityStatus8" />
<TimeBlock EntityType="4214" StatusCode="9" CssClass="ganttBlockServiceActivityStatus9" />
<TimeBlock EntityType="4214" StatusCode="10" CssClass="ganttBlockServiceActivityStatus10" />
<!-- All CSS Class mapping for Appointments -->
<TimeBlock EntityType="4201" StatusCode="1" CssClass="ganttBlockAppointmentStatus1" />
<TimeBlock EntityType="4201" StatusCode="2" CssClass="ganttBlockAppointmentStatus2" />
<TimeBlock EntityType="4201" StatusCode="3" CssClass="ganttBlockAppointmentStatus3" />
<TimeBlock EntityType="4201" StatusCode="4" CssClass="ganttBlockAppointmentStatus4" />
<TimeBlock EntityType="4201" StatusCode="5" CssClass="ganttBlockAppointmentStatus5" />
<TimeBlock EntityType="4201" StatusCode="6" CssClass="ganttBlockAppointmentStatus6" />
</TimeBlocks>
</AppointmentBook>
</ServiceManagement>
</configuration>
</IsvConfig>
<EntityMaps />
<EntityRelationships />
<Languages>
<Language>1033</Language>
</Languages>
</ImportExportXml>
<ImportExportXml version="4.0.0.0" languagecode="1033" generatedBy="OnPremise">
<Entities>
</Entities>
<Roles>
</Roles>
<Workflows>
</Workflows>
<IsvConfig>
<configuration version="3.0.0000.0">
<Root>
<NavBarAreas>
<NavBarArea Id="Sales">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Grants" />
</Titles>
</NavBarArea>
</NavBarAreas>
<MenuBar>
<CustomMenus>
<Menu>
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="RSS" />
</Titles>
<MenuItem JavaScript="var sFolder = '{#subfolder#}';
 if (top.stage.crmGrid == null)
 {
 window.showModalDialog('/' + ORG_UNIQUE_NAME + '/isv/' + sFolder + '/rss.aspx','','dialogHeight:150px;dialogWidth:400px;status:no;resizable:yes');
 }
 else
 {
 var sViewId = top.stage.crmGrid.GetParameter('viewid');
 var sViewType = top.stage.crmGrid.GetParameter('viewtype');
 var sOtc = top.stage.crmGrid.GetParameter('otc');
 var sUrl;
 if(sOtc == '4200' || sOtc == '9100' || sOtc == '4406' || sOtc == '4703' || sOtc == '4700' || sOtc == '4410' || sOtc == '2029' || sOtc == '127')
 {
 window.showModalDialog('/' + ORG_UNIQUE_NAME + '/isv/' + sFolder + '/rss.aspx','','dialogHeight:150px;dialogWidth:400px;status:no;resizable:yes');
 }
 else
 {
 switch(sViewType)
 {
 case '1039':
 sUrl = '/' + ORG_UNIQUE_NAME + '/isv/' + sFolder + '/rssdata.aspx?q='+sViewId;
 break;
 case '4230':
 sUrl = '/' + ORG_UNIQUE_NAME + '/isv/' + sFolder + '/rssdata.aspx?u='+sViewId;
 break;
 }
 window.open(sUrl);
 }
 }">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Subscribe to Current View" />
</Titles>
</MenuItem>
<MenuItem JavaScript="var sFolder='{#subfolder#}'; window.showModalDialog('/' + ORG_UNIQUE_NAME + '/isv/' + sFolder + '/rss.aspx','','dialogHeight:150px;dialogWidth:400px;status:no;resizable:yes');">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Choose Subscription..." />
</Titles>
</MenuItem>
</Menu>
</CustomMenus>
</MenuBar>
</Root>
<Entities>
<Entity name="account">
<ToolBar ValidForCreate="0" ValidForUpdate="1">
<Button JavaScript="recalculate();" Client="Web, Outlook" AvailableOffline="true">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Recalculate" />
</Titles>
<ToolTips>
<ToolTip LCID="1033" Text="Recalculate the Form" />
</ToolTips>
</Button>
</ToolBar>
<Grid>
<MenuBar>
<ActionsMenu>
<MenuItem Url="http://www.microsoft.com" WinMode="1">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Coming Soon..." />
</Titles>
</MenuItem>
<MenuSpacer />
<SubMenu>
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Sub Test" />
</Titles>
<MenuItem Url="http://www.microsoft.com">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Test Sub 1" />
</Titles>
</MenuItem>
<MenuSpacer />
<MenuItem>
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Test Sub 2" />
</Titles>
</MenuItem>
<MenuItem Client="Web">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Web Only" />
</Titles>
</MenuItem>
<MenuItem Client="Outlook" AvailableOffline="true">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Outlook Only" />
</Titles>
</MenuItem>
</SubMenu>
<MenuItem Client="Web">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Web Only" />
</Titles>
</MenuItem>
<MenuItem Client="Outlook" AvailableOffline="true">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Outlook Only" />
</Titles>
</MenuItem>
</ActionsMenu>
<Buttons>
<Button Icon="/_imgs/ico_18_debug.gif" Url="http://www.microsoft.com" WinParams="" WinMode="2">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Test" />
</Titles>
<ToolTips>
<ToolTip LCID="1033" Text="Info on Test" />
</ToolTips>
</Button>
<ToolBarSpacer />
<Button Icon="/_imgs/ico_18_debug.gif" Url="http://www.microsoft.com" WinParams="" WinMode="1">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Test" />
</Titles>
<ToolTips>
<ToolTip LCID="1033" Text="Info on Test" />
</ToolTips>
</Button>
<Button Icon="/_imgs/ico_18_debug.gif" JavaScript="alert('test');" Client="Web">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Web Only" />
</Titles>
<ToolTips>
<ToolTip LCID="1033" Text="Web client only. This will not show up in any outlook pages." />
</ToolTips>
</Button>
<Button Icon="/_imgs/ico_18_debug.gif" JavaScript="alert('test');" Client="Outlook" AvailableOffline="true">
<Titles>
<Title LCID="1033" Text="Outlook Only" />
</Titles>
<ToolTips>
<ToolTip LCID="1033" Text="Outlook Only - This is available offline also." />
</ToolTips>
</Button>
</Buttons>
</MenuBar>
</Grid>
</Entity>
</Entities>
<ServiceManagement />
</configuration>
</IsvConfig>
<EntityMaps />
<EntityRelationships />
<Languages>
<Language>1033</Language>
</Languages>
</ImportExportXml>
Simple right? This is probably one of the hardest to understand portions of CRM 4.0 (and for that matter it gets even harder in CRM 2011). The biggest thing to remember is, ISV Config controls buttons and toolbars, and it has to be “turned on” after you’ve configured everything. I think I’ll do a Sitemap.xml guide after this, if this helped you or if you have anything to add, don’t forget to leave a comment.
