Dynamics CRM Online 2011 vs Dynamics CRM Online 2013 [API Changes]

Question

I am doing some research on building integrations for Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online. The integration I am building will be for Dynamics CRM Online 2013, but I am curious if the 2013 version shares an API with the 2011 version.

Does anyone know if an integration built for Dynamics CRM Online 2013 will be backwards compatible with Dynamics CRM Online 2011?

Any insight here would be appreciated.

Also, if anyone has good resources for working with these API's using Ruby that would be awesome...

Thanks!

Answer 1

I wrote some integration for CRM 2011 Online (C# and PHP/SOAP) and I can happily say both still work.

Any integration written with CRM4 in mind would need some modifications I believe (this may just be changing the endpoints) but 2011 and 2013 seem to work ok together.

If you are wanting to connect using a non .Net language be careful as it can be significantly more painful then creating a wrapper for the web service then talking to that from Ruby.

To connect with a non .Net language you need to use SOAP. I have put some posts here (PHP code but it should be easy enough to convert) http://crmtroubleshoot.blogspot.com.au/2013/07/dynamics-crm-2011-php-and-soap-using.html

I currently don't have it working with Active Directory authentication though!

Answer 2

Everything that I've read about the API changes from 2011 to 2013 has boiled down to the removal of the CRM 4 aspx endpoint. Besides that, most of the changes to CRM are front end.

Answer 3

I read somewhere that a solution made in 2013 can't be exported in 2011. So I don't think will be retro-compatible. Chapter- Introduction to solutions

here it is from the SDK:

Version compatibility

Solutions exported from an older version can be imported into newer versions. Solutions exported from newer versions cannot be imported into older versions. This includes major and minor version differences. Solutions exported from a Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 environment or a Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online organization prior to the Fall '13 Service Update can be imported into organizations using the initial release of Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2013 and Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online Fall '13 Service Update. However as updates are applied and include new features or metadata definitions, these new features or definitions cannot be included in a solution that is installed on an organization that is not current with the definition that the solution was exported from.