Cannot associate records via subgrid without create privileges

Question

The documentation for the Dynamics security model (msdn.microsoft.com/.../gg334673.aspx & msdn.microsoft.com/.../gg328567.aspx) states that in order to relate two records together a user needs Append To and Read privileges on the parent Entity and Append and Read permission on the child Entity.

In practice it seems like a Dynamics CRM 2013 subgrid will not let a user relate records unless they also have at least user level Create privileges on the child Entity. Using the Dynamics SDK to relate two records together works as expected, however when in the Dynamics UI, clicking on the '+' button to begin in a subgrid to relate two records together does nothing unless the user has Create privileges.

Curiously I've also noticed that while clicking on the '+' button does nothing, if I refresh the page afterwards I always get one of those "Dynamics has encountered an error" popups, perhaps this is a bug with Dynamics?

At any rate this is a pretty breaking problem for us as we have plenty of “reference data” Entities in an N:N relationship that users should be able to relate existing records with, but not create new records.

Is anyone else aware of this problem? Is there some kind of workaround or setting that I'm missing?

(Link to issue on Dynamics CRM forums: https://community.dynamics.com/crm/f/117/t/119729.aspx)

Dave Dave · Accepted Answer · 2014-01-23T22:13:25

When you click on the "+" on the sub-grid your sub-grid may create a new record or may give you an option to associate a record, depending on how your child entity is configured. For completeness, I'll detail how to either get the option to associate or to create a new record.

To Give an Option to Associate

On the child (e.g. Contact) The look-up to the parent record (e.g Account) cannot be required. If the look-up is required CRM will automatically create a new form (Contact in this example) and pop it into a new tab/window. If this is your issue and you need the look-up to the parent to be required, you may want to make the look-up to the parent non-required and then require the field using on-load javascript.

To Create New Record & Pop into new Tab / Window

Require the look-up to the parent on the child account, or;
Hide the "Add Existing" button on the child record using your ribbon editor of choice

Cannot associate records via subgrid without create privileges

3 Answers