CRM 2011 Whats the difference between using 'Customize the System' and 'Solutions'?

Question

I make all of my dev changes through an unmanaged solution in our dev system and then import them into our live system as a managed solution.

The issue I have with this is that when I deactivate views in our dev system these changes are not represented in our live system after importing the solution.

Obviously I cannot deactivate views directly in our live managed solution but what would happen if I deactivated them using the 'Customize the System' option?

Is it just a case of that if I make a change within 'Customizations' these would be overwritten when I Import any changes from dev in the future?

Answer 1

As you have noticed, deactivation of views is not a part of a solution (views are stored as SavedQueries in customizations.xml and have no attribute to specify their active/inactive state). Instead, only active views are exported as part of a solution.

You are thus right: You will be able to deactivate the views in your target system. If you later import a solution not containing these views, they will still be deactivated in the target system.