AX has excellent personalization features called IntelliMorph that allow the user to create reports and modify form layouts (hide, move, or add fields to the view of the form).
This information is not held in code, but in usage data. Usage data is the term used to describe the place where user-specific data is stored. This data can be of the following types:
- Form personalization
- IntelliMorph reports (ad hoc user-specific reports created from a form or list page)
- The last used dialogue settings (for example, when you run a report, the options you select in the dialogue are saved and used as defaults)
- Cues you created from list pages (user-specific cues)
- Favorites
- Saved queries used in reports and list pages
This greatly enhances the usability of AX, saving the users' time and allowing users to tailor their user experiences.
There are occasions where the usage data must be cleared, either for specific objects (forms, reports, and so on) or entirely for a user.
Another type of cache that AX uses is the Application User Cache (AUC) file. This is a file that is stored on the local PC that caches the objects loaded from the application object server (AOS or AX Server). This is to improve the performance, as it minimizes network traffic.
The situations that will lead you to clear the usage data or the object cache is normally due to a change in the code, directly or through import. The symptoms that will lead us to decide that it is a caching issue are as follows:
- Symptoms are experienced by a selected number of users, and not all users
- The change made to the code doesn't appear to be working
- A form displays incorrectly after the update for some users, but for other users it is fine
- If a developer attempts to debug the code and cannot reproduce the error
Of course, there are many reasons for errors to occur after an update, some of which are as follows:
- The application wasn't recompiled after a model installation
- The project wasn't recompiled after a project was imported from XPO (although a full compilation is sometimes required for this)
- CIL was not regenerated
- The database wasn't synchronized
Clearing usage data or a user object cache should be done in a specific priority. Removing the users' entire usage data will cause some disruption, depending on the extent to which it is used.
The sequence should be as follows:
- Clear the Application User Cache file
- Delete specific items from users' usage data
- Delete the entire usage data
You will need the local administrator rights on the user's computer or terminal server, and system administrator rights in Dynamics AX.
You should adjust your folder options to:
- Hidden files and folders: Show hidden files, folders, or drives
- Uncheck: Hide extensions for known file types.
The following are the escalating steps to remove the user's cache file that may be causing the reported issue:
- We can clear the Application User Cache file by performing the following steps:
- Log in to the user's computer (or the terminal server).
- Open Windows Explorer and navigate to
%SystemDrive%users. - From the list of folders, open the user's folder.
- Open the
AppDatafolder. - Open
Localand scroll down to the bottom. - Delete the files with the extension
.auc; for instance,ax_{24672906-3FDF-4B97-9E0D-A6B941881847}.auc - Ask the user to log in to AX to check if the problem is solved.
- For deleting specific items from the user's usage data (the process is to locate or select those objects the user is experiencing problems with), perform the following steps:
- Launch the AX client as a system administrator, connected to the AOS in question.
- Navigate to System administration | Common | Users | Users.
- Select the user in question and click on Options in the Set up button group on the action bar or ribbon.
- In the Options form, click on Usage data in the top ribbon at the top of the form.
- Select the relevant tab, and use the AX search and filter tools to locate the data you wish to remove. The list of tabs are given in the following table:
Tab
Description
Ranges
This tab saves filters or searches in forms or reports
Report selections This tab retrieves the last values of report dialogues
Autoreports
This tab retrieves IntelliSense reports the user has created using the report wizard
Jobs
This tab does not retrieve AOT Jobs, but the last values from dialogues for tasks such as posting an invoice
Record templates
This tab retrieves user-specific record templates
Form setup
This tab retrieves the changes the user has made to forms (for example, hidden fields)
Form selections
This tab retrieves the last value information saved about forms
All usage data
This tab retrieves the unfiltered list of all usage data
- Delete the records (elements of the usage data) by pressing Alt + F9.
- For deleting specific items from the user's usage data (the process is to locate or select the objects that the user is experiencing problems with), perform the following steps:
- Launch the AX client as a system administrator, connected to the AOS in question.
- Navigate to System administration | Common | Users | Users.
- Select the user in question and click on Options in the Set up button group on the action bar or ribbon.
- In the Options form, click on Usage data in the top ribbon at the top of the form.
- Click on Delete from the General tab.
As the user opens forms and performs tasks, the client will maintain a cache of the objects in use. AX has a very good method of determining when these cache files become 'dirty', but it can be tricky. In this case, AX will try to load the object from the cache, causing an error to be displayed to the user, or simply to process the cached data.
When the report or form is opened, the system checks the usage data for last values or form personalization. When this data is removed, it loads the report or form with defaults.