One of the nice features of Dynamics GP is the ability to place shortcuts to commonly used tools on the user’s dashboard. Access to various windows, reports and even external files can easily be configured and set as an icon in the dashboard. As a GP Systems Administrator I am routinely asked to add shortcuts to various files to a user’s home screen. Unfortunately many end users are unaware of this feature and do not realize they can quickly add these themselves.

Adding a shortcut is quite simple. Once logged into Dynamics GP, right-click anywhere in the white space of the Home pane. This is the pane on the left hand side of the application window as noted below.

Once you right-click select Add. This will display a list of options for the types of shortcuts you can add to the dashboard. The most commonly used shortcuts are Add Window… and Add External Shortcut…

The Add Window option allows you to add a shortcut to an existing GP window, such as Employee Maintenance or Vendor Maintenance. These are items that are accessible via the menu within GP. If you click Add Window… you will see the following screen. From here, simply navigate to the desired window under Available Windows and click Add.

If you’re looking for a standard GP window, these should be located under the option titled Microsoft Dynamics GP. From there just navigate to the appropriate module. All options are listed alphabetically.

The Add External Shortcut option allows you to create a shortcut to link to an application or file that resides outside of GP. An example of this would be a custom integration built within Microsoft Access. Creating a shortcut would allow the user to launch the integration directly from within GP. After selecting this option you will see the following screen:

From here just give the shortcut a name, any name will do, and click the Browse button. Locate and select the file that you want to use for the shortcut and click Open. Once the path is displayed in the Command Line text box simply click Add to create the shortcut on the GP dashboard.

You can also assign a keyboard shortcut to any dashboard shortcut. To do this, select a desired option from the Keyboard Shortcut drop-down. This feature is available for all shortcuts being added to the dashboard.

Shortcuts make navigating in GP much easier, especially if you are routinely accessing the same windows throughout the day. You can easily add dozens of useful shortcuts by following the steps outlined above.