CRM 2011 administrators rejoice! You can now modify the following properties on multiple fields in an entity at once.
- Whether a field is required, recommended, or has no constraint.
- Whether a field is searchable or not.
- Enabling or disabling auditing.
I still cringe when I recall having to open each field individually in CRM 4.0 Online to mark them as not searchable. Sure, CRM 4.0 on-premise had a free tool to aid in performing this task, but there was no help for the CRM 4.0 online projects. As I embarked for the first time to do this in CRM 2011 Online, I decided to try selecting multiple fields, then clicking the ‘Edit’ button on the grid menu and what do you know, it worked!
You select the multiple fields like you would in any standard Windows application. Hold down ‘Shift’ when clicking 2 fields to capture all of the fields between them or hold down the ‘Ctrl’ key when clicking to select multiple, individual fields.
Then click the ‘Edit’ button and you’ll see a screen like the one below. Simply make your selections, click ‘Save’ and the changes will be applied to every field you selected.
As a best practice, I suggest always making sure you mark any fields that are not being used on forms as “Not Searchable”, especially on the three main, out-of-the-box entities: Accounts, Contacts, and Opportunities. By marking unused fields as “Not Searchable”, you remove them from the list of available fields a user sees when creating an Advanced Find. Showing only the relevant fields can really enhance a user’s experience and thus increase user adoption; always a hurdle in just about every implementation.
Post by: Chris Weilandt,
