AX7: Installing deployable packages with Powershell

Installing deployable packages to an AX 7 environment can often be done just by a few clicks on LCS (as described in Apply a deployable package on a Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Operations system). Unfortunately the situation isn’t always that simple and you may have to install the package manually, using the process explained in Install a deployable package. It consists of quite a few manual steps and where there are repeated manual steps, one should always consider automation.

I’ve built a few Powershell functions to help with these tasks:

#region Parameters
$folder = 'C:\Temp'
$archiveFileName = 'Updates.zip'
$runbookId = 'MyRunbook1'
$ErrorActionPreference = 'Stop'
#endregion
 
#region Derived values
$file = Join-Path $folder $archiveFileName
$runbookFile = Join-Path $folder "$runbookId.xml"
$extracted = Join-Path $folder ([System.IO.Path]::GetFileNameWithoutExtension($archiveFileName))
$topologyFile = Join-Path $extracted 'DefaultTopologyData.xml'
$updateInstaller = Join-Path $extracted 'AXUpdateInstaller.exe'
#endregion
 
Function ExtractFiles
{
    Unblock-File $file
    Expand-Archive -LiteralPath $file -Destination $extracted
}
 
Function SetTopologyData
{
    [xml]$xml = Get-Content $topologyFile
    $machine = $xml.TopologyData.MachineList.Machine
 
    # Set computer name
    $machine.Name = $env:computername
 
    #Set service models
    $serviceModelList = $machine.ServiceModelList
    $serviceModelList.RemoveAll()
 
    $instalInfoDll = Join-Path $extracted 'Microsoft.Dynamics.AX.AXInstallationInfo.dll'
    [void][System.Reflection.Assembly]::LoadFile($instalInfoDll)
 
    $models = [Microsoft.Dynamics.AX.AXInstallationInfo.AXInstallationInfo]::GetInstalledServiceModel()
    foreach ($name in $models.Name)
    {
        $element = $xml.CreateElement('string')
        $element.InnerText = $name
        $serviceModelList.AppendChild($element)
    }
 
    $xml.Save($topologyFile)
}
 
Function GenerateRunbook
{
    $serviceModelFile = Join-Path $extracted 'DefaultServiceModelData.xml'
    & $updateInstaller generate "-runbookId=$runbookId" "-topologyFile=$topologyFile" "-serviceModelFile=$serviceModelFile" "-runbookFile=$runbookFile"
}
 
Function ImportRunbook
{
    & $updateInstaller import "-runbookfile=$runbookFile"
}
 
Function ExecuteRunbook
{
    & $updateInstaller execute "-runbookId=$runbookId"
}
 
Function RerunRunbook([int] $step)
{
    & $updateInstaller execute "-runbookId=$runbookId" "-rerunstep=$step"
}
 
Function SetStepComplete([int] $step)
{
    & $updateInstaller execute "-runbookId=$runbookId" "-setstepcomplete=$step"
}
 
Function ExportRunbook
{
    & $updateInstaller export "-runbookId=$runbookId" "-runbookfile=$runbookFile"
}

When you set parameters (such as the name of your package file) and run the script, you can then execute whole process by the following list of function calls:

ExtractFiles

SetTopologyData

GenerateRunbook

ImportRunbook

ExecuteRunbook

If needed, you can also use RerunRunbook and SetStepComplete (e.g. SetStepComplete 10).

Note that SetTopologyData takes data just from the current machine, but you can borrow the code and modify it, if you need something more sophisticated.

This should make things a bit easier and reduce unnecessary errors such as mistyped runbook IDs.