One Version service updates

This article discusses Dynamics 365's One Version Service Update logic and its components. The purpose is to clarify the functions of each update component and explain the hierarchical relation between them.

No more upgrade, just update!

The true value of a cloud service is realized through continuous updates that can provide both improved reliability and new features while minimizing operational impact. Microsoft optimizes the way they deliver updates for a more consistent, predictable, and seamless experience for every customer. Monthly update cadence aims to provide predictability, lower upgrade costs, user access to the latest product capabilities and performance improvements, and a better support experience.

Lifecycle Services (LCS) has an update experience to align with the One Version service update releases. This update experience provides the options to either take fixes for the current version or to update to a newer version or delay the updates.

Dynamics 365 Finance and Operations which has several components is a web-based application that needs updates in order to fix bugs, extend/remove existing functionalities, and add brand-new features. All these come as service or platform updates to your cloud-based Dynamics 365 solution via One Version. Your system can stay up to date with the latest improvements of the platform without having to upgrade your whole application.

Update Types

Major Updates: There are 2 major updates within Dynamics 365 release plans.

• Release Plan - Wave 1 covers features that are planned for release from April through September.
• Release Plan - Wave 2 covers features that are planned for release from October through March.

Minor Updates: There are 2 types of minor updates.

• Service Updates contain both application and platform changes that are critical improvements to the service, including regulatory updates.
• Quality updates are a cumulative, roll-up build that contains fixes for known issues that are specific to the service update.

Meaning of Update Types: All the above update types are explained below.

• Release plan: Helps you plan and understand what is changing. You can learn about upcoming features up to three months in advance.
• Service updates: Contains both application and platform changes that are critical improvements to the service, including regulatory updates.
• Platform updates: This allows you to upgrade the Dynamics platform to a new release without upgrading your whole application.
• Application releases: Contains "What's new" topics and provides details about the updates for specific months.
• Quality updates: A cumulative, roll-up build that contains fixes for known issues that are specific to the service update.

Support

• The release plans are the primary source of information for all new features and changes for a future release. Features will also include Help topics on docs.microsoft.com as needed.
• The "What's new or changed" documentation is the primary source for the details of each service update’s application release.
• The "What's new or changed in Platform updates" documentation is the primary source for the details of each service update’s platform changes.
• The "Quality updates" documentation is the primary source for the details of each platform update. There will be no quality updates available for any version that’s older than 2 versions of the current service update.
• The service update that will be made generally available and automatically applied to all customers will contain hotfixes and potentially new functionality. If a critical issue is reported after the service update has been applied, customers can pull that cumulative hotfix update from the tile in LCS.
• Critical issues should always be submitted to the Support team via LCS as soon as they are identified. The support staff will work with you to fix the critical issue. Customer-reported issues are searchable via LCS Issue search. You can sign up to be notified when an open issue is resolved.

One Version Service Updates

The below illustration shows the relationship between the update types mentioned above.

After the "release plans" announcement, you can plan what features to be added and what functions to be changed/removed. When the time comes, you can apply "service updates" to your system to have these changes in your system. Lastly, you can apply "quality updates" to fix the bugs in your system.

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