Stop using Dataverse solution publishers incorrectly!
Controversial subject/rant? I’m interested if you disagree.
Publishers should track who owns the work long term rather than who delivered it.
If you are a partner engaged to deliver a solution for your customer and they will own the resulting work:
=> They are the publisher, not you!
If you are a partner selling a re-usable solution that multiple customers will use:
=> You are the publisher of the re-usable bit
=> The customer is the publisher of any customisations on top of that (if applicable)
Publishers are not for vanity.
When you don’t respect the rules above, people start to treat it like it IS for vanity and it’s an “author” field;
- A customer starts with partner A who uses their own publisher.
- Partner B (or the customer themself) comes in and doesn’t like seeing their competitor’s name, so switches all new customisations over to use a new publisher, or even tries to switch it for the whole existing solution.
Why this is an issue?
When components have been installed from a managed solution, the platform tracks the publisher who originated them. It’s not possible to change this without removing the component and installing it again from the new publisher, even with a new solution.
If you install the same component from a new publisher without removing it first, that will create new solution layers on top of the existing ones rather than replacing the base layer.
When you are customising OOTB components, the “merge” results of that may be surprising to you - Forms that are messed up and many other things! (You will be able to remove that layer though thankfully)
When you have custom components, you’ll never be able to remove the solution that provides the base layer… well not without data loss.
Publishers are actually a technical mechanism that is designed for this reason - It’s about identity and avoiding clashes between different teams - Knowing whether the changes being imported should/can replace or augment the base layer.