How LN Exchange import/export schemes, ION/BOD messaging, ION Workflow and Alerts, and the Infor Data Lake map to D365 data entities, OData, custom services, business events, Azure integration services, dual-write, virtual entities, and practical rules for idempotency, batching, and error handling.
LN's integration architecture is built around two proprietary technologies: Exchange (a 4GL-based import/export engine tightly coupled to the LN runtime) and ION (Infor Operating Network, a message broker for BOD-based messaging between Infor applications).
LN Exchange is the primary integration layer for inbound and outbound data exchange in LN. Exchange works through schemes — configuration objects that define: the external format (XML, CSV, flat file), the mapping of external fields to LN table columns, and the session or function to call for each record processed.
Infor ION (Infor Operating Network) is Infor's proprietary message broker. ION mediates message exchange between Infor applications (LN, Infor WMS, Infor HR, etc.) using BODs — Business Object Documents — an OAG (Open Applications Group) XML standard for inter-application messages.
D365 business events are a first-class integration mechanism. Events fire on standard D365 business process steps (post sales invoice, confirm purchase order, close production order) and publish a JSON payload to Azure Service Bus, Azure Event Grid, or an HTTPS endpoint.
Dual-write is a Microsoft framework that synchronises data between D365 Finance & Operations and Dataverse (the Microsoft Power Platform data store) in near-real-time. For organisations using D365 CE (CRM), Power Apps, or Power Automate alongside D365 F&O, dual-write eliminates the need for custom synchronisation by providing…
LN integration estates are rarely only ION BODs. Many also contain IDM (Infor Document Management), ODBC or JDBC extracts, report feeds from Crystal Reports, analytics in CloudSuite Birst, and custom Tools/DAL projections built for one downstream consumer. D365 replaces that mixture with several narrower Microsoft services;
Integrations built without these principles will cause production incidents within the first months of operation.
The LN integration estate — Exchange, ION, BODs, IDL — must be rearchitected, not migrated. D365 provides a rich, cloud-native integration surface that covers the same functional scope with different mechanisms.