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If your enterprise reporting and automation still depends on spreadsheets, manual extracts, and half-retired systems… you don’t really have a data strategy. You have a risk strategy. 

That’s the realization one international telecommunications company came to—and it kicked off two major transformation initiatives that I had the opportunity to support using the Dynamics ecosystem. 

Different regions. Different challenges. Same underlying problem: legacy complexity slowing the business down. 

Over the past little while, my learning focus has continued to evolve from initial onboarding into more advanced, practical development and Azure-related concepts. Building on earlier foundations, I’ve been expanding my understanding of Azure Pipelines and Azure Application Insights, while using these ideas in real application work.

The focus of my work during this phase has been the development of the EzExpense Mobile and PC versions. Working across both platforms has required careful attention to UI behavior, responsiveness, data flow, and usability. This experience pushed me to think beyond simply implementing features and toward designing solutions that remain stable, maintainable, and user-friendly.

Alongside this development work, I’ve been exploring Azure Pipelines and how CI/CD workflows structure the way modern software is built, validated, and delivered. Learning how builds, tests, and deployments can be automated highlighted how critical consistency and repeatability are in reducing errors and ensuring reliable releases.

In parallel, I’ve also been learning about Azure Application Insights and the role of telemetry in production systems. Understanding performance monitoring, failure detection, and runtime analytics reinforced the importance of visibility once applications are deployed. Rather than reacting to issues after they surface, Application Insights enables proactive identification of exceptions, slow dependencies, and behavioral anomalies.

These Azure concepts have directly influenced how I approach application development. While designing screens, refining Power Fx logic, and structuring Dataverse tables, I’ve become more aware of how small implementation decisions can affect build reliability, runtime performance, and overall system stability.

Another important takeaway during this phase has been recognizing how automation and QA complement each other. Azure Pipelines strengthens validation through automated checks, while Application Insights provides insight into real-world application behavior. At the same time, QA remains essential for evaluating user experience, edge cases, and interaction flows that automation alone cannot fully capture.

Beyond technical growth, working in this environment has reinforced a broader engineering mindset. Development is not limited to building features. it includes designing reliable workflows, validating changes, monitoring performance, and continuously improving system behavior.

As I continue progressing, my goal is to further deepen my understanding of CI/CD practices, monitoring strategies, and scalable application design. Strengthening these areas will help me build solutions that are not only functional, but robust and production ready.

EzExpense Mobile takes the hassle out of work-related travel. It can keep track of your receipts and mileage in real time so that you can focus on what you came for – the trip!

Over the past little while at Geoson, my focus has shifted from initial onboarding to actively applying what I’m learning in more practical, real-world scenarios. Building on the foundation I described in my first post, I’ve had the opportunity to deepen my understanding of Microsoft’s Power Platform, AI tools, and how these technologies come together in a production environment.

A major part of this phase has been working through several Microsoft Learn paths related to AI and application development. I’ve been exploring how AI agents are designed and how Microsoft 365 Copilot can be extended using tools like Copilot Studio and Azure. These modules helped me better understand how generative AI fits into enterprise workflows, including concepts like orchestration, agent design, and when AI adds real value versus when traditional automation is a better fit.

Alongside this, I’ve been learning more about AI Builder and how AI models can be integrated into business applications. This included understanding common use cases such as text recognition and data extraction, as well as how these models interact with Dataverse, Power Apps, and Power Automate. Seeing how AI capabilities are packaged in a way that’s accessible to app makers and business users has been especially interesting from a systems design perspective.

One of the most valuable technical areas I’ve focused on recently is Power Apps development itself. I spent time learning imperative development techniques for canvas apps, diving deeper into Power Fx and understanding the differences between declarative and imperative logic. Concepts like global variables, contextual variables, and collections became much clearer once I started using them in real applications rather than just learning about them in isolation.

That learning came together when I started working on canvas screens for the EzExpense Pro version. Being able to contribute in a production environment pushed me to think more carefully about app structure, data flow, and maintainability. I gained hands-on experience writing Power Fx for real use cases, designing screens with actual users in mind, and understanding how small design or logic decisions can impact usability and performance.

Beyond the technical skills, working in a production area has given me a better appreciation for how professional teams build, review, and iterate on solutions. I’ve learned how development decisions are influenced by business needs, how documentation and standards help keep projects scalable, and how collaboration plays a key role in delivering reliable solutions.

As I continue my co-op term, my goal is to keep building on this momentum. I want to keep strengthening my technical skills while gaining more exposure to how AI, automation, and low-code tools are used to solve real business problems. I’m excited to keep learning from the team at Geoson and to continue contributing in meaningful ways as the term progresses.

In 2026, Geoson is expanding customer‑experience applications on Microsoft Dynamics 365 and the Power Platform.

At Geoson, we’re increasingly integrating AI into our daily Power Apps development to deliver smarter, more efficient applications. Within the Power Platform, AI capabilities generally fall into several key areas;

📄 Document Processing: Automated extraction and handling of complex documents.
✍️ Text Analysis: Understanding and deriving meaning from unstructured text.
🖼️ Image Recognition: Interpreting and extracting data from visual information.
📊 Structured Data Interpretation: Enhancing insights from existing business data.

We achieve efficiency by first leveraging Microsoft's prebuilt AI models for standardized, high-volume scenarios. This provides immediate value for common tasks like basic text recognition and general document data extraction.

However, to meet specific business process demands, we design and train custom AI models. This tailored development is essential for increasing accuracy in specialized, real-world data capture—for example, fine-tuning image-based data extraction to handle the unique layouts and fields found on specific vendor invoices or proprietary internal documents. By strategically combining these out-of-the-box and customized models, we streamline data workflows and significantly improve the precision of data capture within Power Apps. This dual approach allows us to build intelligent business applications that accurately reflect and automate complex, real-world operational requirements.

First Few Days at Geoson 

A reflection on my first few days at Geoson, including how I got here and how I want to grow. 

Hi, my name is Ethan, and I’m a Computer Engineering student at the University of Alberta. I recently joined Geoson as a co-op student, and over my first few days, I’ve already had the opportunity to dive into new tools, workflows, and ways of thinking about real-world software development.

My academic background has given me a strong foundation in programming, problem-solving, and systems thinking, but one of my main goals coming into this co-op is to bridge the gap between classroom learning and industry application. Early on at Geoson, I’ve been working through Microsoft Power Platform learning paths, including Power Automate and Power Apps. This has given me hands-on exposure to building automated workflows, monitoring and troubleshooting flows, and developing custom Power Apps components using the Power Apps Component Framework. Going through these modules has helped me better understand how low-code and no-code tools can be used to build scalable, real business solutions efficiently.

Beyond the technical onboarding, I’ve already started getting familiar with how teams collaborate in a professional environment. Seeing how documentation is structured, how tools are used to manage work, and how problems are approached from both a technical and business perspective has been extremely valuable.

Throughout this co-op term, I’m hoping to gain deeper experience applying my technical skills to real projects with real users. I want to continue learning industry tools and workflows that aren’t always taught in school, improve my ability to communicate ideas clearly, and grow more confident contributing meaningfully to a team. I’m also looking forward to learning from experienced professionals through mentorship and feedback and gaining clarity on the types of roles and technologies I’m most excited to pursue long-term.

So far, my experience at Geoson has been welcoming and engaging, and I’m excited to build on what I’ve learned as the term continues.

In today's digital age, keeping a website fresh and engaging is key to attracting and retaining visitors. Recently, I made some exciting updates to my website to improve user experience and functionality. Here's a look at what I've been up to: 

Recently I have been tasked with updating Geoson Solutions very own Contract Management extension. This task required me to learn the new and exciting tool D365 Business Central (BC) and programming in AL.

During the past 2 weeks at Geoson Solutions I got to finally wrap up a project I have been working on since joining. This involved adding some last-minute additions and changes that were requested. It has been a worthwhile experience and I’ve learned a lot. It will be nice to finally have the final version out there.