Microsoft has quietly killed off plans for a unified code base to underpin its line of enterprise resource planning (ERP) applications as it announced new product developments at the Convergence conference in San Diego this week.

That original plan, codenamed Project Green, will be replaced by a strategy of continuing current lines but adapting them to have similar user interfaces, interoperability mechanisms and shared underlying roles templates and business processes.

Green was first mooted in 2003 as a way to integrate code from the acquisitions of Great Plains and Navision in 2001 and 2002 respectively.

However, having rebranded applications under the Dynamics umbrella brand in 2005, Microsoft is now saying that a commonality of approach to the NAV, GP, SL, AX and CRM products is more important than creating a single code base.

“The idea of cutting a whole new code base goes away [in favour of] a common set of applications that share look and feel and facilitate increased use of ERP data in Office and Sharepoint Server,” said Steve Farr, Microsoft Dynamics product solutions marketing manager.

“We’re investing in each of the product lines so that they look the same, operate the same and integrate the same. That provides an easier way to do expenses, book a holiday, synchronise your contacts and so on.”

Farr added that Microsoft is currently focused on shared user interfaces, roles templates and business processes, and that a subsequent challenge would be to create a single set of shared business-intelligence tools.

He added that, at least in recent times, Green had only been used to describe a common approach rather than an attempt to build a unified code base.

However, some watchers said that Microsoft was playing fast and loose with terms.

“There’s definitely a conflicting message,” said Zach Nelson, chief executive of NetSuite. “It’s, ‘We’re going to do a unified product, we’re going to maintain separate code bases’. You can say it’s anything because it will never come out.”

However, Joshua Greenbaum of Enterprise Applications Consulting, said that Microsoft’s current approach makes sense.

“The problem with Green is that it made it impossible for partners to sell against a perfect - and pending - future, and therefore Green had to be killed in order to save the channel,” Greenbaum said.

“There was also the problem of trying to accomplish this difficult technical task, which probably couldn't have been accomplished in a reasonable timeframe anyway. Regardless, it's clear that a single code base is not necessary for Microsoft and not required by its customers or partners.”

At the conference, Microsoft announced plans for the Dynamics client for Office and SharePoint Server, as well as plans to release new versions of Dynamics GP, NAV and SL in the first half of this year.