Understanding User Control Host in Business Central
User Control Host is a new Business Central page type that hosts web pages and custom controls with minimal overhead, designed originally to support Power BI reports and enabling embedded HTML resources without standard page infrastructure.
post Aardvark Labs
"This page design is so restrictive that you can only have a layout, area, and a single usercontrol object on the page."
Key points
- User Control Host is a simplified page type that requires no source table and supports only a layout, area, and single usercontrol object
- It enables embedding web pages and Power BI reports directly into Business Central with reduced page overhead
- Custom controls require JavaScript and HTML5, building on the foundation of embedded web pages
- The page type is highly restrictive by design, with no actions or editing capabilities, making it the most basic page definition possible
- Dynamic URLs can be constructed to pass parameters like customer numbers or filtered report data to the hosted content
Quotes
- “This page design is so restrictive that you can only have a layout, area, and a single usercontrol object on the page.” (Defines the fundamental constraints of User Control Host and explains why it is simpler than standard page types)
- “They totally created this to help with the Power BI Reporting.” (Clarifies the primary use case and motivation for introducing this page type into Business Central)
AL objects mentioned
As named in the post. A name that matches one object page by exact type and name links to it; the others stay as named.
- page “ARD_HostControlDemo”
- other “WebPageViewer”
Not found in BC28-30: page “ARD_HostControlDemo”.
Context
- Features: User Control Host page type, Custom controls, Web page embedding, Power BI report hosting, HTML5 integration, Dynamic URL parameters
Source: Aardvark Labs, community blog. Summary, key points and quotes are derived (CONTENT-NOTICE.md); read the original for the full text.