Keeping it simple

A simple way to dealing with Solomon warning messages when closing a module

This is a trick which we have taught users for years, to quickly resolve what batches are incomplete in the module you are trying to do a period or yearend close. This is the message I am talking about:

What Solomon is trying to tell you is that you have started a batch but it was not completely processed. Solomon wants you to know that it is best to resolve what you want to do with this batch as soon as possible. It may be that you started a batch, but got interrupted and restarted second batch; or maybe you have a suspended batch which needs to be fixed.

The problem is how to quickly find which batches are causing the problem, since there are many times multiple places you might have to look, especially with modules like AR and AP which have multiple input screens. This trick allows you to look one place and see all batches, both released, balanced for release, and suspended batches. It is a one stop to see, and if you want you can also delete the batch.

This trick should be restricted to only your power users and most trusted employees, because we are going to turn on a seldom used access right called initialization for the Journal Transaction screen, 01.010.00. You will need to navigate to the access rights screen which is either located under the administration area for Solomon 7.x or under the Utilities menu. In this screen add this feature for the initialization option :

Close out of the access rights screen.

Next we need to start the Initialization mode option. In the Solomon 6.x version, you need to click on the menu choice called Application_options:

You have started initialization mode when you have a check box displayed as shown above.

Next open up the Journal Transaction screen and note you have the ability to change the module field, which normally is set to a GJ grey value. Change this value to the module you are trying to close, say the Accounts Receivable module.

You can next click on the batch number field, and then F3 to display all batches, likely your batches causing the closing warning message.

We have found this trick very useful to quickly find incomplete or problem batches which are causing the warning when you try to close a module.

I hope you find this trick useful

Regards,

Jeff

Transaction Import: a new tip

Users of Dynamics SL have a powerful tool with the Transaction import screen. Just about any data entry screen in Solomon has the ability to upload a standard file to this screen for data input. This feature is standard on all Solomon modules, and it in typically found under the Administration menu group or (Utility> transaction import screen for pre 7.0 users). The trick I learned this week is that that import file can be edited and saves while in the Transaction import screen. After you have attempted to import, it is a good idea to check on your status via the Edit Error button. This button displays a form that looks like:

 

The top section is displaying line item processing of each import line and associated errors. The bottom section displays the source input list. What I learned is you can make corrections in the bottom section of the screen, and then save your corrections via the File, Save Data File As command. The bottom section of the screen acts like a notepad.exe program and is an efficient and simple way to make quick changes and try the import again.

For years, I have been stuck doing my corrections the hard way. My old method was close out of this screen, then launch notepad.exe and then open the import file, make my corrections then save the changed file, and close out of notepad. Boy this simple trick will save me many hours of effort and I hope it can also save you some time and effort.

Happy TI'ing into Dynamic SL.

 

Regards,

 

Jeff Cozens

 

Preparing for Obama’s Government Bail Out Plans

The tea leafs are all saying, expect our federal government to release funds for some big programs, which will be a mix of tax cuts, business growth incentives, health care changes, and transfer payments to individuals/and states. Up to now the Federal government has largely used monetary stimulus to get our economy going. It looks like fiscal federal expenditures is the next plan that Obama and the Democratic congress is recommending.

As business people, it is timely to ask and plan for how we position our respective companies to take advantage of this next stimulus wave for our federal government. Maybe we all need to think outside the box?

One of our clients is already showing leadership in this area. They are aligning their accounting system to be more project oriented. At the same time, they are looking to implement new rolling monthly budgets at the individual project level. We are in the process of building a new series of reports which will allow the display of actual revenue and expenses by project plus the latest monthly projections of revenue/expenses by project for the remaining 12 months of the year. The focus of planning down to the project level, instead of the traditional budgeting at the department level, makes more sense in 2009. We can see profitability / loss at the project level, thus giving managers a chance to react and manage proactively.

The real benefit is the real time reporting nature of these new project budgeting reports. By being able to create the reports any time during the month with the most current data gives this company a big leg up on managing their business. I see so many people trying to do this type of reporting on an "adhoc" excel spreadsheet type basis. This excel spreadsheet approach almost always leads to "out – dated" data, and hence the reports are poor tools for proactively managing a business.

My question to you, how are you positioning your company to take advantage of the new wave of federal government fiscal spending ? Are you prepared like a good boy scout?

 

Jeff

Stopping transactions from being deleted

In general most accounting departments that I deal with operate from a high level of trust of their employees. As a consequence, many Solomon sites have not done a good job of stopping deletion of transactional detail. Whether transactional detail was deleted as a true accident or whether it was deleted by a disgruntled employee, the effect is the same: the data is gone forever!

One quick trick to see what exposure you have in your Dynamics SL system is to sign into Solomon as the sysadmin or master user and run the report called: Access Rights Report(95.600.00). This report displays what screens and reports are able to be processed for all users and all access right groups. Print this report to screen, and then use the global search feature at the top of the screen and type in the word "delete". Next click on the binocular symbol. When using this feature, the text string "delete" will be searched for across all pages of the report.

This gives you a great tool to monitor who has the rights to delete transactions. My recommendation is to take away the rights to delete transactions from all users except when signed in as the master, sysadmin, user.

Here is an example of

Another step to control deletion of data is to modify your screen for General Ledger closing (01.560.00). This screen can only be modified by people who own the customization module. If you suppress the fields related to deleting transactions, then you can minimize how data can be deleted. Please note, Dynamics SL is designed that data will never be deleted unless specifically requested as a deletion process, and these simple tricks stop that event from ever happening.

Here is an example of a modified closing screen with all fields related to deletion being hidden.

 

Give us a call if you need more information on these ideas.

 

Jeff Cozens

 

 

 

Documenting month end processing:

One of the neat features of Dynamics GP is the ability to document month end reports and processes. This list is really a punch list of tasks. Many people do not realize that you can accomplish this same list of task plus complete procedures in the Dynamics SL by use of Favorites.

I am going to illustrate the way you set up favorites to control the look of the favorites screen and one way to launch procedural text files, such as month end closing documents. In addition, you can use your favorites to launch Solomon screens.

 

 

In the first line you are launch a word or text file which has the month end procedures file. In the second line you are launching a specific Solomon report.

You can customize your look of the favorite page by using the Favorites Maintenance screen, which can be navigated as Utility > Favorites Maintenance screen.

 

 

In this simple example we only added one procedure file and one report to be launched. You can make this as complex as you need to accomplish your closing process. Remember the favorite's screens are customizable by user. Also please note in line one above I launched notepad. You can launch Office word or other programs (i.e. excel) which support a command line structure to start the program and load a specific document upon starting.

 

Have fun as you creatively us these ideas to make month end processing go smoother. Drop me a comment via the blog is you need clarification on these ideas.

 

Regards,

 

Jeff Cozens

 

 

Keeping Financial History

I got a request from one of our customers to check on how much data was stored in the GL history area. When we looked, there was only data back to 2003, even though this customer had been using their software for over 10 years. In retrospect, I recommend everyone set up a new sub directory for called financial history. Go into your print area and print your entire financial history to a pdf file and store this file in this new subdirectory. Each year, as part of your closing process, print the New Year's history in pdf format and add it to this historical data folder.

In this way you can always see all the GL transactions via these external pdf files. You can use the pdf search features for finding the specific account in question. If you are concerned about security, then you can either use network operating access rights or move the data to say a DVD file for safe storage. Taking time to implement this simple trick can save you some real headaches down the road.

Happy archiving….

 

Jeff Cozens

 

Great Tool with any Word, Excel or Dynamics Product for pdf printing

This tool is called Dopdf (http://www.dopdf.com/). This utility installs as a standard windows printer, and can be selected as the printer to be outputted from within any windows program, and it will print your document to file as a pdf file. The ease of use, small footprint to install, and free cost makes this tool a winner all the way around. In Dynamics SL I can save any crystal report as a pdf file; put I find the dopdf printer even easier and better. I also like it with other Microsoft office products, because I can print to a pdf file just by selecting the proper printer. There are versions for Vista and for 32 or 64 byte operating systems. Really neat!

Check it out and see if this is a tool which should be on your computer.

Jeff Cozens

PS. You will still need to use Adobe's reader to read the pdf files. That site for download of adobe reader is: http://www.adobe.com

 

 

Better Solomon Reporting through Longer Sub Accounts

One  of our clients had the problem that their Solomon General Ledger Sub account was initially set to only 2 characters.  While this short sub account met the initial reporting requirements, it became a major problem as the business grew and their needs grew for more flexible financial reporting groups.  I initially thought that this was one of those decisions which clients had to live with.   Using a tip I got from another Solomon consultant, I found that this short sub account was not an irreversible decision.   It took me about 2 hours to figure out that going from to 2 digits to say 6 or more was easily accomplished.   Depending on which version of Solomon you are licensed for, the max length of the sub account field can be 6 or 24 characters.   In this particular case, their 2 digit sub account was set up in the Flex Definition table as left justified.   By building the sub accounts to the right (i.e. positions 3 to 6), I was able to expand both the number of characters in the sub account and the number of segments.   I needed to first use SQL query analyzer to modify certain fields in the flexdef table.   The fields I reviewed and modified were:  maxfieldlen, maxsegments, numbersegments, and Seglenth00, and seglenth01.  Since I am not trying to make this a training session in SQL query analyzer, I encourage you to discuss this with your local Solomon reseller, who already understands Sql commands.  The good news is that this client was able to create a new sub account structure that now allows them to track: division, department, and event codes within their new sub account structure.

 

Novel Idea: software talks to other software

Marketeers have been talking about seamless integration of software for years.  You may have missed this technique, which you might find useful:

Smart tags are a feature found in versions of Microsoft Office XP and later and Microsoft Dynamics accounting software which recognizes certain words or types of data and converts it to a hyperlink between the data sources.

From Wikipedia.org, we find this expanation:

Smart tags in MS Word

With smart tags enabled, Word attempts to recognize certain types of data in a document (for example, dates or names) and automatically makes such text a smart tag, visually indicated as a purple dotted underline. Clicking on a smart tag brings up a list of possible actions for that data type.

As an example, in Microsoft Word the words "John Smith" would be recognized as a personal name and smart tagged. The list of actions available when clicked might be Open Contact, Schedule a Meeting, Add to Contacts, or Insert Address

Here are some examples of how smart tags might be used:

http://www.microsoft.com/dynamics/gp/product/gp_smarttags.mspx

Check it out.

Basbits.... what a funny name

About a year ago I started attending this user groups monthly meeting.   Basbits, which stands for Bay Area Small Business Information Technology Specialists' Consultants Group, is actively involved with Microsofts Small Business Server software.   I'm probably the only non - geek in the room, since I dislike hardware and operating system.  Still this meeting brings me value.  More important it exposes me to who is good with IT support and who is using and pushing these products.

If you are shopping for a new IT team to support your company, what a great way to get a "quick" over view of who is out there and who is good.   This group is meeting this week on 4/23 up in the Belmont, Ca area.  Check out their web site for more info.... See you there.

http://basbits.net