Made2Mentor

There are a couple of ways to achieve automatic login of Made2Manage. However, I first want to say that I think this is a bad idea and I don’t allow this at my company for security reasons.

The simplest method is to make your M2M user name match your active directory user name. I haven’t done this in quite some time, but I do believe it still works. The problem with this was recently pointed out by one of my readers because his AD name is longer than what M2M allows for a user name. Therefore, he can’t auto login because they don’t match.

However, there is another alternative (that once again I don’t suggest) in this case. Navigate to your M2MWin.ini file and open it in Notepad. You can find it in your C:\windows\ directory. When you do so, you will notice a list of settings for M2M. Down the list you will find a section called [License]. Below that enter the following:

Username = User
Password = pass

Of course, you would substitute your user name and password for those entries and do not include quotes. This should allow you to log in to M2M on that computer automatically.

In my opinion, the only valid use of auto login is for computers that are in a locked room. A good example be an executive at your company who uses M2M infrequently and forgets his password.

What do you folks think? Do you know of other clever uses for the M2MWin.ini file?

Your accounting manager comes to you with a problem. Being the stellar M2M Professional that you are, you immediately don your cape and tights. What? You don’t wear tights? Umm.. me neither… really…

Anyway, she explains to you that the terms, which are dictated by accounting, are being changed by some Sales Order Administrators that enter the orders. She can’t tell exactly why, but when this happens product is shipping out to companies who are on credit hold. This results in your company essentially giving away free product.

Your mission, should you choose to accept it.

Therefore, she asks you affect a couple of changes. First, she doesn’t want the terms to be changed at the SO level. You must stop this from happening. Second, she would prefer that the terms still be able to be seen on that screen, just not manipulated.

Now, I’m sure most of us can do it in one way or another. For the sake of this exercise, we’ll assume that you have all of the M2M Optional Modules, but you aren’t required to use any of them. I would like you folks to comment with a proposed way to accomplish this. I want to see how many ways we can come up with.

Also, each person can only list 2 total. That way, we don’t have the first person spoiling the “game” by listing every conceivable way in the first comment. Thinking for a few minutes, I’ve already come up with 6 different ways to achieve this myself.

So, without further adieu — are you up to the challenge?

Yesterday I tried to customize the Sales Order Status/Cost (SOSTAT) Screen. I quickly realized that this screen is not available for FastForms customization. I called M2M for a list of screens incompatible with FastForms and was provided with the following change request. I figured my readers would benefit from this list as well.

Also, I think it’s interesting to note that the screens were originally included in the product to begin with and then removed afterward when they wouldn’t work.

I’d say it’s a safe bet that none of these screens will be added into FastForms since M2M is supposed to re-write their screens for Version 7. Anyone disagree?

CR ID: 112288
Summary: Remove screens from FastForms editor that cannot be extended properly
Entered By: dbryant
Create Date: 5/28/2004 1:08:29 PM
Part: ERP 5.51 FF B4
Release Target: ERP 5.51 FF B4
Object: FastForm
Group: ERP
details: Description: I have researched all of the screens which are currently in the FF Editor to determine if they can be extended using the FF Editor to add new data elements, apply them to the screen and save data to the fields. The attached spreadsheet indicates the screens I believe should be removed from the FF Editor due to data or design issues with the screen.

The list includes the following screens:
ACTADD
AJED
APCASH
ASSIGN
AYRS
BCGRAC
BCPINV
BCPOST
BCSYM
BOMICS
BUDG
CAL
CASH
CCFACT
CDEL
CMDS
CNEW
COCONS
COMP
COMPAY
CRUP
CSPROD
CSSYS
CTTERMS
CURR
DPLSET
DTERMS
EMPIMP
EOP
FIOV
GLAINQ
GLBAL
GLIAA
GLJE
GLMAST
GLTRAN
HIST
INRTMC
INVOH
JORELS
LOC
MRPMSG
NOVW
OLINK
PARTLA
PAVAIL
PHYTAG
PQSUMM
PROV
QCKJO
QUAL
RGNI
RPBWMS
RPECAF
RPECAU
RPECSM
SAOV
SCIFS
SCIFSET
SICTAB
SOQUICK
SOSTAT
SUPP
SYSEQU
TCTRAN
TRTR
USER
UTSEQU
VIEWLG
VTERMS
WEBL

LABR
CSCF
DOWN
CLRECV
DISPRS
DISPSO
IDO
ISO
PHYINV
RSCHED
SSCHED
WSCHED

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Recently another user contacted me via e-mail to ask if they should upgrade to Visual FoxPro 9.0. They wondered if they really needed it because purchasing version 9.0 is not inexpensive (approximately $300 for the upgraded version and double that to license it outright).

I have been using VFP 6 for years and we never upgraded. As far as I know, there is only one area of Made2Manage which requires it and that is Form Customizer (FCUST). The later versions of M2M require you to use VFP 9.0 when using Form Customizer.

M2M used to instruct adminstrators to open M2M from within VFP when customizing their reports. However, they no longer do so because this process causes problems with security and permissions.

Does anyone know of a reason why you need to upgrade to VFP 9.0?

Special Ed from Crank Yankers

I’ve received a few e-mails asking where I’ve been lately. I got a killer virus and I finally had to wipe my primary machine and install all the necessary software. However, that’s not the primary reason I have been silent as of late.

Some of you know I’ve been riding my butt off lately. I joined a recreational team because I work and train with two of the members. Anyway, my coworker came to me and said that the leader would like to use my joining the team to get free stuff from sponsors like drink mix, gels you eat while riding, etc. I wasn’t really paying attention so I told her to do whatever she wanted; I am certainly willing to take free stuff. I later found out that I need to document my mileage to submit for this program. You see, they have me signed up as a “special needs” rider because of my weight. Yes folks, I am the bicycling equivalent of a Special Olympian. It doesn’t matter that I put more miles on the bike than any of them, this is how I’m labeled. So, when we go to rest stops, I act mentally challenged, say Durh! a lot, and miss my mouth with the water on purpose. What the heck, it gets laughs.

I decided that I needed some real bicycling jerseys to use on these group rides, so I didn’t look like a compete goober. However, they are difficult to find in my size because most serious bicyclists weigh 150 lbs. So, I ordered several jerseys along with a bunch of expensive bicycling equipment online and they arrived yesterday. None of the jerseys are sized consistently and the only one that remotely fit was bright red and at least a size too small. So, my team kept saying all day, “Hey Koolaid!!!”. Of course, in response I had to say, “Oh Yeah!!!” with a ridiculously low voice.

Oh Yeah!!!

Anyway, I finished my first group ride in 3 years last week. We made it through 47 miles and I did pretty well. My muscles cramped a bit here and there, but the worst thing that happened was sunburn. In fact, I got up at 6am the next morning to take a 10 mile recovery ride on the bike. My weight is coming down and my stamina is going up. I can do anything.

Oh, and if you’re wondering if I still intend to do the Hotter Than Hell Century ride at the end of the summer the answer is…

Oh Yeah!!!!

Have you ever wondered what happens when you reach 100 revisions of a Sales Order? No? Me neither, but it happened to us last week.

My current employer has long term contracts and the sales orders can stay open for 5 years or more. Items are added, changed, or removed all the time so 100 revisions isn’t as outlandish as it sounds.

Well, when you hit revision 100, the screen displays ** and that value is written to the database. There are no revisions after that.

Made2Manage created a Change Request for it, number 163578b and their workaround is to add and carry the sales order into a new one for a fresh set of revisions. However, there’s no way to actually tie the orders together so you lose your history anyway.

Oh well, you learn something new everyday.

I was in the process of waiting for M2M Tech Support to link my employer to yet another Change Request for me. When I received it, I noticed that the status said, Reviewed. What exactly does that mean? I know it means that they reviewed it, but does anyone care?

I asked the Tech what the real disposition was for the CR and he claimed not to know even though it was a few years old. I decided to browse other CR’s for the Sales Order (SO) screen and came across huge numbers of them. Many of them had other statuses such as Closed, Approved, Awaiting Approval, and Rejected.

For that matter, what does Closed mean? Awaiting Approval?

Just for fun, I looked back into the earliest CR’s and found several dating back as far as 1997 that were still in the Reviewed status.

Now, I know that M2M is not going to approve all of the change requests. However, in my opinion there should only be a few statuses. They would be something like Awaiting Review, Duplicate (for CR’s accidentally requested twice), Approved (and it should indicate a proposed release), and Rejected.

We know that the folks at Consona read this blog. Do any of you folks have other suggestions for the change request system?

I’ve mentioned before that Crystal Reports is a fine product, but I don’t recommend that Made2Manage customers purchase the server package. It’s expensive and their support is lacking.

However, I found out one other thing that it lacks this week. It doesn’t support usage statistics either and I cannot audit who is in the system at various times. Crystal Licenses are concurrent and if your users are not careful, they will close their browser window rather than manually logging out. This holds their license for 20 minutes by default. It’s not difficult to see that this will force you to purchase additional licenses. Apparently the Crystal Reports Server product which costs approximately $8,500 for 5 concurrent licenses does not include basic auditing. In order to get that, you must purchase their Edge Product which costs around $19,000 for 5 concurrent licenses. Both of those prices include the mandatory first year paid maintenance.

Furthermore, I learned that I was qualified to upgrade to Crystal Reports 2008 for free since I had current, paid maintenance. However, when I downloaded the latest version, I was not able to update the desktop design studio. That product was included with my XI Server package, but according to SAP was not under maintenance.

Therefore, I have the right to upgrade my server to 2008, but can not actually produce 2008 reports. Since their support has been less than satisfactory, you can imagine the response I got from my superiors when I requested that we purchase the latest desktop studio.

It was something like, “Whatchoo talkin ’bout David?”

While I fully understand why different programming languages use different syntax, wouldn’t it be nice if they could at least agree on a comment structure?

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve typed something like this into the VBA studio:

-- Make sure to declare the recordset

Code Here

/*

Comments here

*/

And of course it fails because VBA uses the single apostrophe to make comments.

Is it really too much to ask for that the Microsoft languages share the same comment structure?

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. – Arthur Clark

One of the factors which draws me to programming, and especially database programming, is that most people cannot understand it. To most people, computers, networks, and the internet etc quite simply work by magic. They know how to turn it on, and the basics of using the technology, but can’t or simply do not want to understand it. Beyond that, the process of creating, administering, or reporting from databases is simply foreign to them. I have always been driven to understand why technology works, and look at my job as being paid to work on puzzles every day. However, part of its allure, is the satisfaction of knowing something that others don’t; I have never wanted to have a profession that just anyone could do. So in essence, I like being a magician and always have.

I may not pull rabbits out of my hat, but to the average user, what I do may as well be
magic. In fact, most IT managers don’t really understand what we do either. One of my geek interests is reading science fiction and fantasy novels. I have a large collection of the Dragonlance Series created by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman, and they were wonderful reads while I was in my teens.

Raistlin Majere - The Ultimate Geek

One of my favorite characters is Raistlin Majere, the tortured and misunderstood soul who’s yearning for power drives his endless quest for magical abilities. He spends the vast majority of his time studying difficult magic spells utterly incomprehensible languages (cough.. Visual FoxPro… cough…) to perfect his craft. Does this sound like anyone you know? Anyway, his intelligence and knowledge of strange and mysterious powers enables him to come close to conquering the entire world. Fear not dear reader, I do not have aspirations of world domination, but this character had a profound impact on me while growing up. Is there truly that much difference here:

Abdis tukng! Kumpul-ah kepudanya Kuasahan!
Burus longang degang birsish Sekalilagang!
Degagng kuashnya, lampar Terbong kilat mati yangjahat! Xts vrie!

lcfilter2 = STRTRAN(UPPER(lcFilter),["],['])
lcfilter2 = STRTRAN(UPPER(lcFilter2),[.T.],[1=1])
lcAdvFilter2 = STRTRAN(UPPER(lcAdvFilter),["],['])
lcAdvFilter2 = STRTRAN(UPPER(lcAdvFilter2),[.T.],[1=1])

lnHandle = CURSORGETPROP('ConnectHandle','jomast')

IF EXISTS (SELECT *
           FROM   dbo.sysobjects
           WHERE  id = Object_id(N'[dbo].[fn_base36]')
                  AND xtype IN (N'FN',N'IF',N'TF'))
  DROP function [dbo].[fn_base36];

To the average person are those really all that different from each other?

As I write this, flying at 34,000 feet above our world, I wanted to take a moment to reflect on one of my motivations for continuing to pursue this knowledge and be the best at it. If you’ll excuse me now, I’m going to open up my ancient book of runes to study my magic so I can move up to the level 3 spells.