Online Modifier with VBA Workshop

If you are looking for Modifier with VBA training, fellow MVP Mariano Gomez is delivering a 3 day, online Modifier with VBA workshop next week.

Modifier with VBA is an important piece of the GP toolkit, so if you have any interest modifying GP solutions, make sure you hit up this workshop!

I'll be a Convergence Booth Babe

If you're looking to say Hi at Convergence I'm doing 2 sessions, Tuesday at 5 p and Thursday at 2p. I'll hang around afterward too so come by and say hi. Also, I'll be working the I.B.I.S. booth at the Expo quite a bit so feel free to stop by. With the economy being what it is I've been tasked to fill the booth babe role for part of the time. I.B.I.S. was hoping to find someone one more attractive but since Marissa Miller doesn't know GP, they settled for me. They've even promised to get me a booth babe badge!

So come by, say hi, abuse me and take a look at some of I.B.I.S.' offerings.

(For those of you unaware, a "booth babe" is an attractive person, usually a woman, hired to showcase a company's wares at conventions. Often these are aspiring models or actress acting like they understand the company's products. For the politically sensitive crowd, this term is typically viewed as slightly demeaning, however, I'm using it in an ironic way since I'm neither an aspiring actress nor model and am demeaning only myself. For the less politically sensitive, this disclaimer is intended to be sarcastic).

Windows Update Causes GP VBA Problem

Several folks are reporting that a recent Windows update is causing problems with VBA code in Dynamics GP. Developing for Dynamics GP has the details.

Managing in a Downturn Part II

Dwight Specht adds to his series on Managing in a Downturn with his third installment. In part 3 Dwight looks at product and service strategies in tough times. I you are a partner and you're not reading this I'm worried about you. You don't necessarily need to agree with every piece but you should be reading it.

Project Accounting Customer Frustration

Over at Dynamics GP Land, Steve Endow is so frustrated with connecting customers to Project Accounting that he has a 2 part blog entry on it! The core issue is that Project Accounting uses a behind the scenes 5 digit alias to connect back to the customer number and it doesn't work the way you would expect it to. In most cases, this is invisible to the user but every once in a while when reloading PA or installing things later it's possible to break this link.

The fix is easy for one customer, open the customer and click the project button. That's not terribly useful when there are thousands of them. We have a script internally to deal with this and it's nice to see Steve publishing a fix as well.

Make a PO Field Required for a Specific Customer

The MBS Guru has a new post up on how to make a PO Field required for a specific customer. It's nice to see MBS Guru posting more.

Office Smart Tags for Dynamics GP

Over at Rose Business Solutions, Steve Chapman takes a look at Smart Tags usage with Dynamics GP and Excel. I confess to loving the idea of smart tags but over the years I've been disappointed with the execution. It looks like things are finally coming together. Make sure that you check out Steve's article.

Reasons TO Customize GP

After a flurry of posts with reasons NOT to customize Dynamics GP, the MBS Guru comes back 5 good reasons to customize GP. I think we all agree that it depends. A well done customization provides great benefits and will upgrade pretty seamlessly. A poorly done one is a mess. It's great to have all these discussion points

1099 Minimum Problem

Over at About Dynamics, Development and Life, Jivtesh points a flaw in the minimum amount for 1099's when the 1099 amount is exactly $600. It's an easy fix and we're past the 1099 deadline for this year but it's still good info to have.

Weekly Dynamic Project Accounting GL Accounts

This week's Weekly Dynamic segment is a little different. I'm pointing you to my I.B.I.S. ERP Blog post on GL Accounts in Project Accounting where Ross Carlson and I have created an example of posting flows for Project Accounting. This Excel based template includes examples, journal entries and T-Accounts to help people understand Project Accounting's posting flow. We've tackled both Time and Materials and Fixed Price projects. There's even a place to put in your own accounts to help figure out what accounts go where.

Our examples are complete but don't cover every possible scenario. The goal was to take the whiteboard work we do and make it a litte more permanent.

Managing in a Downturn Part II

Dwight Specht takes a look at part two managing a Professional Services Firm in a downturn, specifically Staff Turnover. This is a topic very near and dear to the hearts of many Dynamics GP Partners and since I report up the chain to Dwight, it's a topic very near and dear to my own heart.

You can bet I'll be including this comment from the entry in my next review:

Consulting staff has the knowledge of your products and customers.  They will lead you out of the downturn because they’ll be there to do the work as clients need it done.  They can survive without a manager; you can’t survive without them.

Reset GP After IM Error

A few weeks ago, the Weekly Dynamics tip covered killing a GP session after an Integration Error. Now Steve Endow at Dynamics GP Land has taken things one step farther by creating a batch file that will kill the open session, clean up and restart GP for you.

New Look for Developing for Dynamics GP

I love the new look of Developing for Dynamics GP. David Musgrave took the wraps off of it last week. If you only read their stuff via RSS, make sure that you take some time to visit the site.

Scripting Errors on the Dynamics GP Home Page

If you are getting errors like this

Line: 335 Char: 6Error: The data is invalid URL: file:///c:/Documents and Settings/[user_folder]/Local Settings/Temp/tmp16A.tmp on your Dynamics GP Home Page, Mariano Gomez has the answer over at the Dynamics GP Blogster.

Who Has Been Logged in Too Long?

The MBS Guru was kind enough to take a small nugget of SQL code and turn it in to something useful. People occasionally ask "How can I figure out if people are logged in for too long?". Well, the Activity table in the Dynamics database holds the login date and time and The MBS Guru has taken that info and built the SQL code to use in a business alert in Dynamics GP. That way you can get notified if someone has been logged into GP for longer than a specified period.

I'll add a link to this in the SQL Repository as well. Thanks Guru!

Disabling Multicurrency in Dynamics GP

Mariano Gomez has a nice post on how to disable Multicurrency in Dynamics GP.

Dynamics GP Customizations

In a new article on MSDynamicsWorld.com, fellow MVP Mariano Gomez takes a hard whack at customizations. He looks at the common reasons for customizing Dynamics GP and whether those reasons make sense. The funny part is that typically I agree with everything in the article but I'm in the middle of a project with some large customizations.

The fact of the matter is that sometimes there are constraints, whether they be organizational, industry or personnel that will mandate a customization. The point is that you should be really sure that you need a customization before you head down that road.

Dogfood

Just so you know that I eat my own dog food, this issue came up at a client today and I had the answer in about 12 seconds. I hit DynamicAccounting.net search with "Outlook" and there was the answer. That's another reason why I blog stuff. Computer memory is cheap, human memory is expensive!

Dynamics GP Dev at Convergence

Developing for Dynamics GP has a great roundup of all of the development related sessions coming up at Convergence! Make sure that you check out this post and go to Convergence!

Weekly Dynamic: Project Accounting Reference Transaction

There is no way to do a negative transaction in Dynamics GP Project Accounting for transaction types other than Misc. Log transactions. Or is there? For Timesheets, Equipment Logs and Employee Expense you are stuck making adjusting transactions to reverse the original entry. Or are you?

Are you intrigued yet? Many people don't know that you can create a "Referenced" transaction in Project Accounting that allows you adjust a posted transaction.

For example, in a PA Timesheet transaction (Transactions->Project->Timesheet Entry), instead of leaving Transaction Type as STANDARD, click the drop down and change it to REFERENCED. In Reference Doc Number, enter or lookup the timesheet transaction to adjust. In each line, select the project and cost category id to adjust. You can process negative amounts for this line but you can't subtract an amount that is greater than the original amount.

Adjustments can go both ways. You can subtract time from one project and add it to another for example. The original transaction does need to be posted, otherwise, just adjust the unposted original.

Referenced Transactions are available in Timesheet, Equipment and Employee Expense transactions. Inventory transactions have Return functionality instead and Miscellaneous logs allow negative.

Why I Do This

For those of you wondering why I do all of this Dynamics GP blogging, here is a prime example of the reason:

http://msdynamicsgp.blogspot.com/2008/07/weekly-dynamic-budget-wizard-bug-in.html#comment-8362048792340876591

For those of you wondering how I do all of this Dynamics GP blogging, well, it's good to have a little mystery in your life.

Don't Get Lost in Translation

Over at Developing for Dynamics GP, Dave Musgrave is taking on language translation in Dexterity and GP in a whole new series of posts. Make sure that you check it out.

Revenue/Expense Deferral

Steve Chapman takes a look at Revenue/Expense Deferrals, one of the Revenue/Expense Deferral options in Dynamics GP. In case you were wondering, the other two are Project Accounting and Contract Administration. If you have Revenue/Expense deferral needs, make sure that you take a look at Steve's post.

Tax Assist for GP Supports County Identifiers

From the I.B.I.S. Products Blog, Jack Sowers points out that in addition to supporting zip codes for tax jurisdiction identification, Tax Assist for Dynamics GP also supports and optional county code to fine tune the specific taxing authority. This comes in handing when zip codes span counties.

Reasons to Avoid Too Much Customization

One our friends in the Dynamics NAV world has a nice post on why to avoid too much customization. All of these reasons apply to GP, NAV and any other ERP system you can think of. It's certainly worth a look!

50 Tips at Convergence

,Ok folks, my session at Convergence,"Getting More out of Microsoft Dynamics GP, 50 Tips in 50 Minutes" now has two scheduled times and locations. This should be pretty solid as the schedule is supposed to be final. The first session is scheduled for 5-6pm on Tuesday, March 10 in La Nouvelle AB. This is your chance to start things off right with stuff you can take home and use.

If you're too jet lagged to make it, there is an encore presentation on Thursday, March 12 in Room 335 from 2-3pm. This is a good option if you want to make sure that all these tips are foremost in your mind when you go to work on Monday.

Either way, we'll try to replace some of the brain cells that you'll lose during Convergence evenings!

Sales Forecast to MRP

Steve Chapman has a new post up on as he termed it "...the most elusive screen in the whole system." That would be the MRP Forecasting Selection Screen. Make sure you check out Steve's post.

Weekly Dynamic: Restart Project Accounting

Project Accounting setup can be tough to get right the first time in Dynamics GP. Sometimes a company simply wants to dump their existing Project Accounting implementation and start over without ripping out the rest of their GP implementation. Maybe they only implemented PA for internal projects and now that setup won’t properly support external projects.

There are lots of considerations to take into account before doing this. It is not something to be done lightly. Make sure you understand the implications of this. Those implications are beyond the scope of this post. Make sure that you consult with your partner before doing this. This can also be useful if you are testing PA in a test company and want to start over completely. If you’ve done your homework and you are ready to restart Project Accounting, here is how you do it. In SQL Server Management Studio:

1. Delete DYNAMICS..DB_Upgrade where PRODID = 258 and db_name = 'Company ID '
Use the company database ID for your company.

2. Delete DYNAMICS..DU000020 where PRODID = 258 and companyID = x
where “x” = the companyID from DYNAMICS..SY01500

3. DROP TABLE PA10702
run against the company database


Yes, it really is that simple. After you log in the next time, you’ll get a message that Project Accounting is not setup and PA looks just like it does after a fresh install. Sometimes a fresh start is easier than you think.

[H.T. to Ross Carlson of I.B.I.S. for figuring this out while we were working on resetting a PA test company]

Project Accounting Miscellaneous Logs

Steve Chapman and Rose Business Solutions take a look at Miscellaneous Logs in Project Accounting.

SQL View to Show SOP POP Link

Victoria Yudin has a SQL View to show items with a SOP POP link on her blog.

Why Are Pictures in Dynamics GP Limited to 32kb?

David Musgrave takes us deep into Dynamics GP and tackles the question of why pictures are limited to 32kb. Is it Apple's fault? Btrieve? Ctree?

Using GP to Find Potential Revenue

Over at Implementing Microsoft Dynamics, Paul takes a look at mining your existing ERP system, like Dynamics GP, to find revenue opportunities. It's definitely worth a look!

SEC Mandates XBRL - Warm Up Your FRx

Warm up your FRx skills. The SEC has now mandated the use of XBRL for financial reporting. For large filers, this begins with financial statements ending on or after June 15, 2009. Smaller filers get more time but you'll still have to do it. FRx Buzz has info on how to implement XBRL within FRx.

Microsoft's New BI Direction

Dwight Specht weighs in on his thoughts about Microsoft's new BI direction. Unlike other posts (including mine), Dwight offers specific advice to customers in addition to his insights.

Project Accounting Asset Tracking

I've been swamped with a couple of long days in the last week so I'm catching up. First up, Christina Phillips has a post up at Dynamics GP land on tracking capital expenditures via Project Accounting. Many people think of PA as a black hole so any Project Accounting information is helpful and we've see a lot more coming out over the last several week. Thanks for a great post Christina!

More FRx Direction

The more I hear, the more it sounds like the Dynamics teams got blindsided by the partial death of PerformancePoint. Tim Foster of Trudell Medical was kind enough to point me to another FAQ that give some better interim info on the fallout.

In a nutshell, Management Report lives. It will still succeed FRx. Forecaster lives for now. Enterprise Reporting is back from the dead (risen or zombie we don't know yet. I suspect zombie but zombies can be hard to kill.)

This felt like a "we have to say something" announcement. I'm hoping to hear something concrete at Convergence.

Stop and Look before you Code

Dave Musgrave has a great post up on when it makes sense to create a customization. We tend to follow a hierarchy similar to the one that David outlines:

1) Standard Functionality
2) Process Redesign or Field Repurposing
3) ISV Solution
4) Partial ISV Solution with customization
5) Previously created customization
6) Customization from scratch

Make sure that you check out David's whole article.

Project Accounting and Deferred Revenue

Steve Chapman at Rose Business Solutions has managed to keep following up good posts with more good posts. If have a need for Deferred Revenue, there's more than one way to solve that in Dynamics GP. Steve takes a look at using Project Accounting to fill the need.

Contract Administration

Steve Chapman had a nice post last week on Contract Administration and Revenue Recognition. I'm just a little behind in catching up on posts.

Weekly Dynamic: Killing a Hung Integration

If you use Integration Manager with the Dynamics GP Destination adapters, at some point, you’ll end up with a hung session. Typically this happens when a when an integration fails but Dynamics GP does not return to availability.

The symptom of this is often a message about closing all windows prior to running the integration, even though all windows are closed.

When you run an integration with the Dynamics GP adapter (versus the econnect IM adapter) Dynamics GP must be open. When you click Run, GP disappears and reappears when the integration is complete.  What happens in the background is that Integration Manager writes to GP through the interface. The interface is hidden to improve speed and prevent interference. If the integration fails and GP does not reappear, GP may still be open in the background. If you open GP again, you actually have 2 GP sessions running and this is really confusing to Integration Manager.

There is a simple fix for this. Simply open up the Task Manager and kill the Dynamics task. Then reopen Dynamics GP and reintegrate. In very rare cases where this has not worked for me, rebooting always fixes the issue.