by Robert Hascall, Marketing Committee Chair

The Marketing Committee has undergone some changes over the past year and a half as the Newsletter Committee was brought under the umbrella of its responsibilities.  By the end of the year, another committee will align itself under the Marketing Committee; the Web Development Committee.  Bringing all of these committees under the same roof, as it were, will allow us to better utilize the tools of all three to keep you informed and focused on the benefits of being a member of the users group.  After all, the end goal of our efforts is to provide value to our member companies through the offerings in these three areas.  Here are some of the ways we are achieving this:

• Online bulletin boards - Here you will find peer-to-peer Q&A with experienced Eclipse users who can answer any question you may have about any Eclipse issue you may have and how problems have been solved with real-world solutions.
• IDEAS Site - Do you have a great idea for an Eclipse enhancement?  The IDEAS site provides you with a forum to post your idea where it can be voted on by the user community as a future enhancement to the Eclipse software package.
• Monthly Newsletter - Each month we send a newsletter to our user community that includes tips, helpful articles and offers from 3rd party Eclipse add-on software providers. 
• Communication - Have you liked our Facebook page?  This is just another way that we try to communicate with our user community-and even those who are on the fence about becoming a member.  Check it out when you have a chance.  And by the way, if you're a social media fan, let us know.  We're looking for someone with a passion for using Facebook (and Twitter too) to help us in that area.

What's New?

Check out our website (www.eclipseuser.com)!  We've made some changes to keep things fresh and more informative.  We've implemented a really cool slider on our home page which will help us provide you with more information at a glance.  Let us know what you think.

Help Wanted!

We're always looking for someone willing to write articles and help in other areas.  If you would like to help out, please contact Suzanne Saltmarsh to let us know.

Dear Uncle Frank,

                I constantly use the Eclipse message system, sending messages back and forth between myself and other workers here.  It is like text messaging, email or instant messaging but all from inside my Eclipse system. 

                But I use messaging so much that it is very hard to keep track of all the conversations I am having.  I ask purchasing a question and by the time I get a response of "Yes, it is on schedule", I do not know which inquiry of mine that they are responding to.

                From,

                Martha (the multi-tasker) from Montgomeryville

Dear Martha,

                The Eclipse message system has a view just for you!  I know you always start by viewing your received messages.  And sometimes you switch views to see your sent messages.

                But take a look at the DIALOG option.  It will show you BOTH the sent and received messages between you and one user!

                In Solar, from your Message Queue, go to the Mode menu.  You will see Received, Sent, Both and View Dialogue.  Check out the View Dialogue option.  Then, put it on your Custom Toolbar (along with Received and Sent) and then you can easily toggle between views.

                IF you are using Eterm, in the Message system, there is a hot key 'G' on the bottom listed as Dialog.  To leave the dialog mode, just hit 'escape'.

                Even better is to encourage everyone to use the RESEND option when replying to messages instead of either hitting REPLY or just starting a new message. 

                When using RESEND the original message is kept in the reply message.  It is like replying to email where the original email sent to you is shown in the bottom of your response. 

                Regards,

                Uncle Frank

by Chris Bohn, Enhancement Committee Chair

If you recall, back in June we added the Job Management and the E-Mobile Ideas Community.  To complement those new communities, we have created two new matching bulletin boards on the Eclipse User's Group website.  The same "rules" apply as with the other bulletin boards vs. the ideas communities.  Post your questions and requests for information on the bulletin boards and post your brilliant ideas for enhancing the Eclipse product on the ideas site.

Currently, there are many posts on the Job Management Ideas site.  These ideas came out of the User Group Member Job Management Steering Committee.  There are plenty of ideas so if your company is currently using Job Management, please have your appropriate staff review these ideas and vote, vote, vote.  A special thank you to Kris Hopkins, your esteemed User Group President for adding these ideas to the site.

Until next time...don't forget to vote!  

Using an Import Template.csv file you can take a list of part numbers and quantities and import them into a sales order in Eclipse. The Import Template allows importing of any of the following:

• Customer Specific Part Numbers
• Product Description (like 800TXA)
• Eclipse ID (called an Internal ID in SMP)
• UPC Code 

The Import Template.csv has columns for each of these types of data, and you can have information in more than one column. For example, you might have both a Customer Specific Part Number, and manufacturer's Part. You would want to include both, so if an exact match is not found on the Customer Part Number, it may still match on the manufacturer's part in the Product Description column.

To use this feature, create a .CSV file with columns like in the image below. To save time, every user on our system has a folder on their C: drive called Inbasket, and we save the Import Template.csv file in that folder.

The problem with manufacturer part numbers is there is often more than one match in Eclipse. The following process takes that into consideration by adding a period after the part number before importing:

  

1)      Copy the list of part numbers from whatever source - spreadsheet, email, or other document.

  

2)      Open the Import Template.csv file (On our PCs this is always located in C:\Inbasket\ folder for consistency)

  

3)     All rows below the first (header) row should be blank. Clear any pre-existing data below the header row by selecting those cells with data and hitting the [Delete] key on your keyboard.

  

This next section is to help prevent many "Product Not Found" problems by adding a period to the end of each manufacturer's part number, thus having Eclipse look for an exact match:

  

4)      Right click on cell A2 and select Paste

  

5)      In cell F2 enter the following formula: =A2&"."  The formula adds a period to the end of the part number in cell A2

  

6)      Copy the formula in F2 down for as many rows as you have part numbers in column A. To copy a formula down, select the cell to copy, then click and hold the little black square (called a Fill Handle) in the corner of the cell and drag down. 

 

 

7)      Right click on the header of column F and select Copy

8)      Right click again on the header of column F and select Paste Special.

9)      In the Paste Special dialog, select Values, then click OK.

10)   If your source document has quantities, copy and paste those into the Quantity column in cell H2. If you don't have quantities the bid will default to a Qty of 1.

11)   Close the Import Template.csv file.

12)   Click Save or Yes on all following dialogs

13)   Start a new Sales Order Bid for the customer.

14)   On the Body tab go to Edit Order>Import.

15)   In the Order Entry Data Import dialog click OK.

16)   Products that were not recognized will display as "Product Not Found History" with the part from the template as a comment line. Type over "Product Not Found   "with the part number to see potential matches.