Company Name	City	State
First Source	Houston	TX

by 'Uncle' Frank Ousterhout

 

Dear Uncle Frank,

 

                When I enter a date into Eclipse, do I need a full four digit year or can I use just two digits?  For example, should I use 14 or 2014 for this year?

 

                Scott from New Jersey

 

 

Dear Scott,

 

                Actually, when working in Solar, for the current year, you need neither.  Let me explain. 

 

                Solar Eclipse was programmed to be very smart with date (and time) entry.  If you want to enter January 20 of this year, you have multiple ways of doing it:  1/20  or  1-20  or  1.20  or  1  20.  They all work.  If you do need a different year, you can add just the two digits so next January 20 would be 1/20/15  or  1-20-15  or  1.20.15  or  1  20  15.

 

                Of course the easiest way to enter a date in either Eterm or Solar is just to use the 'F10' key.  This will bring up a calendar page and you can use your arrow keys to move to the date you want and then just hit 'Enter'.  So if it is Monday and you want to set a date for Thursday, you do not have to look at the calendar on your wall to see what Thursday's date is.  Just 'F10' and you can see the calendar date for Thursday.  (If you insist on using your mouse, you can also click on the little Calendar Icon next to any Solar date field.)

 

                Entering time has some neat features also.  You do NOT have to fully format any time entry for Eclipse for it to know what you mean.  Forget the ':' (colon).  You also do not need a full 'AM' or 'PM'.  With no designation, the system assumes AM time and just a 'p' will let the system know that you mean PM.  For example, 1020  is 10:20 AM, and 1020p is 10:20 PM. 

 

                Lastly, Eclipse also respects military time.  For 1:15 PM you can just type 1315 and forget about using the letter 'p'. 

 

 

                Regards,

                Uncle Frank

 

Did You Forget or Never Knew?

by  Elizabeth Richardt - CappUSA

PURGE MAINTENANCE

 

Purge Maintenance is an option that very few of us use on a regular basis, but it is a way to remove old logs from our system that can slow down processes. Depending on the number of files set to purge, the process could take several days or weeks the first time it is ran. This process should never take place during business hours. Although you can do "Manual Purges", Eclipse recommends using the Phantom Scheduler to set up regular purging when it will least impact your company. Since this is the case, I will only show Scheduled Purges.

 

What Logs should I consider purging?  When in doubt always check with Eclipse Support.

            MAINT.LOG     PROD.LOG       CARON.DETAIL            DTS.QUEUE

• How does the system know how many months are to be kept.  This is predefined in "File Definition Maintenance". Eterm - F2 - F - F  (If you are not familiar with this screen, do not make changes without consulting with Eclipse)
• Purge Maintenance - Solar - Maintenance -> Merge/Purge -> Purge Maintenance Eterm - F1 - U - M
• Manually enter the log or Press F10 or Click on the "?" for a list of available logs

• When you enter the Log, the "Keep Months" field will auto populate with the information from File Definition Maintenance
• Next Run Date - Displays the date the system will run the purge next - once it has been scheduled
• Last Run Date - Displays the date the system purged the file last
• Last Status - Displays the status for the last purge:
  • Finished - Process completed without incident.
  • Sleeping - Process suspended based on parameters entered in Purge Detail Maintenance, such as running during normal working hours.
  • Disabled - Process suspended based on parameters entered in Purge Detail Maintenance, such as running during inventory maintenance or a holiday.
  • Running - Process is currently running. Use the View > View Log option to review actions on the file, such as how many records were purged during the last run.
  • Stopped - Process stopped manually. The system restarts the purge process during the next scheduled time frame. Use the View > View Log option in Purge Maintenance to review actions on the file, such as when the purged was stopped.
• Next - Select "Detail Schedule" (Under Options on the menu bar or create a button) - to set "Detail Purging Schedule Setup"

 

 

• Use the View > View Log option from Purge Maintenance to review the status when the log was last purged and what changes have been made to the log purge process, to determine if records need to be reviewed or checked.
• Once you have entered the information on this screen, you are then ready to Schedule the Phantom Processes
  • From the Option menu, select Schedule to display the Phantom Scheduler screen and schedule the purge for regular intervals.
• You can stop a process if you begin a purge process and find that you need to stop that process due to system resource impacts.
  • From the File > Merge/Purge menu, select Purge Maintenance to display the Purge Maintenance window.
  • In the Purge File column, enter MAINT.LOG to populate the Purge Maintenance window.
  • Locate the line item you want to stop and select the check box in the Stop column.
  • The system changes the status of the purge to Stopped. The system runs the purge again at the next available time based on the schedule set up in File Definition Maintenance.
• If you decide to Purge the "PROD.LOG" - please be aware of the following:
• Product log files contain the cost, quantity, and location changes for a product as recorded in the Product Activity Log. The system displays a warning message when you schedule a purge.

• CAUTION!! 
• Purging the PROD.LOG could affect your Inventory Valuation Report if you check the history for calculated cost, such as average costs. We recommend carefully considering the purge before continuing. It also stores the historical average, average landed cost, the landed cost and the last cost.

 

Well, hopefully many of you will have scheduled or even implemented the Eclipse 8.7.9 Update by the time you read this.  If you are unaware of the purchasing benefits of this enhancement or the very powerful Queue Builder you will do yourself a big service to watch the recorded presentation on the User's Group website.  Simply go to www.eclipseuser.com, login, click on the VIDEOS tab along the top, then select the "What's New In Epicor Eclipse Release 8.7.9".  You will be glad you did!  One of the important reminders I'd like to stress is that this release is loaded with features that came from the users group member's feedback on purchasing. 

 

So what's next?  The next release, 8.8.0 will be focusing on Solar enhancements.  During the month of August, members of the Enhancement Committee will be meeting with the Eclipse Product Managers and perform a Deep Dive on the Solar community on the Ideas Site.  With this detailed review of EVERY idea, we are hoping to squeeze more of your suggestions into this next release.  "How can I help?" you ask.  I would ask that you, or your "Solar advocates" log onto the Ideas Site and review the Solar Community ideas, and vote.  Your votes do matter.  If there are two ideas that development is deciding between, the one with the greater votes will most likely win.  Also, if your great idea is not listed, please add it!

 

Here are a couple of Solar ideas that will get you started!

 

SOE customer selection should be sorted by the sort-by field in Customer File Maint - Idea to have customer accounts listed in alphanumeric order when creating a sales order for a customer with multiple ship to accounts. 

 

Window closes after use - Idea to keep report windows open after running a report instead of automatically closing.  Currently, Solar is very inefficient if you are running the same report multiple times.

 

Thanks again for helping to make Eclipse a better product!

Eclipse Users Group/UFO | 813-643-1001 | edufo@eclipseuser.com | http://www.eclipseuser.com
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