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RMClabel offers significant advantages over other third-party label printing software

Infor LN & Baan

Kathy Barthelt 0 86894 Article rating: 5.0

Since label information can be unique to a business, item, customer or functional area, RMClabel allows for an easy method to configure exactly what is needed on any type of label, including 1-D barcode, 2-D barcode and RFID labels. 

Built in label logic allows for automatic switching of label formats. RMClabel is built for Infor LN and Baan. It natively understands the table structures and easily integrates with any data collection application or Infor LN/Baan session

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Why should I automate my processes?

LN & Baan

Kathy Barthelt 0 35789 Article rating: 5.0

The truth of the matter is that automation is a necessity in order to stay competitive in today’s marketplace. The demand to do more with less is ever present. Automating your processes can give you the competitive advantage you’ve been looking for.

Basic automation tools also help manufacturers track performance, such as cycle times, and order-to-delivery times, so that they can measure improvements. This tracking ability provides a historical record, as well as analytics that can be used to predict future needs. With this information, manufacturers can keep a close eye on trends in production orders, and use them to identify seasonal and customer buying trends and triggers. This insight can be helpful in planning for needed resources—from personnel to raw materials.

Read more > Manufacturing Industry Perspectives - Shop floor automation: A necessity for competitive manufacturing

Contact Kathy Barthelt today to discuss how Crossroads RMC can help you automate your processes and propel your business beyond the competition.

 

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Infor LN & Baan Tip of the Week: Inventory aging analysis report

Kathy Barthelt 0 84480 Article rating: 5.0

A new standard Inventory Aging report can be printed in the Perform Inventory Aging Analysis (whina1440m000) session. This report is mainly based on the physical incoming and outgoing inventory movements and transactions. The date of inventory consumption or issue is compared to the date of receipt. If inventory is not yet issued, a reference date is used for aging calculation.

The report includes this information:

• Which inventory items are not frequently used or are obsolete.

• How long items have been stored in a warehouse.

• Inventory and transaction values. This facilitates the financial auditing process.

To use this new feature, an inventory aging analysis definition must be available in the Inventory Aging Analysis Definition (whina1140m000) session.

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What do you get with IDF?

Infor Development Framework

George Moroses 0 32998 Article rating: 5.0

What do you get with IDF?

With Infor Development Framework (IDF), you can configure your view of the application data without modifying the core application and its supportability. Included with IDF are several interfaces including:

• PowerLink – A Windows-based client for end users

• Link Manager – A Windows-based environment administration client for importing environments, starting and stopping environment, and installing Fix Patches.

• Net-Link – A browser-based client (used by LX when running with SiW)

• System-Link – A XML-based interface for processing transactions from external sources.

The IDF ISO includes several components:

• All of the above interfaces

• Enterprise Integrator – for customizing IDF components and creating new business objects

• EGLi – Enterprise General Ledger 

• CRMi – Customer Relationship Management 

If you already have IDF installed for Infor LX 8.3.x, then it must be upgraded to a level that is compatible with LX 8.4. IDF PTFs and Fix Patches are required. See the Infor LX IDF 06.03.05 Installation and Upgrade Guide for details.

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OTTO Q&A from the Director of Planning & Technology at Champion Industries

George Moroses 0 30283 Article rating: 5.0

1.  How difficult is it to initially install OTTO?

Dead easy is the straight answer. We relied on you to install, and you installed in the predicted 1 hour.  

2.  Would you install it on a test system or on the production system?

Production system is another easy answer. I use OTTO as the ideal prototype when talking to business contacts about “add-on” products. It is non-invasive; it only reads data from our ERP files. I know the implementation is 100% safe because no ERP files are ever updated (read corrupted) by OTTO.

3.  How difficult was it to implement OTTO? Was there a negative impact on daily operations?

There is a learning curve involved in using any new tool that has value to add. OTTO implementation is very low on the impact scale, but I would strongly recommend that a prospective client plan on investing in education and practice. OTTO implementation is low impact. No valuable tool is “no impact”.

Click here to learn more about OTTO

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Is the Crossroads Analytics Dashboard Product Better than Spreadsheets?

Crossroads RMC 0 33699 Article rating: 5.0

You bet it is!

The Analytics Dashboard allows you to take your data and configure it any way you’d like, all without touching your ERP system! 

Any number of reports can be generated with just a few mouse clicks. In addition, full color graphs are automatically generated to illustrate the data being presented. Paper reports and Excel spreadsheets are dated. With Analytics Dashboard, data is refreshed at the touch of a button. 

Analytics Dashboard for Infor LN & Baan >
Analytics Dashboard for Infor LN, BPCS, & M3 >

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MES News: Current trends indicate plants and factories are seeking to improve...

George Moroses 0 36853 Article rating: 5.0

Current trends indicate plants and factories are seeking to improve internal flexibility, implement a common information platform, and deliver real-time information. MES supports a variety of lean concepts on the plant floor, including kanban, waste reduction, load balancing, etc.  It maximizes your existing investment in your ERP system while embracing lean initiatives.  Visit our Crossroads MES page to learn more.

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Tips:  LX | BPCS | M3

Improves control over PO costing changes during invoice entry by replacing passive warnings with an intentional override action.

  • In ACP500D3 (Invoice Entry PO Costing), users previously could unintentionally accept changes by pressing ENTER, even when quantity to cost or amount to cost values had changed.

  • A new “F14 to Override” warning message replaces the old message:
    “Details have changed. Press enter again to accept data.”
    This ensures users acknowledge and confirm significant changes explicitly.

New System Parameter:

  • “Apply GRN Costing Tolerance for PO Costing” (optional):

    • Within tolerance: Displays the original message —
      “Details have changed. Press enter again to accept data.”

    • Outside tolerance: Triggers the new override requirement —
      “F14 to Override”

Benefits:

  • Enhances oversight and reduces unintentional cost acceptance.

  • Enables better control of PO costs when invoice details differ from expectations.

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Tips: LN | Baan

Kathy Barthelt
/ Categories: Infor LN & Baan Tips, Manufacturing

Infor LN & Baan Manufacturing Tip: Performance Problems in Generate Order Planning (cprrp1210m000)

When the Generate Order Planning (cprrp1210m000) session is run it can take minutes to days to finish the process.

The performance of this session depends on many settings, like the number of plan items, the number of orders, but it also depends on hardware and database setup.

Here are some guidelines on how performance can be improved.

  • Be sure you are always on the latest solutions with the planning sessions. We are constantly improving the software to gain more speed in the Enterprise Planning (EP) sessions.
  • The number of planned items is critical. Try to reduce the number of planned items. Is it necessary that all items be planned via EP? For shop floor stock the TPOP or SIC replenish systems are often more suitable.
  • When you use PCS, be sure to close the projects when they are finished. When a PCS project has status Closed, the customized items will not be planned.

It's better to run Remove Plan Items for closed Projects (cprpd1220m000). This session removes the item planning data for customized items of closed projects.

  • If you run EP with the option, Also Generate Item Master Plan and/or Online Update Item Master Plan, consider if you need an Item Master Plan for all plan items. An Item Master Plan is usually meant for global long-term planning. Again this is not very useful for shop floor stock. Reducing the number of master-planned items improves performance.
  • When you use Resource Master Plans; are all your resources really critical? If a work center is not critical do not create a Resource Master Plan for it.
  • When using Item Master Plans and/or Resource Master Plans, set in Scenarios (cprpd4100m000) the total scenario length as short as possible. For example, if your sales order horizon is 2 years, a scenario end date which is 3 years after the current date is sufficient. During the calculations of the Item Master Plan and the Resource Master, all periods defined in the scenario are checked and calculated. So if you have the end date of the scenario on 2038, EP will do the calculations (for every master-planned item) until 2038.

Defining a rolling scenario will keep your scenario length constant and you don’t have to worry that you run beyond your scenario's end date.

  • Updating the pegging relations has a serious impact on the EP performance. In EP Parameters (cprpd0100m000) you can set the Pegging Horizon in days. Keep this horizon as short as possible. The Update Signals by Item/Planner option also has some impact, but less than the pegging.
  • EP uses the so-called phase numbers to detect the lowest level in which an item is used within a BOM structure or in a supplying relation. If the phase numbers are not ‘up-to-date’, EP will correct the phase numbers during the planning. This takes time during the planning run. If there are loops in BOMs or in supplying relations, this recalculation has a big impact on the performance. Therefore you could run Compute Phase Numbers (cprpd6200m000) on a regular basis. For example once a month. Always run this session with the Generate Report option selected. If loops are detected these are reported. Be sure to solve all the reported errors.
  • When unexpected results occur, especially when the data is imported from external packages, always check the number of records in tables cprpd100 and cprpd120. The number of records should match! Remark: From 10.4 onwards the table cprpd120 has become obsolete so this point not applicable anymore.
  • The number of calendars also impacts planning performance. Then for every warehouse, work center, or BP, and so on, a different calendar is defined. Planning has to read all of these calendars from start to end. This can have a huge impact on performance.
    • If you link a calendar to a work center or warehouse, avoid defining a new calendar for every work center/warehouse. Try to link the same calendar to more than one department.
    • Define the start of the calendar close to the start date of the scenario. For example, the current date is 01-07-2014, the start date of the scenario is 365 days in the past. So a start date for your calendar could be 01-07-2012.
    • Define the end date of the calendar not too far in the future. Depending on the end date of the scenario you could use 5 years ahead.  For example, the current date is 01-07-2014, the end date of the scenario is 3 years in the future. So an end date for your calendar could be 01-07-2022. Do not define an end date past 19-01-2038, which is the last UTC date Infor LN can handle.

Also, the interaction with the database can have a big impact on performance. 
A commonly used way to improve the total run time of the EP run is to start the session in parallel processing. 
See also Knowledge Base Article 22881401 Performance, Tracing and tuning Guide, for more details.

These guidelines are just some hints, and a good starting point because performance is a complex issue.

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