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Infor LX Tips, Infor LN Tips, BPCS Tips, Baan Tips, Infor M3 Tips & Infor ERP News

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Infor ERP Tips & News from the Experts

Infor LX | Infor LN | BPCS | Baan | Infor M3

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

Kathy Barthelt 0 85153 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.

What do you get with IDF?

Infor Development Framework

George Moroses 0 33147 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.

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

George Moroses 0 30647 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

Is the Crossroads Analytics Dashboard Product Better than Spreadsheets?

Crossroads RMC 0 33882 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 >

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

George Moroses 0 37009 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.

Infor LX & BPCS Tip of the Week: Purge optional during Month/Period End - LX 8.4

George Moroses 0 57783 Article rating: 5.0

For various month/period end programs, the purge function is now optional.

Scope:

INV903, Inventory Month End Close, optionally purges both inventory records as well as customer invoices. Some applications already have a flag or option for purging (for example, ACP900) and other applications are stand-alone. If you do not want to purge, do not run these programs: Order Purge and Close, ORD900, Close Quotes, ORD930, and Delete RMAs, ORD935. Now there are options on whether to purge records during the month end or period end programs.

The Benefits include:

• Flag or option added to allow the user to decide whether to perform month-end function with or without purge.

• Allows for month-end processing without purge.

• Improves efficiency of month-end processing.

Impact:

This enhancement includes these programs or areas:

• INV903, Inventory Month End Close

• ACR900, A/R Period Close

• CST900, PRF900, SFC900 Shop Order Close

• PUR900, Purchasing Month End Close

Johnson Crushers Selects Crossroads RMC for LN 10.6 Data Collection

Kathy Barthelt 0 38074 Article rating: 5.0

Johnson Crushers International (JCI), a global leader in engineering and manufacturing full lines of cone crushers, horizontal and incline vibrating screens and track-mounted, portable and stationary crushing and screening plants, has selected Crossroads RMC’s Data Collection solution for their Infor LN 10.6 implementation. 

JCI’s main objectives with this project are to support their continued growth and enable a continuous improvement effort to drive additional value to the business. In phase 1 of this project, JCI will implement Crossroad RMC’s Labor Reporting and Maintain Receipts data collection applications. Go live is expected to occur in early Q1 of 2020.

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Tips:  LX | BPCS | M3

Tips: LN | Baan

Kathy Barthelt
/ Categories: Infor LN & Baan Tips

Baan/LN Tip of the Week: Product Configurator - Part 2

Baan Tips

Who gets involved?
  1. Most commonly Engineering is involved in writing the rules, creating the bills and routings.
  2. Sales or Customer Service determines the questions and the order they are asked in.
  3. Sales or Customer Service determines the rules for the pricing.
  4. Sales, or Customer Service, and Engineering work together in determining the part number, description and text.

What are the steps?

  1. You must start by defining the features and options (questions and answers) and the order in which these are asked. We work this out first using sticky notes and large easel paper. Normally during the process we find that we want to move these questions around. Setting them down on paper makes the process of getting the data into Baan much more efficient. We also then have a record of what decisions were made prior to entering the data. This is normally a joint effort of Engineering and Sales. This is required and must be the first step.
  2. Constraints for features and options. These are the rules for determining what questions are asked and which options are allowed. This is generally done by Engineering or whoever is responsible for the configurator. This is required.
  3. Generic Bill of Material. All possible bill options are entered here and constraints are written to determine which options are selected based on the answers to the questions. This is generally done by Engineering or whoever is responsible for the configurator. This is a required step.
  4. Generic Routing. Similar to the bill of material, but used for generation of the routing steps. This is generally done by Engineering or whoever is responsible for the configurator. This is optional.
  5. Generic Item Data. This consists of creating custom item numbers, descriptions, text, material, size or standard fields in the custom item master. This is generally done by Engineering or whoever is responsible for the configurator though Sales may have some involvement. This is optional.
  6. Generic Pricing. This is used to calculate the selling price based on the answers to the questions. This is normally a responsibility of Sales or whoever determines the pricing. This group is also trained on writing the constraints for this section only. This is optional.

What other modules will be affected?
  1. Quotes, sales orders and projects.
  2. PRP planning for the configured items.
  3. Managing changes to the configuration. Who, what and when?
  4. Variant statistics.
  5. MPS and generic items.
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