Please Wait a Moment
X

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

Crossroads Connections

Infor ERP Tips & News from the Experts

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

IDF News: IDF Maintenance

George Moroses 0 33268 Article rating: 5.0

The Infor Development Framework (IDF) provides two options that you can use to review information about jobs that are in the job queue or underway at the workstations and change the status of unattached jobs or review detailed information for specific unattached jobs.

                Option 5 – Job Status Maintenance: Use this option to review information about jobs that are in the job queue or underway at the workstations. You can also delete records of jobs in the Job Activity (JOBACT) file.

                Option 6 – Unattached Job Status Maintenance: Use this option to change the status of an unattached job. You can also review detail information for a selected unattached job.

About 65% of the world’s population are visual learners. This extends into the ERP software realm, too.

Infor LX & BPCS

George Moroses 0 38721 Article rating: 5.0

Graphical representation makes complex concepts—like the intricacies of an ERP system—more universal, relatable and easy to understand.

ERP dashboards gather and visualize critical metrics from across the organization, offering insight into the performance, outlook and interconnectivity of business processes.

By setting up ERP dashboards that illustrate key metrics and compellingly communicate operational performance, key stakeholders will have a clear picture of the health of the business—and make better, more informed business decisions as a result.

The Crossroads Analytics Dashboard has preconfigured views for all of the following:

 Infor LX & BPCS
  • Sales Bookings (ECH)
  • Accounts Receivable (RAR)
  • Accounts Payable (APH)
  • Planned Orders (KFP)
  • Purchasing (HPH)
  • Shop Order Material (FMA)
  • Shop Order Operations (FOD)
  • CEA
  • Order Booking (ECS)
  • Labor History (FLT)
  • Sales History (SIH)
  • Material Status (IIM/ILI)

To learn more visit our Analytic Dashboard webpage.

Consulting News: How do I identify the processes that impact my ERP upgrade?

Crossroads RMC 0 40827 Article rating: 5.0

Identify all of the processes that impact my ERP upgrade

  • Identify all current users that transact/execute transactions
    • List users by transaction type/functional area
    • List users by shift worked (off-shift resources often support multiple areas/functions)
    • List users by time frame of use (Daily, Weekly, Monthly, Annually)
       
  • Identify all users that receive reports from the system
    • List last run date of all reports, queries and owners
       
  • Identify all data extract programs/routines
    • Downloads to Excel/Access databases
    • Downloads to Labor / Payroll Reporting Systems
    • Downloads to Assets Management Systems
    • Downloads to Third Party Logistics partners
    • EDI messages for requirements downloads to vendors
    • EDI Input for Order Entry, ASN, and Quotes.
    • Downloads/uploads to vendor Quality Management Systems

Infor LX & BPCS Tip of the Week: MPS vs. MRP

George Moroses 0 40697 Article rating: 5.0

What items should be MPS planned, and what items should be MRP planned…

Master Scheduled Items are those items that are finished goods, or service items, that receive their requirements either specifically from Independent demand, or both Dependent and Independent demand.

  • Independent Demand is demand that cannot be calculated from higher level demand in the product structure, and therefore must be either a forecast or an actual customer order (Finished Goods or Service parts sold to customers).
  • Dependent demand is derived from higher level demand in the product structure. Dependent demand includes components, raw materials, and sub-assemblies. (these are not normally Master Scheduled Items).
  • Service Parts may have both independent demand from forecast and/or customer orders, as well as dependent demand from higher level demand if that item is also used in other sub-assemblies or products.
  • Cumulative Lead Time is a concept used in Master Production Scheduling (MPS) that combines the “fixed” lead time, and the “variable” lead time needed to produce the product. It is the longest path through a given Bill-of-material. Based on the MPS setup options, Infor/ERP LX will calculate cumulative lead time (also called “the Critical Path”) for you (use the “indented BOM” display in BOM300 and find the item with the longest lead time “L/T”). Note: You may have to use Action 21, Line Detail, to see the “L/T” lead time for each item.

You’ve got a handle on your inventory requirements, right? Are you confident you can handle a rush order, or ten rush orders?

Baan & LN Add-Ons

Kathy Barthelt 0 30784 Article rating: 5.0

RMCbuild gives you the ability to report a component’s gross requirement, shortage, on-hand inventory, on-order inventory, allocated inventory, inspected inventory, production or work orders due to replenish component inventory, buyer or planner, and/or item group… and more.

RMCbuild takes all the surprise and guess work out of inventory planning. Give your employees the tools they need to do their job effectively.

Avalara isn't only tax calculation and returns filing....

Baan & Infor LN

Kathy Barthelt 0 35748 Article rating: 5.0

Did you know that in addition to tax calculation and returns filing, Avalara can also help with:

  • Business license and tax registration
  • Streamlined Sales Tax qualification
  • Nexus analysis and compliance
  • Tax document management including exemption certificates
  • Audit preparation

Contact us today! We partner closely with Avalara to provide you with solutions on ALL version of Baan and Infor LN!
 

Infor LN & Baan: Is Your House All In Order?

Kathy Barthelt 0 28311 Article rating: 5.0

Have you successfully closed all of the fiscal, tax and reporting periods for 2019 and closed the year? Sometimes this task hangs out there looming because either people don’t know what needs to be done, or there is a fear there are going to be problems.

Let Crossroads RMC’s expert finance consulting team help you through this.

Move into 2020 with ease! Contact Kathy Barthelt today to put together a plan for your close.
800.762.2077

RSS
First4344454648505152Last

Theme picker

Tips:  LX | BPCS | M3

TECHNOLOGY: Facility Security Ranges

Previously, a user could complete the Cost Transfer (CST920) process for any range of facilities regardless of their security settings established in SYS600. This enhancement verifies the user security settings set up in SYS600 before processing cost transfers for a range of facilities in CST920. If the user has authority for a facility range, but there are facilities within that range that are not authorized, the program skips those facilities and completes the cost transfer process.

FINANCE: Expiration Date for Quotes and RMAs

A Cancel-by-Date has been added to the Quote Header and RMA Header panels. This optional field can limit how long a quote or authorization to return items for credit is valid.  

For quotes, this enhancement provides an optional end date for the quote. For RMAs, it provides an optional date by which the customer must return the items to receive the credit listed on the RMA.

The Cancel-By-Date prints on the Order Acknowledgement and RMA Acknowledgement to inform the customer of this important limitation to the quote or return authorization. 

An Order Entry user cannot copy the quote to create a new order if the Cancel By Date has caused the quote to expire.

OPERATIONS: Default Split Salesperson to Customer Orders

Sales commissions are based on combinations of the Primary, Split, and Line-Level salesperson and the commission codes defined for the customer and item. You can now define the Split Salesperson in the same master files as the Primary Salesperson. While the Primary Salesperson is mandatory, the Split Salesperson is optional. It defaults during Order Create using the identical hierarchy as Primary Salesperson. Using Split Salesperson provides more flexibility in the calculation of sales commissions. The ability to define a default Split Salesperson improves the accuracy of sales commission qualification and calculation and reduces maintenance and adjustments necessitated by corrections.

Previously, a user could complete the Cost Transfer (CST920) process for any range of facilities regardless of their security settings established in SYS600. This enhancement verifies the user security settings set up in SYS600 before processing cost transfers for a range of facilities in CST920. If the user has authority for a facility range, but there are facilities within that range that are not authorized, the program skips those facilities and completes the cost transfer process.

12345678910Last

Theme picker

Tips: LN | Baan

Kathy Barthelt

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.

Previous Article Infor LN & Baan Tip of the Week: Limitations of Customer Defined Fields (CDFs)
Next Article Infor LN & Baan Tip: Broadcast message to users
Print
28607 Rate this article:
5.0
Kathy Barthelt

Kathy BartheltKathy Barthelt

Other posts by Kathy Barthelt

Theme picker

Contact author

x

Categories