True Sky Planning™ is a powerful and flexible Planning, Budgeting and Forecasting solution that helps organizations manage and streamline their planning process. The basic philosophy of True Sky Planning™ can best be described as:

• Budgeted in Excel
• Managed in SharePoint
• Stored in SQL Server


In the coming months we will be releasing more on our True Sky Planning, Budgeting and Forecasting solution. For a more detailed overview on how True Sky can work for you go here, or to book your personal complimentary viewing call us at 905.470.6830.

Recently Microsoft released two new videos to highlight Dynamics GP 2010 R2 and the GP Product Roadmap;

• The first video highlights the key themes for Dynamics GP 2010 R2.
• The second video “Microsoft Dynamics GP Product Roadmap”, provides information on the future plans and some potential new features for GP.

If you are looking for a short summary of the key features in Microsoft Dynamics GP 2010 R2 you can download a PowerPoint presentation highlighting the new features or give us a call at 905.470.6830 x126 for a focused discussion.

Despite having to split our team and travel to both these events in the same week, TGO sees the events as a great opportunity to strengthen our partnerships within the communities and learn roadmap details for the upcoming year(s). Attending these conferences allows us to stay current on the array of technology offerings; ensuring that our clients and projects continue benefit from new technologies, best practices and solutions.

This time is very exciting. These conferences have traditionally been a platform where new announcements are made public and where both Microsoft and Sage highlight their continual investments into their products. It’s a great opportunity to learn first-hand the direction of Microsoft and Sage; see their solutions going forward and understand how they will benefit businesses.

If you’re at the either of the conferences, enjoy your time and feel free to say ‘hi’ to the TGO gang there. Otherwise, stay tuned as we share more on what’s trending at both conferences.

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Consider a task you perform on a daily basis. Are there webpages that you have to access to complete that task? Do you frequently visit customer or vendor websites? Do you access a webpage for currency exchange rates when updating your exchange tables? Do you use a shipment tracking website? All of these sites, and any others, can be setup as a custom link, saving you time, and making your group more efficient, by requiring fewer clicks of the mouse to open them.

With Custom Links there is no need to open Explorer or Outlook, simply click a link in the GP window you’re already using and the window opens automatically.

In this week’s Tips and Tricks we will go through some of the options available in Custom Links, and work through some useful examples.

GP CUSTOM LINKS SET UP

To set up Custom Links go to Microsoft Dynamics GP >> Tools >> Setup >> Company >> Custom Link

Select “New” or use the keyboard shortcut, Alt-N, and the Create/Modify Custom Link window will open.

DESCRIPTION OF FIELDS

Prompt: This is the “type” of link you’re creating. There is a predefined list of options to choose from.

Ex. Chequebook, Credit Card, Currency, Customer, Employee, Exchange Rate, Item, Salesperson, Tracking Number, Vendor

Custom Link Label: The label can be anything you choose that will clearly identify this link to the user.

Field Value: If you selected “chequebook” in the Prompt field above this lookup will give you a list of available chequebook IDs, if you selected “currency” it would give you a list of currency IDs, etc. There is a checkbox labeled “All field values”. If you want the same link to be available for all chequebooks, for all currencies, or for all customers, select this checkbox.

Internet Address: This is where you type the address of the window you want to pop up when the user clicks on the link you’re creating.

EXAMPLES

Example 1.0 – Create a link to a customer webpage

A link to a customer or vendor webpage can be useful in many situations. Clicking between multiple windows to look up the internet address and typing it in your Internet Explorer is inefficient. Even looking for the address in your favourite list in Internet Explorer takes more time than using Custom Links would.

This will allow you to automatically open the webpage that has been saved on the internet information window for the specific customer selected in any transaction window.

Links can also be added for the customer’s e-mail, FTP site (shown below), or any other field that is used on the internet information window.

Example 2.0 – Create a link to an online currency converter for all currencies.

If your organization uses multicurrency a custom link to the site that provides current exchange rates will make maintaining your exchange tables much simpler.

Once you click save on this window, anywhere the words Currency ID are underlined you will have an option to go directly to the Bank of Canada’s Currency Converter.

If you would rather attach this link to Exchange Rate rather than Currency ID use the following setup.

Now the words Exchange Rate on the Exchange Rate Entry window will give you the option of opening the online currency converter.

As you can see adding a new Custom Link is very simple, and allows you to take advantage of automation functionality in Dynamics GP. Consider how many additional steps you take in a day that can be automated using this feature!

If you have any questions about Microsoft Dynamics GP optimization please contact TGO Consulting at support@tgo.ca, or visit our website.

From the Microsoft website — With the Microsoft Portals and Collaboration competency, you can demonstrate to customers that you have the skills and proven experience in meeting team and organizational collaboration and connectivity needs across intranets, extranets, and the Internet.

While it has been very interesting (and frustrating) dealing with all the recent changes in the Microsoft Partner Network program, their tightening up of the standards to carry Silver or Gold certifications will definately help separate the wheat from the chaff in the marketplace.

A big thanks to the following team members at TGO who all studied hard to pass their exams:

• Jerry Bierema
• Richard Mintz
• Chris Mara
• Marg Wilson

Now that Convergence 2011 is about to begin, what does the Dynamics GP team have up their sleeve for this year’s event?  Well let’s just say that they have been busy. Over the next few days the Dynamics GP team will be announcing their new release, Microsoft Dynamics GP 2010 R2.

What is Dynamics GP 2010 R2, you may ask. Well using the old version numbering methodology, it might have been called Dynamics GP Version 11.5. Yes, in less than a year, the Dynamics GP team has added enough new features into this interim release to certainly earn a 0.5 version number. Here is a slide listing some  of the R2 Feature List.

Over the next few days the Dynamics GP team will be sharing more details and demos regarding Dynamics GP 2010 R2 and we will be highlighting some of our favourites here. If you want to learn more about the new features and functions in Dynamics GP 2010 R2, take a look at the Features of the Day released on the Microsoft GP Blog.

Until our next post,

Blair Hicken

Your TGO Consulting team