Volume III #18
IN THIS ISSUE:
A D M I N I S T R I V I A
A I V I R T S I N I M D A
1. Cost Center Identification of each order. You can now enter a cost center for each order which is automatically linked to a particular group of Contacts assigned to this Customer and Cost Center. Your Forms Management reports may be re-designed now to take advantage of this ability and subtotal by Cost Centers for each Customer!
2. You can also link orders to a particular Contact assigned to the selected Customer. Coupled with the new Cost Center feature, you now have a complete cost center management system when selling to larger customers with several orderers!
3. Numbered forms can now be tracked per release. So if you ship, for example, 200 checks to a particular location, you can review what the next starting number should be for that specific location within a larger organization!
4. There is now a separate customer value for each item you sell and release. In other words, you can assign a value to your customer's forms as they are released, which is independent of the price they actually paid for the item. This allows you to provide customized Customer Value reports for each customer which may be revised without affecting their sales history or your actual inventories!
5. User Specific Tagging can now be turned 'on' and 'off' for various modules. In other words, you can have User Specific Tagging for check printing, but global tagging for Sales Invoices!
6. You can now add Voided Checks directly to the Check Register. If you hand write a check and void it before it is entered into SAFE, you can now simply add the check into the Check Register as a Void without having to enter it, print it, then void it. Additionally, this may be done quickly for a whole range of checks. Say, for example, twenty checks are ruined because of water, you can enter the range 39000 to 39019 and void the complete list in a single step!
Check out the complete list of new SAFE 4.2 features by going to http://www.suntowersystems.com/new442.htm
.ThinSAFE Beta
2 Now Available!
The second major beta release of ThinSAFE is now available to those interested in being a part of
this exciting new product. To review, ThinSAFE is a thin client version of SAFE which
allows users to run SAFE from virtually any machine using the same interface as SAFE. The
difference is that your machine is connected to your main server over the Internet! This
means that you have a real-time connection to SAFE no matter where you are.
ThinSAFE works well even on slower computers and 56k modem connections, but with DSL or Cable Modems the performance is virtually indistinguishable from using SAFE in your office over a LAN! (In fact, we had to change the user interface slightly just to remind users that they are indeed, connected over the Internet and not using local data!)
Our second beta is very stable and we are now simply optimizing for more speed before final release. As always, beta testers will recieve a substantial discount on the gold release in exchange for their vital help in polishing the product.
ThinSAFE will be priced at $4,000 for unlimited users over a single Internet connection. Customers who have purchase Remote Office Extensions may cross-grade to ThinSAFE at a special price depending on how many remote office licenses you have currently in use.
Editorial: Dwindling Broadband Options!
We have received more and more calls
from customers who have run afoul of various DSL companies who are rapidly being run out
of business. The short version of why this is happening is that the Regional Bell
Operating Companies (RBOCs) such as Qwest, Ameritech, SBC, et al. have done their best to
stifle competition and prevent smaller DSL and voice companies from gaining entry into the
market place. The break up of the Bells was supposed to allow a level playing field for
all companies who wanted to get into the phone business, providing equal access to the
Bells' network. That simply has not happened. Furthermore, the Telecom Act of 1996 which
was supposed to make things more competitive for high tech services such as DSL and
Internet has had the opposite effect thanks to lots and lots of corporate lobbying. The
latest fiasco is a plan to remove the last block on the RBOCs to long distance service
which all but assures a return to the good ol' monopolistic days of yore. We've said it
before and we'll say it again: the RBOCs are not your friend, regardless of your political
persuasion. Reliable, competitive voice and data systems are the life blood of all
businesses nowadays and your company is at risk due to the shoddy service which you are
forced to accept from these companies. Have you checked your local service bill lately?
When was the last time it went down? Have you noticed just how responsive the
service of your local phone company has been when you've had a problem? Hmmm. Write
your Congressman. Write your Senator. Tell them that you do not support freeing
restrictions on long distance service between RBOCs (effectively undoing the AT&T
break up). But do it soon, as a final vote on this bill has been scheduled for
early in the fall!
CIARAN'S CORNER:
Windows XP Licensing!
Now that Windows XP appears on it's way
to final manufacturing we wanted to give you our opinions and for the most part, they are
extremely positive. XP Is not only quite stable and much easier to use, it also bridges
the feature gap between Windows 2000 and Windows 98 that prevented many laptop and home
users from making the switch.
We have found XP to be rock solid, as one would expect of the next generation of NT. Finally! We have had machines running XP since Beta 1 that have never crashed. Not once. And it also has all the ease of use and support for multi-media, USB and laptops that users of Windows 98 now take for granted. In other words, we believe that Windows XP has it all.
Actually, that's not just a phrase: there is so much stuff built into XP you better make certain that your PC has more horsepower than ever. In other words, think about a Pentium 1GB and 256MB of RAM as being the minimum for good performance.
Another downside is a licensing concern that has recently come to light, but which Microsoft has chosen to not address in the initial version. Basically. the problem is that if you move XP from one machine to another, or upgrade certain components, you may trigger something in it's code which disables your license and stops your computer from functioning until you purchase another license! Although this probably won't affect users of new computers that have XP pre-installed, it should be noted that users could run into a problem if they make too many changes to their system over time. For those so technically inclined there is an excellent article on the new licensing scheme for XP at http://www.licenturion.com/xp/.
Finally, there are some concerns raised by various Internet experts that there are significant security holes in XP. In MS defense, there will always be holes found in any operating system and XP has managed to plug nearly all the egregious problems found in all prior versions of NT and W2K. And when you have as many customers as MS does, it is inevitable that more holes be found than say with Linux, simply because something like 10,000 times more people are using Windows than Linux. In short, we do not see these concerns to be a reason to hold off. <BTW> if every network admin would simply keep up to date with the various patches to NT and W2K that Microsoft makes freely available, over 90% of the virus scares we routinely hear about would not occur. It is the simple fact that most networks are not kept up to date that hackers are counting on, not the lack of patches to the operating systems.
In short, Windows XP is the best Windows ever. It is more stable, easier to use and more complete than any previous operating system. It should work consistently well in all your scenarious (home, laptop, office, server) provided you have the necessary computing power (chips, chips, chips!) and are careful about upgrading machines to avoid a problem with the licensing management code.
Cheers!
---CM
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End of E-News From The Suntower, Volume III #18