E-News From The Suntower Volume VIII, #6

Holiday Notice: Mark Your Calendars!
It's coming up quick! The week we've been telling you about for all these months will soon be here. Are you OK? Any last minute things? As they say at the altar, 'Speak now or forever hold your peace!'.

Being a family run business it is extremely difficult to get everyone together all at the same time. For our twentieth anniversary, we're getting everyone together from all four offices for a week-long love-fest in Dublin. And the net effect of this is: we will be closed from business for all except absolute emergencies from Monday April 24 through Sunday April 30. We will re-open on Monday, May 1st. Again, if there are real emergencies (database crash, earthquake, etc.) there will be someone available to help, but unless it is urgent. please bear with us until we're back.

SAFE Discussion: It's Optional
We're taking a break from talking about SAFE/8 in order to talk about something architectural about SAFE which matters in SAFE/7 and will matter even more in SAFE/8; namely the two Options tables which control much of how SAFE works for your business.

Global Options is a list of options that affect SAFE for all users, all the time. Many of these are accessible from the Setup:Company window, though there are many, many more.

Employee Options are options that affect SAFE only for the currently logged in operator. Many of these are accessible from the Employee Master, though there are many, many more.

Each option has a three attributes:
A Module - this is a code which identifies the area in the program or report that is affected by the option. For example 'UpdateSOHeaders' is SAFE's internal name for what you would call the 'Sales Order Editing Window'.

A Parameter - this is the actual name of the option. There maybe a bunch of parameters for any given module. In UpdateSOHeaders here are a few examples:

OrderIDFormula - This stores the formula for how Order IDs are assigned on new Sales Orders.

WarningNotesFormula - DThis formula determines when Customer Warning Notes will pop-up.

You get the idea. Now in addition to the fact that there are many, many of these, one other thing you may have noticed is that the purpose of each Parameter is usually pretty easy to figure out. That's intentional.

Now what we just discussed were all Global Options. Change their value and all users will be affected. There are also many Employee Options for UpdateSOHeaders. So each user can open a Sales Order Editing Window and have features that are customised for them. Some of these include

SQLRecordsToFetch - How many records are fetched when you open a browse. This customises the 'snappiness' of the program to the speed of your computer.

ClonePresetName1 - The name of Clone Preset #1 (each user can save his/her own Cloning Options).

Also, the Employee Options store the size and position of all windows and any report options you prefer.

The first is the hidden 'Suntower' value. There are a number of options which you cannot change; only we can. Or rather, we should say that you shouldn't because if your local database guru tries we'll act like we don't know you. Don't touch!

The other is a default value. Every option has a default value---which means it has a default behaviour. For example, the default for AllowDeletes is '1' which means they are allowed. So when you first get SAFE, users are allowed to delete orders. If you don't want this, you can then change it. A big part of configuring SAFE for your company is knowing which options are available, what their default values are and how to change the values where the default won't work for you.

SO WHAT DO I DO WITH ALL THIS KNOWLEDGE?
Well, that's for next time. You see, between the Global and Employee varieties there are currently over 30,000 Options in SAFE. We can't possibly document them all in our On-Line Help.

So, in our next issue we'll discuss how to figure out what options you can change, why you would want to change them and the mechanics of doing so. We think you'll find it rather eye-opening at how much control you have in customising SAFE to your company's needs.

Ciaran's Corner: Current System Recommendations
One of the most common questions we used to get was regarding system configurations. Those requests have dropped off. So I thought it was a good time to re-visit just what makes a good SAFE server. And that means it's time for an warm-up rant!

OH BOY! A RANT ON WHY YOU SHOULD BUY YOUR SERVER FROM US!
When we would get those requests, our usual response was, 'Buy it from us!' And not because we were (or are) so gung-ho on selling hardware. But rather because:

2. Everyone seems to have a brother-in-law who can get them a real good deal on a 'server'. And a lot of these setups end in tears.

Frankly, we were always surprised when you didn't purchase from us. Since you're in a value-added business, we initially thought that most of you would see that it's penny-wise/pound foolish to get a server from brother-in-law 'Fred'--especially in a field which is quite removed from (for many of you) your area of expertise. But since everyone does seem to have a brother-in-law Oh well. I can imagine the conversation in your office with brother-in-law Fred. 'Hey, just get a parts list from Suntower and let me set it up for you. I'll take care of everything.'

A typical nightmare scenario would be, not that the gear wouldn't work, but rather that Fred would drop off the gear and then leave all the actual server configuration and software setup to us. Hmmm.... I guess we're expected to provide that stuff for free, right?

And then a couple of months later, you need to restore from a tape backup. No one knows how to use the tape software. Call Fred. Oops. Fred's in Cancun. Good thing we have 'Suntower' to help us. For free.

A few months later, performance is crummy. Man that 'Suntower' software sure is a crock! So, anxious to avoid trouble we do a system analysis. Wow. That bargain server has el-cheap-o motherboard, insufficient RAM and some sort of 'disk mirroring' which is supposed to provide security, but which really is only slowing the database down to a crawl.

All these scenarios force everyone to work harder, waste time and spend more money in the long run. That makes us look bad. But it's really because someone told you that your server is a commodity item. Which it is and it isn't.

WHAT IS A COMMODITY?
The components are a commodity. The up front cost differential is apparent and it's easy to buy into the idea that that is the total cost of the purchase. But the intangible service that we provide to make certain everything works right from day one is an intangible but no less real. In other words, unless you've done this for a while, you can't know the value of savings on trouble you avoided. We tell you it's significant. Your brother-in-law tells you it's all a plot to get you to spend more money. Like they say on TV, 'You make the call!' But here's the question I would ask:

You trusted us to run your business with our software. That's far more important than any piece of hardware. (After all, as counter-intuitive as it sounds, it's the software that needs to last---not the computer!) So... why does it make sense to trust our advice for the program but not when it comes to the big white box in your closet?

BUT IF YOU STILL GOTTA BUY FROM FRED?
If my previous words don't reach you and you're going to get a Fred Special regardless, then at least try to do it somewhat safely.

The most important thing to know is that the technology has changed a lot in the past 18 months. Things were pretty stable there for a couple of years and there really wasn't too much all that 'new'. I think that lulled everyone into thinking that PC's were pretty much all the same. But right now, there are huge differences in performance between various small servers. So you now have to actually read the specs carefully.

Here are some tips on avoiding disaster. These aren't comprehensive, but they reflect where we are in April 2006.

4. Do get at least 2GB of RAM and do insist on a name-brand. Crap RAM chips are a leading cause of lock-ups.

5. Do insist on a quality power supply, cooling system and case. These things now draw a lot of power and generate a lot of heat. The days of getting a PC coming in some generic tin box are over. A bad power supply, or inadequate cooling are often death sentences for even the best PC.

Are you hearing a recurring drumbeat? Quality matters! The days of all PC's being generic are over. You simply must insist on a quality box. And no you can't assume that just buying from some place like Dell or HP is the answer. The truth is that all the big name players, like a lot of companies these days who are struggling to keep making quarterly profit goals, have started cheating on component quality on their less expensive products. If you go with those companies, you should avoid their 'value lines' entirely. Of course then that puts you in our price range. Hmmm... I wonder what that could mean?

IN SHORT...
Most of you have no business buying a server on your own or from brother-in-law Fred. Things have gotten too complicated in the past 18 months. So we now strongly encourage you to either buy from us or...
a) Have us sign off on any system before you buy
b) Budget for at least a few hours of labour from us to make certain that the system you buy is optimally configured for SAFE.

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