Graphic Production Costs Added to Go2Show

Over the last couple of years several of you have come up with solutions to taking a Graphic order from a client. Some have been Go2Show solutions and some have been inside the core e-Info function.

Recently one of our sites who uses a rather slick  ‘Order a new Graphic”  trick in Go2Show asked for some help in both informing the customer of the costs for a New Graphic verses the typical pull & prep and making life a little better for their internal staff by eliminating a step in order processing.

The system was able to offer up an excellent solution and as a result we all get to share.

For the Asset type you want to allow the User to order, most likely Graphics, you need to add the new Attribute GRAPHIC PRODUCTION COSTS. Then when you upload your solution for placing a graphic order apply your Cost for that Graphic to the Attributes of that item.

On the Go2Show Selection screen that new value will now Appear and that same cost will be placed in a separate row on the Budget Screen all on one same click. The client sees their cost separated out on the G2S receipt and Budget and there is no need for any account time to go into a budget and separate the costs out.

Update to Default Asset Preferences Attribute Screen

For those site administrators who have been with us for a while you will no doubt remember holding one or more conversations regarding the Conflict logic rules. Likely not fondly…and I am sorry about any headache after effects.

We have dramatically simplified this situation based on user feedback.

The Default Attribute screen has a set of drop downs where you set “gray out days” for before and after a Project’s Open & Close dates. The days you add are to allow for transportation and on-site setup or dismantle. The system allows you to make this dates fields of varying duration as move-in and set up are frequently longer than tear down and move out.

Beyond these dates the system was original designed to allow for an arbitrary Days to Return to Warehouse date range controlled by us. This added value and the accompanying complicated math it generated has been a pain for many poor SA over the past several years. No more.

While the queries that control the system’s election to determine if an Asset is in Conflict is still the same we have changed the number of Conflict levels from four to just three.

An Asset is either:

 1. Not in Conflict and you can use Add to Cart

 2. In Conflict as a result of a DEAD overlap of any one day of the Project Open –Close days if you attempt to use Add to Cart you will be taken to Conflict Resolution but the Assets with a dead overlap will not display

3. In Conflict as a result of an overlap of the Days before or Days After setting you have established for the Asset type if you attempt to use Add to Cart you will be taken to Conflict Resolution but the Assets will appear in red if they are NOT a dead overlap and you can make a selection.

The net result is that you have more direct control over what will constitute a Conflict and the system is less restrictive in selection, it does assume you will use this new, more liberal authority wisely and make intelligent choices.

We are suggesting you take advantage of this new logic and reset your Days Before and Days After setting drop downs, based on the Days to Return to Warehouse being reset to zero, effectively removing it from the math of Conflict determination.

To help you in this change we have added a display of your site’s Days to Return to Warehouse current setting immediately under the Days before and Days after drop downs for an Asset.

This new feature will allow you to easily determine how to adjust your drop down settings.

Many sites have already moved to zero, if you have not, you will need to request that change from us.

Here is what we recommend for making this change.

1.  Review your Asset Type settings for Days before and Days After
2.  Make note of your current Days to Return to Warehouse setting ( It will be the same for all Asset Types)
3.  Discuss with your warehousing teams what if anything you might like to adjust.
4.  Contact us to schedule a cut over.
5.  At a scheduled time adjust all of your Asset type Days Before and Days After settings
6. By agreement we will, at the same time, change your Days to Return to Warehouse to < 0 > at the same time.The change will take effect immediately but will not impact any Scheduling of Assets already made. However since you will likely adjust your Days Before and Days after settings to simply reflect your current values, accounting for the resetting of the Days to Return to Warehouse being zero there really is no impact.

The real value is of course, the logic is easier to understand, your teams have more control of how they manage Conflict decisions and in the future you can make changes without having to reach out to us.

NOTE: We are recommending you make this change to simplify and obtain  full control.

Blue Bars & More Reporting Power

Those inventive little code guys have figured out how to build customized roll up Reports from the data captured under Blue Bars. In addition the data capture tools of Blue bars have been increased to include both Single select and Multi-select drop downs.

In short, you can now capture data on Blue Bars from many Projects and bring that data back to meaningful business reporting tools. There is a cost for this customized report development but if you have any thoughts on what might make for a good report please feel free to reach out and discuss that with us. 

Note: If you idea has enough merit and we feel it would benefit many sites we will work with you on that pricing.

Quick click icons make things easier

Don’t hate me. I could have done this ‘years” ago! I just never asked.

May I present for your clicking amusement two new but familiar icon shortcuts in an entirely new setting. When you use the Select a Project function, in addition to the original hyperlink from the Project Name to the Project Home Page, there are now those familiar icon shortcuts that will take you directly to the Project’s Summary Page or into the Project’ folder directory.

ENJOY!

EMERGENCY Server Maintenance Required

The hosting firm that maintains our network environment has identified an issue with our Network Interface Cards (NIC). The cards reside in a device that uses them to allocate workload. It is the device itself that is not fully utilizing both cards. To repair this situation, BEFORE it causes an issue, we need to perform this preventative maintenance ASAP. We have elected to conduct this preventive repair work this weekend beginning Friday, August 19^th. As a result the servers must come off line for a full backup and to prevent any data from being added during the repair work. A full backup of our servers requires something approaching 72 hours. 

The Servers will go off line:

 Friday August 19th @ 10PM EST

Service will not fully be restored until:

 Monday August 22nd @ 7AM EST

We apologize in advance for any inconvenience this may cause but this is a critical and necessary action we need to take.

Show Service Cost Factor Increase

Not many sites use the automated show service estimating module but for those that due they are aware that the rates have not been increased in our tables for two years. The loss of Trade Show Week and their wonderful annual Report of site costs put a damper on our source of creditable data.

Red7, the management firm for EDPA has taken up that charge and while they do not track as many items their information has prompted us to update ours. So if you are using this feature you should advise your clients and of course your internal Users as well about the increases.

New Cost Factors in the calan Tables:

Upgrade to Budget Service Item Management

Over the past months more and more sites have been establishing custom Budgets for their customers.

In the past if you customized a budget’s Service Item menu selection and then added a new Company; where you might like to use the same Service Item menu you had to contact us.

Now on Create you will have the ability use the calan default or to choose from any existing Company’s Service Item menu.

 

Once you make this choice on Create you will have to contact us directly for any changes. 

Note: As a few of our sites have discovered editing, a Company’s Budget Service Items, after Projects have been executed, especially as it has to do with Roll-up reporting can be a very painful experience. Please consider this decision very carefully at Create and try to establish your customized Budget screens before the Service Items themselves are populated for Projects.

As always contact us for any assistance you might require.

Celebrating our 200th Blog: “Well…duh!”

 It seems only fitting that our 200^th Blog should be a terrific addition that was the result of one of our User’s direct requests.

During a recent review with one of our long time subscriber sites, we were reviewing current practices and improvement opportunities. One of the daily Users of the Work Order module offered up how difficult it was sometimes to issue an addendum when you could not remember exactly what had been said in earlier releases. Sure you could flip away to another screen and find the information, but frankly that was a pain. Simple solution, display all of the prior releases for a WO category when you call that Category for an additional release. Well… duh!

This suggestion has been added.

Yes... you can Cut & Paste from the text displayed from earlier releases and then edit in the text box. Just be sure you get your cursor to display in the box before trying to Paste.

Note: Keep those wonderful ideas coming. We really enjoy adding features that make our user communities more productive.

Show Table offers New Reporting Value

Most of the time we are focused on a single Customer and their Project.  However it is not uncommon that a site will have many Customers going to a single SHOW. Think about sending three clients to CES 2012. (I know that sounds pretty good.)

In the circumstance above, there are real advantages to sharing specific data values across all of these Projects and having the ability to roll-up all of that data; like the Pick-Lists to give to the shop, all of the shipping requirement so you can merge shipments and of course passing all the Packing lists to your EAC set-up partner. 

Here are those new reports I just discussed. They all have the word SHOW in them. They look just like their original Project versions. You will need to add to the appropriate Roles for your site.

On the Create a Project Screen you’ll find two new entries.

You can select an Exiting Show. If you don’t see the Show you want you can use Add/Edit Show to Add a new Show or Edit an existing one.

When you select a Show it will default into the Project’s name. You can edit if you wish.

If you elect to Add a new Show it only takes two required values.

You can choose to add additional information like the Facility and Open and Close dates. This is a version 1 release. Over the coming months more data fields will be added and some additional reporting will be added.

Keep in mind all data copy overs are one time, one way only. If edits are made to a Show, it will not update a Project that is already associated to the Show. You can return to the Project’s edit information screen, deselect the Show and then re-select the Show to update. However if you have made specific edits to any of the values that are copying over it will overwrite those changes as well. There are alert statements to warn you regarding your choices.
Note: And yes in the near future you will be able to Copy Shows forward.