October, 2004

 

In This Issue:

APOS Freeware

Dynamic Parameters - Powerful New Features!

Object Manager - Powerful New Features!

KPI - Powerful New Features!

Subscription Manager Update

APOS Help Desk Support - An Update

Case Study - Thomson Learning, Cincinnati, USA

Migrating from Seagate Info to Crystal Enterprise

Business Objects Annual User Conference

New Features for Current Products

APOS Suite of Add-In Solutions

APOS Freeware *Yes, It's True, Software, No Charge

We've developed a variety of useful tweaks and solutions for Crystal Enterprise™ that we offer on our web site. Note that APOS Freeware is provided complimentary and without support.

Visit here to download any of these freeware solutions:

ePortfolio Tree Menu *New

A set of csp pages that provides a tree style presentation of Crystal Enterprise folders, reports and instances. Viewing instances is supported while scheduling is not supported. Simply copy these csp pages into a separate folder, share the folder as a web site and try it out!

Update User Preferences

Now you can easily update specific preferences settings across all your Crystal Enterprise users at once, instead of changing them all individually.

ePortfolio Events tab

Now you can easily provide users with the ability to add an 'Event dependency' to a scheduled report right from the standard Schedule page in Crystal Enterprise.

ePortfolio Reschedule button

Now you can easily provide users with a 'Reschedule' capability right from the standard History page in Crystal Enterprise.

Dynamic Parameters *Powerful New Features Added

Currently our most popular product, Dynamic Parameters is now better than ever, check out these new features:

Performance - An enhanced algorithm is now used to enhance the loading time of parameter values into ePortfolio's schedule page.

Capacity - Enhanced to support loading long lists of parameter values - as many as 11,000 parameter values can now be loaded!

Multi-Select Parameter Values - the parameter value listing now supports multi-selects to facilitate selecting multiple parameter values.

Viewing Reports - now you can view reports in a new page while the parameter page is left open, facilitating re-running the same report with different parameter values.

Parameter String Values- Parameter string values with single quotes are now supported as an option.

If you want to check out how Dynamic Parameters can help your organization, please visit here to request demo download instructions and our current price list.

Object Manager *Powerful New Features Added

Now, using Object Manager, you can make changes to Crystal Enterprise settings for report objects, in bulk, in one step:

Set Refresh Options - Instead of setting Refresh settings for reports one at a time, Object Manager now allows you to change Refresh settings on groups of reports, in bulk. You can specify what Refresh settings to apply to the group of selected reports - title, description, current/default parameter values, record/group selection formulas, printer options, default database logon info, etc.

Set Audit Notifications - Object Manager now allows you to specify whether to create an audit log of success and/or failure status on groups of reports, in bulk.

Set Destination Defaults - Object Manager now allows you to specify the desired default destination settings on groups of reports, in bulk. All Crystal Enterprise destinations are supported - FTP, Email, unmanaged disk, etc.

Set Server Process Settings - Object Manager now allows you to specify the desired default servers to use for scheduling, viewing - on groups of reports, in bulk.

Set Viewing Refresh Defaults - Object Manager now allows you to specify the business rules for refreshing report content when viewing - apply settings on groups of reports, in bulk.

If you want to check out how Object Manager can help your organization, please visit here to request demo download instructions and our current price list.

KPI for Crystal Enterprise *Powerful New Features Added

Now, the APOS KPI database is updated with more information about your Crystal Enterprise than ever before, supporting comprehensive off-line analysis of critical aspects of your system:

Business Views - APOS KPI now captures and stores Business Views information (supported by a new APOSKPI database table: AP_BVObjects).

Business Views Object Relationships - APOS KPI now captures and stores Business Views object relationship information (supported by a new APOSKPI database table: AP_BVRelationships).

Discussions - APOS KPI now captures and stores Discussions objects information (supported by a new APOSKPI database table: AP_DSObjects)

Plus, enhancements are now complete to speed up KPI's operations:

Performance - Added the ability to exclude Crystal Enterprise user security information which will enhance scan performance.

Subscription Manager *Update On This New Product

Since its release a month ago, we've been encouraged by the interest in our innovative Subscription Manager Add-In Solution.

Subscription Manager for Crystal Enterprise allows authorized Crystal Enterprise users to 'subscribe' to specific reports, so that they receive the latest instance of a report whenever available. Subscription Manager comes with Crystal Enterprise ePortfolio integration.

If you're interested in additional information, please visit here to request demo download instructions and our current price list.

APOS Help Desk Support - An Update *Investing in Quality Support

If you've contacted our Add-Ins Help desk recently, you were hopefully impressed by our ability to respond. Most of our support is provided to companies evaluating one of our Add-In solutions prior to a purchase decision. A smaller percentage of our support calls are from current customers.

Over the last year, we've invested in an online knowledgebase, an online case entry /inquiry system and additional quality personnel to provide the best support we possibly can. It all seems to be paying off . . .

To APOS:

"I have been working with APOS technical support staff with the add-ins through yesterday and find that I have new messages from support@apos.on.ca this morning! I really appreciate and commend the technical support team during this testing period. Nou Moua and Mark Watson have been excellent as professionals" . . . from a satisfied customer

To APOS:

"Once again, you came through with excellent service. I love your tech support service. Part of my criteria for selecting a company to purchase products is how good / responsive is their tech support. Obviously your company is coming through with flying colors. Please pass this up the chain"

. . . from a satisfied customer

To APOS:

"I also want to THANK you in getting this process to function and in your assistance in identifying what was going on with our install.  Your professionalism and technical expertise are wonderful.  You know the product very well and when you had questions you had the resources to back you up.  Here is a 2 handed pat on the back for a job well done" . . . from a satisfied customer

Case Study - Thomson Learning *Cool Customer

“We have another process in place that reports off an Oracle database. We are able to pick up changes made to this database and feed them to InfoScheduler. So InfoScheduler has allowed me to move away from monitoring changes to the Oracle database and freed up my time to focus on other improvements” said Francisco Calderon, Business Analyst, Thomson Learning based in Cincinnati, Ohio.

Tools Used:

InfoScheduler (with Crystal Enterprise™ 8.5)

Background:

With over 9000 employees in 40 countries and 2003 revenues in excess of 2.1 billion USD, Thomson Learning delivers sate-of-the-art learning solutions for individuals, businesses and institutions worldwide. Thomson Learning is among the world’s largest providers of tailored learning solutions. In the academic marketplace, they serve secondary, post-secondary and graduate-level students, teachers, and learning institutions in both traditional and distance learning environment. Thomson Learning is part of the Thomson Corporation.

Business Issues:

• Reduce labour-intensive operations for scheduling reports

Even though the Thomson Learning databases held the vital historical data that Business Analysts like Francisco Calderon needed, the issue was not extracting the data. Rather, it was how to schedule and distribute over 500 Crystal Reports to as many sales representatives, with minimal manual intervention.

 “You’ll find our sales representatives in hundreds of higher learning campuses throughout the USA and abroad. Clearly, we wanted to help our sales folk by giving them the latest market-derived information so that they could act on it. For example, we could tell them which customer or potential new customer does not have the latest edition of a particular text book. So, we created a detailed report. Unfortunately, we quickly realized that it was prohibitively labour-intensive to schedule over 500 reports in Crystal Enterprise,” recalled Mr. Calderon.

Solution:

• Automate the scheduling of the reports using the APOS InfoScheduler add-in software product

Francisco Calderon determined that the best solution for his organization was to use the APOS InfoScheduler product. With this Microsoft Excel-based tool, Mr. Calderon was able to reduce the number of reports by allowing them to schedule a single report for processing, and then using Crystal Enterprise’s email service to deliver the reports to each member in the salesforce on a specific day, at a specific time.

“The salesforce now have a predictable process for receiving their reports, so important to them,” emphasized Mr. Calderon.

Results:

• Freed up time to improve report content and database administration process

Time is a modern day asset that is increasingly more difficult to manage. So any activity or technology that frees up time can lead to compelling advantages. Mr. Calderon noted that InfoScheduler has given him the ability to focus on two key areas. First, he now spends more time creating better information for the reports emailed to his salesforce. Second, he has improved the database administration process.

“We have another process in place that reports off an Oracle database. We are able to pick up changes made to this database and feed them to InfoScheduler. So InfoScheduler has allowed me to move away from monitoring changes to the Oracle database and freed up my time to focus on other improvements ”, said Francisco Calderon.

To read the full Thomson Learning case study or view others, visit here.

Migrating from Seagate Info to Crystal Enterprise? *We Can Help

Some aspects of migrating from Seagate Info to Crystal Enterprise are challenging. APOS has the tools and experience to assist with special needs like migrating existing report schedules from Seagate Info to Crystal Enterprise.

Visit here to request additional information on Seagate Info migration services.

Business Objects Annual User Conference *User Event of the Year

We hope you're joining us in Dallas on Nov 7 - 10, 2004 - a number of APOS team members will be there and participating! If you're attending, please look us up at the Vendor Fair where we're showing all our Add-In solutions - with some new add-in solutions being shown for the first time!

Visit here for additional information and to register.

New Features for Current Products *Stay Current

For current release notes on all our Add-in solutions, visit here to login to our new self-service portal, and then Search our new knowledgebase for all articles containing 'Release Notes'. Here's some recent update highlights . . .

Dynamic Parameters v.10
 • a number of new features, see article above

KPI v.10

• a number of new features, see article above

Object Manager v.10

• a number of new features, see article above

APOS Suite of Add-In Solutions *Extend Crystal Enterprise

One of our challenges is keeping our customers and colleagues current on the APOS suite of Add-In products as it grows. Visit here to request demo download instructions and our current price list.

Administration - System Monitoring . . .

DocAssist - report design content analysis & repository tool

Instance Monitor - email notification of failed instances

KPI - who is viewing which reports, license usage analysis, server activity monitoring

Administration - Scheduling . . .

Bursting Manager - burst a large instance into small ones, burst one report to many

InfoScheduler - power batch scheduling from Microsoft Excel

Administration - Instance Administration . . .

Instance Manager - administrator power tool

Administration - System Administration . . .

Object Manager - report promotion, object management, security maintenance

RunTime Manager - availability time windows for Crystal Enterprise components

Extending ePortfolio . . .

AddressBook Gateway - integrate an addressbook with ePortfolio scheduling

Business Calendars - customized calendars for report scheduling

Dynamic Parameters - SQL-based, user-specific pick lists, cascading parameters

Extending Distribution . . .

Distribution Server - email link, email content, failure notification, distribute on alert

Subscription Manager - allow users to manage their own report subscription

Row Level Security . . .

Processing Extension RAD - fast track processing extension development

View Time Security - row level data security without C++ development

Frequently Asked Questions

Visit here to see our latest FAQ list summarizing many of the needs our customers have been asking for help with in our various add-in solutions.

Suggestions, Requests, Unique Requirements

If you have a unique reporting system requirement, let us know. We love to work on special projects and regularly save our customers a lot of time and money by using our Add-In solutions as a fast-track foundation for a specific customized solution.

 

 

APOS Systems Inc.
Head Office: 285 Fountain Street South, Cambridge, ON, Canada N3H 1J2
Tel: 519.653.2767 - Fax: 519.653.8511
Branch Office: 30703 Blueridge Drive #13,  Abbotsford, BC, Canada V2T 6M8
Tel: 604.864.0766 - Fax: 604.864.4291
Email: apos@apos.on.ca - Web: www.apos.on.ca

 

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(c) 2004 APOS Systems Inc. All rights reserved. Crystal Decisions, Crystal Reports, Crystal Enterprise, Crystal Analysis, Seagate Info and Business Objects are trademarks or registered trademarks of Business Objects SA. All other trademarks or registered trademarks are the property of their respective owners.