Overview

MOGenerator provides a number of useful Manufacturing integration utilities, such as the ability to create MOs, reschedule MOs, create child-MOs, and receive MOs.  Collectively these utilities will be referred to as MOGen in this post.

MOGen can be run manually, where it runs one time and processes all available records in the integration tables, and then stops.  Or, it can be run continuously.  When running continuously, it periodically polls the integration tables to see if there is anything to process.

When MOGen is part of a system integration, a common need is to have it run automatically on an unattended machine.  The steps below describe how a GP client can be configured to launch automatically everyday, run MOGen during business hours, then shut down.  The benefits of this process are that it ensures no GP clients remain connected to the SQL server during maintenance periods, and it provides for regular “refreshing” of the GP client (which tends to run better if it is regularly restarted).

 

Configuring MOGen

See the MOGen documentation for more information about this window.

Mark the box next to “Auto-start after login”.

All of the Timer settings are saved automatically, and reload when each time the window is opened.

The Timer must be ENABLED.

Stop After x-Hours.  Enter the number of hours the utility should run before it shuts down.  For example, 10-hours would calculate an end time 10-hours in the future from the moment the IMPORT button is clicked.

Close GP When Done.  MARK this box.  The macro discussed below will launch MOGen, when the stop time is reached, MOGen will stop processing and close GP.

If the utility will run overnight, add this setting to the DEX.INI file:

SuppressChangeDateDialog=TRUE

This setting keeps GP from popping the “Do you want to change the date” dialog at midnight.

Login Macro

If MOGen is going to be run on a dedicated GP client PC, or a VM that is not a shared GP instance, you can configure GP to remember the Username/password and Company.  These settings are stored in the DEX.INI file so they can only be used on a dedicated GP client.  If you can do this, skip the Login Macro information below.

The Login Macro will be used by Windows Scheduler to launch and log-in to Dynamics GP.  It then opens MOGen and clicks the Import button.

There are a few import sections of the macro.

The logging file entry:

Using a logging file keeps GP from popping up a dialog box when the macro finishes running.  The dialog box would interfere with MOGen, and also prevent GP from closing.  Set the path name to an appropriate location for your system.  A good place is in the GP\Data folder.

Username and password:

The Username and password are in plain text.

The next section of the macro selects a Company.  If you only have one company, or the MOGen user has access to only one company, remove these lines from the macro.

The next section of the macro opens the MOGen window and clicks the Import button.  If you have a newer build of the software that has the “Auto-start after login” option, remove these lines from the macro.

Selecting the company :

Edit the macro so that the “item 1” line selects the correct company from your login window:

As shown above “item 1” corresponds to “Fabrikam”, and “item 3” corresponds to “ZArchive”.  If you need “ZArchive” change the macro to “item 3”.

Download the MOGen login macro text file at the link below.  After downloading the file, change the extension to “.mac”.  Save the file into the GP Program folder, in the same location as DYNAMICS.EXE.

GPLoginMacroMOGen

Windows Scheduler

Use Windows Scheduler to create a Basic Task to “Start a program”.

The Program/Script is the path to DYNAMICS.EXE, such as

“c:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Dynamics\GP2016\DYNAMICS.EXE”

In the Add Argument field, enter:

DYNAMICS.SET GPLoginMacroMOGen.mac

If you can set GP to remember Username/password and Company, you do not need the Login Macro line above, just DYNAMICS.SET.

Set up the Task Schedule as desired.  The frequency with which the Task runs must be coordinated with the Timer Settings on MOGen to prevent launching GP before MOGen has closed GP from the previous run.

 

Monitoring MOGen

MOGen updates a record in a “heartbeat” table every time it runs.  So if MOGen is set to run once every 15 minutes, the heartbeat will be updated every 15 minutes.   The heartbeat table can be monitored to see if MOGen is still running–if it has quit updating the date/time stamp, it has quit running.

See the MOGen documentation for more information about monitoring MOGen remotely.

WithoutWire Inventory Sciences (www.withoutwire.com) just released a new video showing how manufacturers can make efficiency gains with their WMS System and Microsoft Dynamics GP.  WoW integrates to GP Manufacturing through WilloWare’s MO Receipt Integration utility.

ItemCopy (in WilloWare’s MFG PowerPack Suite) creates a new Item by copying settings from an existing Item.  “But wait,” you say, “Doesn’t GP already have an Item Copy?”

Yes, but the list of what the GP Item Copy can copy is pretty short (see above).

WilloWare’s Item Copy covers much more, including all of the Manufacturing related information.  It has options for copying Notes (Item Notes, Routing Sequence Notes), mapping Routings to the new Item, choosing which BOMs to copy, and much more.

The real unique power of WilloWare’s Item Copy is that it can create AND update Items from an Excel spreadsheet, or from a SQL staging table.

Sample of the staging table

Sample of the Excel spreadsheet

In both examples, the first row shows a “add new item” record, and the second row shows an “update existing” record.

By using the table or Excel import utilities, a large number of new items can be created quickly by copying from “template” items.

It can also update specific fields on existing items, and as part of creating a new item.

When importing from Excel, field updates are created by using the Table Name and Field Name as the column header, such as IV00101.USCATVLS_1.  The “new value” is entered into the rows below the column header.

The Excel spreadsheet shown above would update CAP100 to set the User Category #1 field to “Rev 2”.

The Excel and Table import utilties provide an easy way to load all of the setup needed for new items when implementing GP.  In a simple manufacturing environment, the Template Item could have a simple 1-step routing, which could be copied to new items, saving the step of needed to manually create hundreds or thousands of routings.

It could also be used as part of an on-going integration to support an external quoting system, or engineering system, which needs to create new items.  A simple integration to the staging table (New Item & Template Item) are all that would be needed to automatically create the Items in GP.

GP Report Extender (GP-REX) is a Report Writer enhancement that allows easily adding any field, from any table, to any GP Report Writer report.

You do not need to know VBA or Dexterity.  You just need to be able to write a simple SQL query.

The new video demo shows how easy it is to add a field…from a different DATABASE…to a report running in Fabrikam.

View the video here: //youtu.be/ArEgnkmXwpI

 

We just released (06-FEB-2017) an exciting new feature in Consulting Toolkit called GP Report Extender (GP-REX).  GP-REX adds Report Writer functions that allow retrieving data from any table in the database.

A quick internet search on “Dynamics GP Report Writer” and “How can I add a field” yields pages of results.  This has been a frequent challenge with Report Writer for the entire history of Dynamics GP.  If a table is not already linked to the report, or a table linked to the report does not have relationships defined to the needed table, the is no way to get the data on to the report.

GP-REX solves this problem by providing Report Writer functions that execute SQL Stored Procedures.  The Report Writer functions pass parameters to the Stored Procedures where anybody proficient with tSql can code a query to retrieve the desired information.

Use GP-REX to:

Retrieve information from 3rd Party Products or customizations

Perform complex text manipulations (i.e. masking a SSN or Bank Account)

Perform complex calculations

Update other tables (since GP-REX is in SQL, you could have it add records to a table to track each time a report is printed, or make other updates to the database during printing)

Perform language translations (i.e. have column headers and item descriptions print in the Customer’s language)

Add amount paid, or a “Paid In Full” message, to an invoice

Think of GP-REX as Report Writer functions that are actually stored procedures.  It unleashes the capability of tSql  to accomplish any task* you want from a calculated field on a GP Report.

* By “any task” we mean anything you can do with tSql. 🙂

We at WilloWare are very excited to bring you this new tool that solves such a common problem.  Read more about it here:

//willoware.com/products/consulting-toolkit/