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Ecommerce Programming for Great Plains Dynamics Gp – Introduction

admin — Tue, 18 May 2010 14:02:26 +0000

If your organization deploys Microsoft Dynamics GP Great Plains ERP and you are thinking on connecting it to your eCommerce site, we would like to give you initial introduction – where to start digging GP, tools, integration options, limitations, pluses and minuses and others typical FAQ. Current version of Great Plains is 10.0, we assume that it is reasonable to be at list on version 9.0, prior to begin ecommerce connection project â?? otherwise you will be reprogramming your integration with version upgrade. If you are on older versions, especially on Pervasive SQL 2000/Btrieve or Ctree/Faircom (this might be the case if you are on GP 7.5, 7.0, 6.0 or earlier), we recommend you first upgrade to MS SQL Server based version (you should contact you MBS VAR and they will provide you with the migration tool and it is recommended that professional Great Plains consultant does the conversion)

1. Sales Order Processing module or SOP. This module is typically integrated with your e-commerce application. In eCommerce you create either SOP Order or SOP Invoice. The easiest scenario is to create order or invoice without inventory items allocation, this is especially recommended if you are trying to program integration in SQL stored procedures

2. Great Plains tables structure. This is one of the first questions, which we hear from developers. You should login GP, depending on version, we will give you the path for version 10.0: Microsoft Dynamics GP->Tools->Resource Description->Tables. Tables are grouped by GP series: Financial, Sales, Purchasing, Inventory, etc.

3. Microsoft Dexterity technology. You should be aware that if you populate GP table records, you should treat GP business logic accordingly. The most important is treating GP Dexterity business logic, which is validated when Great Plains client application tries to read records, populated by you â?? if business logic is violated and could not be validated, Dexterity interface will error out and you will make GP ERP inoperable

4. eConnect. Yes, this is what you should consider to use whenever possible in e-commerce. eConnect core is set of SQL stored procedures, which allow you to create, modify, delete GP master records (customer, vendor, inventory item) and work transactions (such as SOP invoice, or SOP order), plus eConnect allocates invoice or order lines, so the limitation of topic one is not a problem here. What eConnect can not do is post individual transaction or SOP batch â?? this routine is left to GP operator by GP architecture

5. Posting Server. Alba Spectrum Posting Server allows you combine eConnect with autoposting directly from eCommerce application. Posting server is GP Dexterity application and should be installed on separate GP workstation (or your GP server, where you keep GP workstation with Posting server running). When deploying posting server â?? you will need to place approved batches to custom tables and posting server will take care of posting process

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Ecommerce For Dynamics Gp Notes: Econnect Batch Posting

admin — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 00:41:58 +0000

Microsoft Dynamics GP is becoming very popular ecommerce ERP and accounting back office. This trend is probably related to success of eConnect SDK, especially for Dynamics GP 10.0 and 9.0 versions. eConnect allows you, being generic C#, VB.Net programmer with good SQL and XML skills to program Great Plains objects manipulation: Customer, Address, Sales Invoice, Customer Payment and other attributes of ecommerce shopping cart. eConnect, being coded in SQL Server Stored Procedures (they are encrypted, so you probably should not expect to trace SQL code for Great Plains business logic there). In this small publication we would like to share with you ecommerce coding experience and Dynamics GP automatic batch posting from eConnect application directly:1. Older versions of Great Plains Dynamics GP. If you are on GP 8.0, 7.5, 7.0, 6.0, 5.5, 5.0 or earlier versions, we recommend you to upgrade to Dynamics GP 10.0 as for this version eConnect is really advanced. If you do not have registration key, probably due to the fact of lapsing in Dynamics GP Great Plains annual maintenance program, consider deploying Sales Order Connector, or set of SQL stored procedures, created for ecommerce web developers of older Great Plains version to connect ecommerce shopping cart with GP Sales Order Processing module, please call us for details. If you are on Pervasive SQL or Ctree, your options are very limited, you can still try to program ODBC connection to Pervasive SQL 2000 database, but then you will have to reprogram the logic, which is in fact available in eConnect (if you migrate from Pervasive to Microsoft SQL Server and upgrade to new version GP 10.0)2. Automatic Batch Posting. Here we often hear from ecommerce programmers the question – why eConnect doesn’t have the tools and logic to post Great Plains SOP Batches (as well as post batches in other Great Plains modules). The answer is in GP architecture (it is pretty common, and you should expect similar restrictions in other ERP and MRP platforms). The concept of ERP business transactions flow suggests you to use three phases of transaction life: work, open and historical. eConnect allows you to create work transactions, in Great Plains these are newly created invoices or sales orders, placed in the batch and submitted for Great Plains user review and posting. In order to trigger Dynamics GP batch posting from eConnect application directly – you have to deploy Great Plains add-on – Alba Spectrum Posting Server3. Posting Server. It consumes one user license and deploys Dynamics GP Dexterity source code to trigger the same coded logic in Dexterity for batch posting. Autopost is targeted to eCommerce web programmers, plus it post virtually all types of Great Plains Batches: GL, Inventory, Payroll, AP, AR, SOP

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Dynamics GP eCommerce Integration Notes

admin — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 00:48:03 +0000

Certainly, if you are building ecommerce from scratch, then you should consider products as the base of your future ecommerce web application. However, and this is probably your case, in ecommerce scenarios we often see legacy ecommerce portal, which does the job, and your role is to give some impulse as software developer in your IT department to ecommerce integration evolution. In this case you are moving away from emailing orders “automatically” from ecommerce to Great Plains users to somewhat like batch overnight ecommerce Sales Invoices and Payments processing or even in ideal case to real time Invoices creation triggering from ecommerce to Dynamics GP SOP module. Popular PHP based ecommerce shopping carts also create customer profile on the fly or update existing customer. In this case integration goes to Receivable Management Customer Master file in Great Plains. Let’s take a look at technical side or programming tools:

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Benefits Of Rss In Ecommerce

admin — Sun, 28 Feb 2010 00:29:02 +0000

Really Simple Syndication (RSS) is an XML-based format for content distribution. News, information, enterprise applications and weblogs (blogs) can all be published in RSS. When a new article is posted or a change is made to an application, RSS feeds can automatically notify the user. Text, images, audio (including podcasts) and video can be incorporated into RSS feeds.
RSS feeds can help keep you up-to-date on news, information and blog posts, making you more knowledgeable and productive, both at work and at home. According to Technorati as of March 2006, there are more than 30 million RSS feeds available. Most mainstream news and information sites publish RSS feeds.
There are a number of different use cases for RSS since both internal (enterprise applications, blogs, reports) and external (industry news, competitive information, blogs) content can be delivered as feeds. In particular, many businesses see benefits by not having to periodically check Web sites for key updates or wade through traffic on e-mail distribution lists. In addition to increasing knowledge and productivity, RSS feeds can also be used for brand monitoring, crisis communications, internal/executive communications and competitive intelligence.
Media Companies and Other Content/Information Providers, RSS feeds offer readers, visitors and customers a convenient way to read and access their information. RSS feeds can also be incorporated into Web sites to offer a more personalized and rich user experience, strengthen the brand and maximize revenue opportunities.
To view RSS feeds, you will need an RSS reader or aggregator. There are a number of free or low-cost online, desktop, mobile and Outlook—based readers available. To leverage RSS for a large number of users inside of a company, you will likely need an RSS server to handle security and scalability issues, centrally manage users and groups and present a common interface. To aggregate RSS into an external Web site, you will also need a server-based solution, either hosted or customer-premise based.
RSS and ECOMMERCE
Many online retailers like NewEgg.com are utilizing R.S.S. feeds to keep there customers coming back. If you visit NewEgg.com you will see R.S.S. icons near the sites’ products, with messages offering users regular updates on those products. Once a user has indicated a preference for, say, LCD monitors or daily specials, he clicks on the icon telling the company to send the alerts to his personalized page.
If the user directs NewEgg.com to deliver alerts to a My Yahoo page, NewEgg.com will send the alert, typically an item description with a photo, only when it has a new product or a promotion relevant to the specified items.
Customers might not expend the energy to surf through all the merchandise to find items of interest each time they visit. But R.S.S. is a way to basically position highly relevant interest in front of consumers.
Retailers who are employing R.S.S. feeds are ahead of the curve, but not unreasonably so. It’s still a little too early for this to catch on widely, but as something for the future, it can be incredibly rewarding and potentially very lucrative for retailers.
If you are interested in more information about RSS for your company, Bizatomic boosts your site optimization by creating RSS feeds containing top search engine keywords and adding them to your website. Placing “keyword-targeted” feeds on your webpages will greatly enhance your ability to achieve optimum keyword density. A news feed is preferable to a search engine feed for SEO because news feeds are updated more frequently.

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Dynamics GP ecommerce programming: eConnect, Dexterity, SQL Scripts

admin — Sat, 27 Feb 2010 00:42:13 +0000

If you already have Microsoft Dynamics GP, formerly known as Great Plains Dynamics, implemented in your company, and you also have established and in-house supported ecommerce application, it is natural next step to automate integration. Typically automation covers Catalog items synchronization and publishing from Dynamics GP Inventory Control module; Sales Orders or Invoices batch mode or real time integration from ecommerce web site to Great Plains Sales Order Processing module; new Customers creation and existing customers info update in ecommerce and moving or updating them in Dynamics GP Receivables Management module. Sometimes you go beyond these basic integration routines and do Stock availability for specific item in specific warehouse or location; Sales order tracking, where you check order lines fulfillment in Dynamics GP SOP module with shipping via Starship or another FedEx or UPS tracking add-ons. We are here to offer you help in tuning our existing custom solutions and scripts to expedite ecommerce integration projects, please read ecommerce integration highlights below:

1. eStore ecommerce server integration to Great Plains. We offer scripts for eStore integration to Dynamics GP SOP, Receivable Management and Inventory Control modules. We are happy to provide several case studies and customer references, where ecommerce is deployed on eStore and Dynamics GP tandem

2. eConnect coding. With Dynamics GP eConnect SDK you can expect master records (customer, inventory item, address, vendor, etc.) and work transactions in the batch creation and update directly from your ecommerce C#, VB.Net application. Again, here we are emphasizing Solutions approach, where we will give you integration codes and guide your eConnect MS Visual Studio programmers in tuning and deploying these codes

3. Microsoft Dexterity and eCommerce integration. One of the obvious advantages in deploying Great Plains Dexterity engine is GP batches posting directly from your eCommerce application. We have special product, dedicated to Posting Great Plains Batches automatically – Alba Spectrum Posting Server or Autopost. It is written in Dynamics GP Dexterity and it deploys original GP Posting logic

4. SQL Scripting in GP ecommerce. This approach is a bit challenging as you will have to imitate Dynamics GP business logic in direct SQL insert statements, and here we encourage you first to review eConnect, as it does exactly the same things in encrypted SQL Stored Procedures. We have Dynamics GP Order Connector, this is the set of our custom SQL Stored Procedures and it enables ecommerce programmer to integrate Sales Order and Invoice directly to GP SOP module. The advantage of Order Connector is high performance, comparing to both Dexterity and eConnect (as we use simplified business logic, assuming that you are following simple ecommerce integration rules)

5. Please, feel free to call us: 1-866-528-0577, help@albaspectrum.com

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Dynamics GP Ecommerce Programming and Integration Notes

admin — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 00:40:42 +0000

Microsoft Dynamics GP is open to ecommerce programmer via eConnect SDK, as well as Microsoft SQL Server programmability tools (typically Stored Procedures and Views). Before you dive into technical project of eConnect programming, please, review Great Plains Integration Manager module and its customization options: VBA scripting of Before Document Commit (as very common modification point) event; you can schedule IM integration with Windows Macro or deploy free and ready for purchase applications, extending basic Windows Macro with additional functionalities. Dynamics GP Integration Manager based (for version 10.0 and future versions 11.0 and up) on eConnect technology (in addition to supporting old OLE Server integrations), meaning that IM integration should be able to achieve the same goal with less efforts. And as you should expect the same limitations for eConnect as you have for Integration Manager – most often manifesting limitation is eConnect and Integration Manager Batch Posting inability. Now straight to the Great Plains eCommerce Developing topic:

1. eConnect is Software Development Kit, written in SQL Stored Procedures (encrypted), it allows you to program GP master records (Customer, Vendor, Employee, GL Account, Inventory Item, Address, Project, Budget, etc.) and so-called Work Transactions: SOP Quote, Order and Invoice, POP Purchase Order, GL Transaction, Employee Paycheck, Inventory Adjustment and Transfer, to give the idea. eConnect is friendly and requires very short learning curve for Microsoft Visual Studio .Net C#, VB and other .Net compliant languages programmers. Additional pluses if you have XML, SQL Scripting skills

2. Sales Order Processing and Inventory Control modules and tables. These two are the most popular in ecommerce integrations. SOP tables have SOP prefix (famous SOP10100 transaction header and SOP10200 lines), and Inventory INV (INV00101 – item master and INV00102 Quantity master) respectively. Sometimes, especially in old Great Plains ecommerce legacy integrations you find Invoicing module (IV prefix)

3. Posting problem. In ecommerce application you often want to do all the way transaction processing: Sales Invoice creation and modification, applying credit card payment deposit, allocating merchandise, approving and posting Sales Order Processing batch (or individual transaction). Here, you will hit the wall and realize that Posting functionality is not included in eConnect or Great Plains Integration Manager. There is no shortcut here (we assume that you are Not Dynamics GP Dexterity software developer with tons of programming experience, including Dexterity Source Code Programming), you will need to purchase Dynamics GP Add-On, we recommend Dynamics GP Posting Server, also known as Autopost

4. Dynamics GP eCommerce SQL Scripting. If you have the opinion that your ecommerce integration routine is very simple and eConnect is too cumbersome and heavy in being considered for deployment, you can always rescue to SQL direct insertion statement. Please review GP table structure: Dynamics GP -> Settings -> Resource Description -> Tables. Or, simply install GP Software Development Kit from CD #2. Dynamics GP Business Logic might be too complex for intuitive programming, so if you will get the buggy situation, consider creating test transaction in GP user interface and review the records in GP tables. If you prefer proven set of stored procedures – we offer them as Order Connector, feeding data into SOP tables

5. Feel free to call us on Microsoft Dynamics GP eCommerce integrations concerns: 1-866-528-0577, help@albaspectrum.com

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Dynamics GP and SAP Business One eCommerce integration options

admin — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 00:43:48 +0000

ERP and ecommerce system integration is probably important question for established ecommerce operations as well as for those who are in startup mode. It is perfect situation if you find appropriate Corporate ERP software, where ecommerce is working out of the same tables as core ERP Sales Order Processing, Inventory Control with Price Lists. However, this might be good hope for the future, real life shows the pattern, where ecommerce store deploys unique business logic and pricing schemas – and in order to implement these rules you often have to either do custom ecommerce web development or pick very generic and powerful ecommerce web stores (which may not be necessary integrated with major Small and midsize business Corporate ERP packages). In this small article we would like to draw the picture in the case of deploying and implementing SAP Business One or Microsoft Dynamics GP, formerly known as Great Plains Dynamics:

1. eCommerce extensions. If you do not have existing ecommerce website in production, then for both SB1 and GP, please look for ecommerce extensions. For Dynamics GP look at GP Business Portal Order Management module. For SBO review its ecommerce module. There are ecommerce add-ons on the ISV products market for both ERP, out of scope here. Regarding BP and SB1 ecommerce module, please see presentation and be sure that it fits your requirements at least 95%, as you may find the solution to be too difficult to customize. If you find your case resolved, we are happy for you, for the rest of us, let’s go to the next paragraph

2. Real time versus Batch mode integration. Now, you are trying to find reasonably priced integration technology, allowing you to export ecommerce documents: invoices, sales orders, price lists into your new ERP and potentially integrate back to ecommerce document status from the ERP. You may decide to start in your pilot mode with Batch mode integration, where you initiate data synchronization by calling user friendly integration tool. In the case of SB1 you can deploy Data Transfer Workbench with Advanced ODBC Sources and Dynamics GP has Integration Manager module. Real time integration, as you could expect requires custom programming, in the case of SB1 it is SAP Business One SDK coding, and in GP it is eConnect. Both eConnect and SB1 SDK could be a way to go if you need very advanced custom ecommerce integration, especially when you are large company and can afford ecommerce to ERP integration budget

3. Document Status export back to ecommerce. Here in simple and inexpensive scenario you read Dynamics GP tables: SOP10100, SOP10200, or in SB1: OINV or INV1. In both cases, please review Dynamics GP or SAP Business One SDK help documentation, where you can review table structure. How you update statuses in eCommerce, please review your ecommerce application documentation, or talk to your in-house ecommerce programmers

4. Documents posting in accounting application. In SAP B1, when you add Invoice – it automatically posts itself all the way through General Ledger, so posting is available to SB1 SDK developer. In Dynamics GP, in contrast you have more flexibility in batch reviewing and approving, however this flexibility blocks you from posting GP SOP batches directly from eConnect methods, as Batch and Transaction Posting is in GP user competence and eConnect can only create so-called Work documents and place them into the Batch. To offer you work around for eConnect ecommerce programmer we created Alba Spectrum Posting Server, where you place batch into queue table and Autopost launches posting process automatically

5. Master Slave scenario. You should decide if your Corporate ERP (Dynamics GP or SAP Business One) should become Master in entering initial Inventory Items, Price Lists, Promotion Campaign, etc. and then uploading these objects to ecommerce or this role is for your ecommerce application – then SB1 is Slave and ecommerce is sort of Master. This decision should orient you in strategy and potentially avoid long decision making IT meetings. Normally, for the Master application you should have very high level of comfort in technical knowledge and be confident in its future, as Slave role is less critical and maybe in the future remapped to something else

6. How to get help? Please call us 1-866-528-0577, internationally: 1-630-961-5918, or email us: help@albaspectrum.com. We are also comfortable to help you if you are international client, we speak English, Portuguese, Spanish, Russian, Chinese. SB1 is localized for numerous countries and it supports Unicode (Chinese, Japanese, Korean hieroglyphs). SAP Business One or Dynamics GP licenses sale or reenrolling you into MS or SAP annual support program is possible if you are orphan client. We will help you if you need to implement and integrate Timesheets in Microsoft CRM and upload them to SB1 or GP as Invoices, feel free to call us for details

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B2B, B2C ecommerce for Dynamics GP notes for IT and consultant

admin — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 00:40:28 +0000

If you are consulting, or programming for ecommerce oriented company, or you work in Information Technology department, and the organization has Microsoft Dynamics GP, formerly known as Great Plains Dynamics ERP implemented and now you are looking to either implement ecommerce from scratches or integrate existing ecommerce B2B or B2C application, this article is for you. First of all, you should think about dilemma to choose ecommerce product, of build ecommerce website internally or program it with software development partner firm. In our opinion, if your are small ecommerce channel reseller, then you should stick to your franchisor ecommerce recommendation: eBay, etc. However, if you are trying to start up new technology selling business with ecommerce emphasis, and you have backing capital – you may find that your ecommerce requirements are too unique and existing shopping cart/ecommerce products are too simple to fit your business – the you consider assemble ecommerce in Microsoft Visual Studio C# or VB.Net web project (purchasing ecommerce libraries or SDK from trusted ecommerce vendors). If you are large corporation, you should do your homework as the final answer depends on various factors. Again, in our opinion, ecommerce at this time is not ready to be considered as simple choice, it is rather painstaking process of selection, reselection, implementation and reimplementation:

1. Dynamics GP Business Portal with Order Management Module. Here you are working with existing Great Plains company Inventory items, and you create orders that end up in GP SOP tables: SOP10100 and SOP10200. You can have active catalog, which is outside of GP – in separate BP Catalog tables in your Company database. In B2B scenario, you have BP module Electronic Document Delivery which enables Sales and other types of documents emailing to your business partners. Outside of ecommerce, if you need to save on Payroll stub postage, you can implement HR employee self service (assuming that you are deploying GP Payroll module). You should definitely review Business Portal and if it fits your requirements, perfect, we are happy to sell and implement it for you. Some remarks we heard from our customers and prospects – Dynamics GP Business Portal is not very flexible in customizations, besides color schema and pictures or logos uploading. We may agree and disagree with these comments, as you should probably be more open to adopt the technology of the future, as Microsoft is likely very committed to its Dynamics products Business Portals. Good example is Microsoft CRM SDK, where in the initial versions 1.2 and 3.0 you had very slow customization interface and restricted programmability and now with CRM SDK 4.0 you can virtually do whatever you like as programmer. We believe that Business Portal for Great Plains Dynamics GP will improve dramatically in the short future and third party ecommerce add-ons will have hard time to compete with it, however for now you may decide to implement third parties, as they are several steps ahead of Dynamics Business Portal

2. OK, now to third party modules, such as Alba Spectrum Order Connector, Posting Sever or Autopost. At this time we are launching multiple ecommerce GP dedicated products, in fact by repackaging our former customizable solutions to become out of shelf type of products, plus we are expanding our Microsoft Dynamics GP ecommerce Software Development Factory. We assume that you already did research on the competition. In B2C scenarios, we recommend you to consider our Order Connector product – it is for simplified ecommerce integration to Dynamics GP SOP module: Quotes, Sales Orders, Invoices, Returns. We are writing these lines in August 2009, and we are in very rapid progress, so for current offering, please visit our website or call our office

3. Direct eConnect programming. If you have C#, or VB.Net software developers in stuff, we recommend this direction. If your ecommerce web application is coded in house, then you should have complete control with eConnect SDK programming. We do not discuss in this article specific eConnect objects, however you should expect as coder reasonable familiarity with Dynamics GP tables structure and object model. If you feel that you need additional help, please install Dynamics GP SDK from GP 10.0 CD #2. Talking about eConnect for GP versions 10.0 and even 9.0 we heard mostly positive opinions from third party programmers, Dynamics GP ISV and consultants

4. Great Plains Integration Manager. If you are OK with Great Plains operation initiated integration, or in advanced IM scenario with scheduled integration, this approach is worth to consider, as IM is rewritten in eConnect for GP 10.0. If you are on older version of Great Plains, IM requires OLE Server to be running in integrating time, meaning that you have to consume open Great Plains User License if GP workstation is running 24-7

5. Great Plains Dexterity in eCommerce coding. Dex is initial architecture of Great Plains Dynamics. This development tool has no limits in adding new or altering existing object in Great Plains. In fact we use Dexterity Source Code programming to develop our products, that extend eConnect limitations (such as posting GP batches directly from ecommerce applications)

6. eCommerce for older Great Plains Versions. eConnect is in our opinion reliable for Dynamics GP 10.0 and in most of the areas for 9.0. If you are on older versions of Dynamics GP Great Plains or eEnterprise: 8.0, 7.5, 7.0, 6.0, 5.5, 5.0, 4.0, 3.2 or Great Plains Accounting for DOS, Windows or MAC, please consider upgrade to Dynamics GP 10.0. If upgrade is exceeding your budget, and if you are already on Dynamics GP on SQL Server 2000 or 2005, we are ready to help you with Order Connector product

7. Non Microsoft ecommerce platform. If you are on Linux, Oracle, DBII, PHP platform, please review ODBC connections options to Microsoft SQL Server, where Dynamics GP is hosted. If you are comfortable to create and support these connections (including JDBCODBC bridges), then we can help you to integrate you ecommerce application with Dynamics GP

8. How to get help? Please call us: 1-866-528-0577, outside of USA 1-630-961-5918, email us help@albaspectrum.com We speak English, Spanish, Portuguese, including Brazilian Portuguese, Chinese, Russian, Filipino, Arabic. Please, be aware that Dynamics GP is not UNICODE compliant application, and if you need help in having GP Screens to be translated to Chinese, Korean, Japanese, and other hieroglyph based characters language, this is not possible. We would be happy to create Chinese Crystal Reports out of your Dynamics GP system with the help of third party Dynamics GP ISV tools, such as NJ Star. If you are trying to consider Great Plains for your Brazilian subsidiary, we would have to discourage you and ask you rather to consider SAP Business One, which is localized for Brazil. Great Plains Dynamics GP is also not localized for Russian market, we invite you to call us to help you understand ecommerce and Corporate ERP options in Russian Federation, Kazakhstan, Ukraine, Belorussia, Moldova, Lithuania, Poland, Latvia, Estonia, Czech Republic, Poland, Serbia, Uzbekistan

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eCommerce Connectors for Dynamics GP and SB1 notes

admin — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 00:40:45 +0000

Both Corporate ERP applications: Microsoft Dynamics GP and SAP Business One should be a good fit for mid-size or even small ecommerce oriented store. Both platforms have ecommerce products with shopping cart, checkout, item catalogue and other standard estore features. In this small publication we assume that you already reviewed existing electronic commerce add-ons (including SAP Business One eCommerce module and Dynamics GP Business Portal Order Management) and you decided or inclined to consider approach of simple integration from GP or SBO from your ecommerce web site, which is in production and does the job. This approach is good for both models: B2B and B2C. In B2B model you should decide if you would like your special pricing model for each of your customer or for specific customer group to be set in your Accounting (in this case, pricing should be reprogrammed in ecommerce application to reflect changes made in GP/SB1) or it should be originated in ecommerce business logic and then simply pushed to GP on each of the ecommerce invoice line (in this scenario you simply do not use GP/SBO Item Pricing functionality and have your ERP application to accept passively what is coming from ecommerce):

1. Philosophy. Instead of aggressive ecommerce out-of-the-shelve product selling, we prefer to have as ready for deployment ecommerce product and in addition to this we offer them as customizable “solutions” and connectors. Plus, we are in good position to help you with integration programming, where your internal software developers need help with eConnect, GP and SAP B1 tables structures, Great Plains batch posting directly from ecommerce application code, helping your with barcode warehouse management custom automation logic and ecommerce logistics. Plus, we are helping you in cross platform ecommerce connections, when you may have ecommerce on Linux, PHP/MySQL, Oracle, Java EJB platforms and you need help with heterogeneous ecommerce data feeding query to Microsoft SQL Server based GP and SAP Business One databases.

2. Batch mode integration. This scenario is perfect for small ecommerce retailers. Great Plains and SAP BO have Integration modules: GP Integration Manager and SB1 Data Transfer Workbench. Dynamics GP IM is more advanced, comparing to Workbench, however you have to purchase it as separate module to GP, and WB is included into your SB1 purchase (free stuff is important for small businesses, especially when they are in startup mode). Let’s first review in brief GP Integration Manager. IM is user friendly application, where you can setup integration of your new customers, new ecommerce invoices and then have IM operator to call this integration once per day or every hour. You can also schedule IM – special tool is available from Microsoft Business Solutions or, if you are technology savvy you can deploy Windows macro third party applications to do similar scheduling. You can consider exporting ecommerce documents in tab or comma delimited text files or simply work with SQL Views – in this case you use Advanced ODBC Queries in Integration Manager. Now SAP Business One Data Transfer Workbench – you can export your ecommerce data flies in CSV format, which fits exactly to DTW CSV templates – this will allow you even to schedule DTW jobs via Windows scheduled tasks. Second more advanced approach allows DTW job to work with ODBC connection to Microsoft SQL Server Views. MS SQL Server view may call data from Microsoft and non Microsoft DB sources, such as MySQL, Oracle, MS Access, FoxPro, etc. At this time, SAP Business One version 2007 you cannot schedule DTW ODBC based job – it should be called by DTW operator

3. Real time integration. In this scenario you extend your ecommerce application code with SDK libraries. Dynamics GP ecommerce SDK( it is eConnect) and SB1 SDK – both of them are open for Microsoft Visual Studio C#, or VB.Net developer (SAP B1 SDK also has reasonable openness to Delphi programmers). Some comments here: eConnect is coded in SQL Server Stored Procedures and its methods are very fast in execution, where SB1 SDK methods are at this time (September 2009, SB1 2007, and former version 2005) slower, expect one invoice in 3-4 seconds, do not expect several thousand transactions to be integrated in ten minutes (however GP eConnect is that fast, we recommend eConnect only if you are Dynamics GP latest versions: 10.0 or 9.0). You can also review SQL direct programming into Dynamics GP Sales Order Processing tables: SOP10100, SOP10200 and related, however we recommend you rather use eConnect objects to do the same job. We do not recommend you to push data directly to SQL B1 Marketing Documents tables: INV1, etc. as SB1 Early Watch is designed to monitor all the changes to SB1 records done outside of the SB1 application, Work Bench and SDK methods realms

4. SAP Business One and Dynamics GP Tables Structure diagrams. In the case of SB1, you can read SAP Business One SDK documentation – it has table references. In the case of Great Plains, please consider installing Dynamics GP SDK from CD #2. As quick reference in GP user interface: Tools->Resource Descriptions->Tables; in SB1 in view menu mark View System Information – when you open SB1 screen, such as AR Invoice, place cursor over the field and read its Table and Field name in left down corner, for example RDN1.ItemCode is the field for item number on return line. Again, we would like to stress that Tables Structures are in ideal scenario for pulling data from GP or SB1 for ecommerce order status report, if you need certain level of ecommerce customer self service (and not for pushing data into your Corporate ERP tables with SQL insert statement, as this practice has very high business logic violation and data integrity compromise potential)

5. eCommerce with Custom Logic in GP or SB1. In the case of SAP Business One you can create new so-called User Defined Tables and extend existing tables with User Defined Fields. User Defined Tables have automatically created simply editing interface, where you can add records or modify existing ones. If you would like to add user defined fields to such tables as Marketing Document Line (including customer invoice line) – these fields should become immediately available to be placed on Customer Invoice form, plus they will be available for Data Transfer Workbench integrations and in SB1 SDK. In the case of Dynamics GP some of the objects have User defined fields included and ready for activation. If your targeted object doesn’t have User Defined fields extension, you will need to program it likely in Great Plains Dexterity as table, linked with related original GP tables by the Primary Key with the same fields

6. eCommerce in International scenarios. If you are multinational corporation and you are deploying Dynamics GP in US headquarters, please try first to understand if GP is localized in the country where you plan to deploy it as Accounting or in ecommerce. Great Plains version 10.0 is available in English Speaking countries: USA, Canada (including French Canadian Quebec version), Australia, New Zealand, UK, South Africa, Oceania, plus in South East Asia for the countries, where English is the language of business. With some exceptions it is also available in Spanish Speaking Latin America, Mexico and Caribbean. By its architecture Great Plains doesn’t support UNICODE based alphabets, mostly hieroglyphs: Chinese, Japanese, Korean. SAP Business One is more widespread, it is available localized in such countries as Brazil, Russia, Poland, China, Japan, Korea. Even if you deploy Great Plains Dynamics in US headquarters, we recommend you SB1 internationally, where GP is not available – SB1 is very simple in data export and consolidation to Dynamics GP via Integration Manager or FRx consolidated Financial Reporting

7. Alba Spectrum eCommerce Products. We offer Order Connector, sending transactions in realtime to Dynamics GP Sales Order Processing Tables; Posting Server (Autopost), allowing you to post GP batches directly from eConnect application. We also offer Microsoft RMS integration to Great Plains, if your ecommerce is working from RMS tables

8. Dynamics GP eConnect and Dexterity programming training. We offer USA and International phone or skype based training, supported with web sessions

9. SAP Business One eCommerce integration and programming training. If you are comfortable to program ecommerce integration for SBO and you need some guru level help, we offer this service via phone or skype conferences, supported with web sessions if required

10. How to get help? Please, feel free to call us: 1-866-528-0577, outside of USA: 1-630-961-5918 or email us help@albaspectrum.com We are very technical and real Dynamics GP Dexterity, SAP Business One SDK programming gurus. We have Great Plains Software Development Factory and could support unlimited Dynamics GP Customization and Programming needs. Plus we speak English, Chinese, Spanish, Portuguese, Russian, and not only as native speaking sales folks, but as real technical consultants. If you prefer skype: albaspectrum

eCommerce Connectors for Dynamics GP and SB1 notes is a post from: wordpressrobot.com

Dynamics GP ecommerce Integration Technologies: notes for Programmer

admin — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 00:43:17 +0000

We assume that in your case you have established Microsoft Dynamics GP (also known as Great Plains Dynamics in the past) and use it in production for accounting, Sales Order Processing, AP, AR, distribution and logistics. Plus you have working ecommerce website, where integration to GP is very loose: maybe it triggers email to Picking and Packing department, or Sales Order Processing people. In this small publication we would like to review relatively open for end user or in the case of software developer – not difficult to begin integration coding. We do not specifically review here differences between B2B and B2C ecommerce scenarios in Dynamics GP, please review our past articles. There are ready for deployment solutions, we assume that you already did this homework and decided to preserve your investments into your current eCommerce web application, and all you would like to do is robust integration:

1. Real Time versus Batch Mode integrations. Real Time ecommerce transactions move to GP Sales Orders or Invoices is definitely cool to have, however if this is not absolutely required, we recommend you first to think about Batch Mode ecommerce integration. Batch mode means, that ecommerce may have some lookups for your customers if item is available in one of your warehouses (via simple SQL query to your Dynamics GP Company database), however ecommerce transactions are moved to GP Sales Document only once per day, or maybe every hour, if you are larger ecommerce retailer

2. GP Integration Manager. This tool is very friendly to Great Plains users, and it could be extended by programmer via VBA event driven scripts. IM is first choice if you are planning integrate in Batch Mode. Please, do not be mislead by some GP consultants, that IM is for text files only. For advanced ecommerce integration to GP we recommend you to base IM data queries on SQL Server Views (Advanced ODBC based query) and the View itself looks at the existing GP orders and lines and into new ecommerce document – in that case your scenario could be completely automated. Plus IM integration could be called automatically via Windows macro third party tiny applications (or you can purchase Integration scheduling tool from Microsoft Business Solutions, check with your Dynamics GP Partner on that). We helped implement scenarios for large Computer IT integrator and warehouse, where all transactions are coming through B2B ecommerce website on PHP/Linux and GP Integration Manager is scheduled to run every 20 minutes to be close to real time mode integration. OK, now if you think IM is too simple, let’s move on to eConnect

3. eConnect SDK and technology for Dynamics GP. If you are C# or VB.Net ecommerce programmer or programming savvy web master, please review eConnect, as it has set of libraries, which could be added to your MS Visual Studio web projects and you could create, edit, delete virtually all GP Master records: customer, vendor, GL account, Item, Address, Employee, and work transactions: Sales Invoice, Purchase Order, Purchase Receipt, GL Transaction, Customer Payment. Please, note that you cannot post GP Batches (such as popular in ecommerce scenarios Sales Order Processing Batch) – if you need complete automation with Batch Posting you need to consider Alba Spectrum Posting Server or Autopost. Also, eConnect doesn’t cover some rather historical modules, such as Invoicing (usually Great Plains Customers prefer more robust Sales Order Processing module). And plus, eConnect from Dynamics GP doesn’t cover third party Dynamics GP ISV modules, which you may deploy – consider to check with you Great Plains ISV partner if they have extensions for eConnect. If you are on Dynamics GP 10.0 and 9.0 – eConnect is the way to go, however if you are on older version, consider to upgrade to GP version 10.0 prior to deploying eConnect in your ecommerce integration programming

4. Beyond eConnect. If you believe that your integration is SOP only and it is very simple, we offer Alba Spectrum Order Connector. This tool supports all current versions: 10.0 and 9.0 plus older versions: 7.5 and 8.0. You can also combine some Great Plains Dexterity programming to alter business processes in GP as additional help to Integration. We are trying to discourage you from considering direct SQL Server Stored procedures coding, as eConnect already have this work done for you – its initial layout is encrypted MS SQL Server Stored Procedures, plus consider the fact that Dynamics GP Business Logic and Data Flow is complex, and its database is not protected from inexperienced SQL programmer – you can compromise data integrity and incur additional unexpected expenses in involving GP Technical consultants to do data recovery and repair

5. How to get help? Please, feel free to call us: 1-866-528-0577, outside of USA: 1-630-961-5918 or email us help@albaspectrum.com We are very technical and real Dynamics GP Dexterity, SAP Business One SDK programming gurus. We have Great Plains Software Development Factory and could support unlimited Dynamics GP Customization and Programming needs. Plus we speak English, Chinese, Spanish, Portuguese, Russian, and not only as native speaking sales folks, but as real technical consultants. If you prefer skype: albaspectrum

Dynamics GP ecommerce Integration Technologies: notes for Programmer is a post from: wordpressrobot.com