The Dynamics GP Blogster

Microsoft has released the 2,010 Payroll Tax Updates - Round 1 , available for download un CustomerSource and PartnerSource and has communicated that Round 2 will be out the week of January 18th to include changes to Rhode Island and EIC. As many of you have been sending comments and emails about Payroll Tax Updates and Year-End procedures, here is a compiled list of resources for both US and Canada. Featured on this site Payroll Year-End Close and W-2 Forms Supportability US Payroll Tax Update Rounds * 2009 Payroll Tax Update for Microsoft Dynamics GP 8.0 * The following is the complete list of Payroll Tax Update rounds for 2009. External resources Version 9 CustomerSource/PartnerSource 2010 U.S. Payroll Tax Update for Microsoft Dynamics GP 9.0 (Round 1) CustomerSource/PartnerSource 2009 U.S. Payroll Year End Update for Microsoft Dynamics GP 9.0 CustomerSource/PartnerSource 2009 Canadian Payroll Year End Update for Microsoft Dynamics GP 9.0 Version 10 CustomerSource/PartnerSource 2...

Another years is gone by and as it's customary around the last days of the year the media always seems to have some list with "The best this" or "The best that" of the outgoing year. I figured I won't stay behind and, while by no stretch of the imagination I am some media conglomerate, I would join in with the best articles or series of articles published on this site during the 2009 year. Hope you enjoy the selection and chime in with the ones you believe were the best. So let's get the ball rolling! 1. Sending emails with Collaboration Data Objects (CDO) and Dexterity (Jan 19). This article became a hit with the Dynamics GP development community and formed the base for the SMTP email capabilities built into the Support Debugging Tool . 2. Displaying Hijri dates in Microsoft Dynamics GP (Feb 19). What was once thought impossible -- displaying Hijri dates -- was accomplished with a couple lines of code. Now the Dynamics GP community in the Middle East ...

Merry Christmas! Happy Hanukkah! Happy Kwanzaa! Happy Al-Hijira! Best wishes throughout the Holiday season in company of your friends and family from The Dynamics GP Blogster. Once again, thanks for all your support and comments throughout the year and for confirming what I always knew: the more information you have, the better you can perform your job. That's the objective of this blog and the reason I strive to deliver a variety of information and topics always revolving around Dynamics GP. 2010 will sure bring exciting stuff! We have the long awaited GP "11" release coming out, the new Microsoft Office 2010 , incredible features being delivered in Microsoft SharePoint 2010 , the new and spectacular, feature-rich Microsoft Visual Studio 2010, the promising Power Pivot, and last but not lease, the new Microsoft SQL Server 2010. To accompany this array of applications and tools, we have spectacular events like Convergence, right in my backyard here in Atlanta. In additio...

Folks, this time I take a hard swing at four common myths around the *beloved* Integration Manager . I know there are a lot of mixed feelings out there when it comes to poor IM, but this tool has saved my *ss in more than one occasion and in this article I make a case for its use in serious mission critical application integrations. So head over to MSDynamicsWorld and read up ! After reading the article, I would like to get your comments and experiences with IM. Until next post! MG.- Mariano Gomez, MVP Maximum Global Business, LLC http://www.maximumglobalbusiness.com/

Fresh out of the oven is MSDynamicsWorld's Top 10 Microsoft Dynamics Stories of 2009 . I am honored to have one of the most read stories of this year with my article Four Microsoft Dynamics GP Project Team Blunders and How I Become a Hero . I have received numerous inquiries on the subject since the article was published and it's safe to say the Microsoft Dynamics ecosystem is always looking to maximize its implementation dollars, while making sure projects will be delivered on time. Once again, thank you for your support and readership, and please drop me a comment letting me know what stories you would like me to cover in 2010. Until next post! MG.- Mariano Gomez, MVP Maximum Global Business, LLC http://www.maximumglobalbusiness.com/

Two weeks ago, I began working on a Microsoft CRM to Microsoft Dynamics GP integration project. Sales orders initiated in CRM and are transferred to GP once they are submitted in CRM. Once the orders got to GP they must be placed on automatic hold for document verification. However, once the hold was removed, the client wanted to be able to transfer all verified orders in bulk... so far good! The problem though was, when orders were transferred to invoices, the invoices remained mixed with the orders that did not get transferred in the same batch. This presented a control issue for the client as the staff performing the documentation is not the same staff transferring the orders. Last year I posted the article Moving SOP Transactions from One Batch to Another . This article demonstrated a SQL script that would allow a database administrator to move SOP documents from one batch to another. The script in that article forms the basis for this customization. However, to make it more user f...

The good folks over at DynamicsWorld in UK has a post up interview with ... me! Please take some time to read up as I trace back to the roots of my career and a few comments about the Microsoft Dynamics ecosystem. Until next post! MG.- Mariano Gomez, MVP Maximum Global Business, LLC http://www.maximumglobalbusiness.com

Yep, it's that time of the year again! And no, I am not referring to Christmas, Hannukah, Kwanzaa, or 1st of Muharram, though I respect all these celebrations. I am referring to the not-so-celebrated Payroll year-end close and submissions of W-2s -- at least here in the United States. So here are a few things to keep in mind for a successful Payroll year-end close and printing of W-2 forms: 1. Apply the 2009 US Payroll Year-End Update Just don't do it by yourself! If you use Microsoft Dynamics GP v10.0 Extender, do not install the 2009 U.S Payroll Year End Update. If you use U.S. Payroll in addition to Extender and need the country code changes or the 1099-R Distribution code changes, please contact Microsoft Technical Support to assist you in installing the update. This should be a free support case. If you use Web Services for Microsoft Dynamics GP v10.0, the latest hotfix for Web Services must be installed prior to installing the 2009 U.S Payroll Year End Update above. Cl...

The opening goes something like this: I upgraded from version X.XX [typically 7.x, 8.x] to Microsoft Dynamics GP 10.0 and now we are having a problem where the next PO number will sometimes jump back in sequence, often many numbers. What's happening to our PO Numbers? In my previous article, Why does my next document number change randomly? I gave some insight into why Microsoft Dynamics GP 10.0 seems to randomly skip document numbers, sometimes backwards. Here is more information on PO Numbers and another method of preventing this behavior. In Microsoft Dynamics GP 10.0 Purchase Order Processing module, it is possible that a user may have a purchase order number that is completely different from the next number found in the Purchase Order Processing Setup window. Although the next number for purchase orders is set up in the Purchase Order Processing Setup window, Microsoft Dynamics GP will look for unused PO numbers that precede that number. The system will be able to re-use a pu...

If you are an end user you probably already know that one of the most frustrating aspects of working with GP has to be navigating through the menu structure. Granted, improvements to the navigation bar introduced since version 9 have made things a lot easier. Nonetheless, remembering where to find an option that will take you to a specific window can be very challenging at times for both experienced and novice users. Also, what if the window you are trying to access is not a main window? What if you don't even have security to the window you are trying to access? What if all you know of the window is a portion of the name? I have to say, I rarely get into blogging about specific ISV solutions, but I had a chance to play around with Mentor by Rockton Software . Mentor answers the questions above and some more about any window, whether in the Dynamics dictionary or any integrating or third party product and is able to provide the exact menu path to follow to access said window. The I...

Last year in May, I worked on a number of VBA SOP customization upgrades from v9 to v10. As a result of the experiences I blogged about the one issue that I ran into in my article Upgrading SOP Entry VBA Customizations from Dynamics GP 9.0 to Dynamics GP 10.0 . The main issue was the sudden switch from the individual push button controls to the new Action Button , which is a Dexterity Button Drop List control. Of course, this made the SOP Entry window interface a lot cleaner for v10, but brought its own challenges for developers. SOP Entry window, GP 9.0 SOP Entry window, GP 10.0 While it is relatively feasible to work with the Action Button from VST, a few things need to be taken into account: 1) Unlike push button controls, button drop list controls do not expose Click Before Original and Click After Original events in Visual Studio. This is because the button drop list control has the menu items selection action to deal with. 2) As a result of the above, the button drop list chang...

Folks, it's real cool to be a part of the Microsoft Dynamics GP MVP family, but even more rewarding when you can follow the accomplishments of your colleagues who wear the same badge you do. Microsoft Feed recently featured MVP Mohammad Daoud from Amman, Jordan in an interview examining his personal and professional accomplishments and life as a Microsoft MVP. Mohammad has been very involved in the Microsoft Dynamics GP community in the Middle East and can now be considered a veteran in the field. In reference to my opening statement for this article, Mohammad is the proud father of a baby boy , one of few born in what could be considered a Microsoft Dynamics GP Community Baby Boom 2009 . Until next post! MG.- Mariano Gomez, MVP Maximum Global Business, LLC http://www.maximumglobalbusiness.com/

"This disk will self destruct in 5 seconds" As with the movies, MVP Mark Polino makes a theatrical appearance on MSDynamicsWorld showing Microsoft Dynamics GP alert mechanisms . He takes a quick run down through Reminders, SmartList Reminders, Business Alerts and SQL Server alerts. It's very easy to forget that Microsoft Dynamics GP offers a range of mechanisms to work proactively, instead of spending tons of hours at crunch time trying to figure out why AR does not tie with GL. Until next post! MG.- Mariano Gomez, MVP Maximum Global Business, LLC http://www.maximumglobalbusiness.com/

I salvaged this post from the Microsoft Dynamics GP Partner Forum comparing the features in Inventory BOM versus those in Manufacturing BOM. The props go out to Microsoft's Jim Shauer for the detailed explanation. The core Bill of Materials module works closely with the Inventory subledger. You can define bills and assemble the bills in this module. This module works best for companies with a very simple assembly/production process where the finished good production is normally recorded after the fact. The Manufacturing BOM module stores the definition of the BOMs. It does require the use of the Inventory subledger and you must use this module together with Manufacturing Order Processing. This Order Processing module is used to record the production of the finished goods. The Manufacturing BOM (together with Manufacturing Order Processing) provides more functionality related to the definition of the BOMs and the methods in which those finished goods can be produced. These modules...

It's been quite a while since I have posted a SQL script, and it's funny, because this is what I had in mind when I started out my blog. Shaun Childers posted a question on the Microsoft Dynamics GP public newsgroup , as follows: "We are trying to create a script that will pull together our most recent purchasing information only. The results should give all inventory items with a qty on hand > 0, the current cost (we are average perpetual), the most recent receipt number, the unit cost for that receipted item, the receipt date, and the vendor name. I have tried to put this together, but have been unsuccessful." At first, this query may not seem to complex, but when you start to analyze the information being requested, it becomes apparent that using a standard set based query is not going to be as simple. Luckily enough, we can take advatage of the latest T-SQL enhancements to use ranks and partitions on sets to deliver the requested query, as follows: -- Created...

Folks, is Thanksgiving Day here in the United States and it is always an occasion to share with friends and loved ones. In particular, I would like to thank each and everyone of you for your readership and support shown over the last two years or so that my blog has been in circulation. The Dynamics GP Blogster is a success because of you! You certainly motivate me to continue writing and delivering the content you have come to rely on to get your job done or to find that unique aspect about the Microsoft Dynamics GP product that otherwise won't be available elsewhere. This year I have heard comments like "I no longer go to CustomerSource/PartnerSource, I search your blog first!" and I really appreacite them from the bottom of my heart. In fact, keep your comments comming! For now, wherever you are in the world, Happy Thanksgiving! Until next post! MG.- Mariano Gomez, MVP Maximum Global Business, LLC http://www.maximumglobalbusiness.com/

Fellow blogger Houston Neil addresses the proverbial question of what's the difference between the Microsoft Dynamics products . The truth is, to understand the functional and technological differences, you have to go back a few years in history to look at the Microsoft Dynamics products acquisition process, the failed Microsoft Project Green, and perhaps, even look at Oracle's attempt over the last 7 years to consolidate their products after their acquisition of PeopleSoft to understand that the ERP world is a very complex one with the customer base driving product decisions across the board. I am a big Microsoft Dynamics GP proponent and defender, and in fact being an MVP allows me to carry out a lot of the product evangelism to customers and partners. Despite the product directions and strategies I have been witnessing over the past couple of years, I will be the first to say that there will be GP for years and years to come (see my article on Microsoft Dynamics GP Roadmap...

Just when you thought there wasn't anything more to learn about Integration Manager something else comes along to demistify that theory. I have been involved in a JD Edwards on DB2 and AS/400 systems migration for almost 4 months now and last month I blogged about how Integration Manager can be a powerful tool in multiplatform systems integrations . Part of disengaging JD Edwards is to write a series of integrations to existing systems running on the AS/400 platform. In the process, the client needed a simple to use tool which required limited programming and maintenance, hence the choice of IM. After unit testing the integrations, everything was A-Ok to begin with the week long systems testing, which would exhause the integrations while allowing the customer to get the overall "feel" for GP and how it would address the existing business processes. One particular business process -- Expense Reimbursements -- required an integration to Payables Management. How difficult c...

It is not uncommon for Microsoft Dynamics GP v9 and v10 users to report system sluggishness when posting inventory related transactions in Sales Order Processing, Purchase Order Processing or Inventory, especially if using the Average Perpetual valuation method. The main reason why you may experience slow posting of inventory-related transactions is because Microsoft Dynamics GP uses an "inventory ripple" effect approach to recalculate the average cost of each inventory receipt layer due to inflow and outflow transactions in SOP, IV or POP. This is normal because in GP9.0 and GP10.0, the system is already observing the so-called "moving average" calculation. In addition, the system now "ripples" all item transactions. Hence, if transactions are backdated, each transaction would have to "ripple" through approximately n lines in the Inventory Purchase Receipts Work table (dbo.IV10200). This new costing functionality in GP9 and GP10 also includes...

The Conference ended with David and I dragging feet, with little to no sleep, but with the satisfaction that we delivered to the best of our abilities. I woke up the following morning after spending part of the previous night packing my suitcase, only to come to the realization that I left my pair of Louis Vuitton glasses somewhere along (ouch!). After having breakfast downstairs, we (David & I) hopped a ride to the Microsoft campus with Mark Rockwell (Rockton Software) and Jim Peliksa (Rockton Software). It was time to go get some goodies for the trip back home. After the campus store opened, we went downstairs and I got a remote controlled Warthog (Halo 3), a cool MS presenter's mouse, and an ultrasleek MS mouse for my wife. I also managed to pick up an embroided Bing hooddie sweater for my daughter. We went back to the Oak room. David went off to a team meeting and came back after 1 hour. We then went to Scott Stephenson's office to get our goodbye picture taken. I h...

The good results of Day 1 and the hard work we put into preparing for the double whammy Troubleshooting session ahead of us had began to take their toll on Dave, Leslie, and I. We had a good breakfast at the hotel before being shuttled back to the Commons building. Upon arrival, Dave, Leslie and I went back to the Oak room to perform one last pass on the presentation, print out the cheat sheets and try to relax a bit. We were on at 10:30 AM and the presentation went really well with minor unnoticeable glitches. It felt good, but not good enough. At the end of the first session of our Troubleshooting topic, and despite being extremely tired, Dave, Leslie and I returned to the round table to analyze the things that went wrong in our first session. After a few touch ups here and there, Dave and I went off to the table topics. I joined Nick Hoban who runs the Microsoft Dynamics Community website to discuss some improvements to the site. We were back on stage at 3:30 PM for our second...

D-day, literally! If I had to qualify scary moments throughout my entire life, this certainly had to be at the top of the list. After completing the prep work for the Customizing session the day before, David and I attended the opening session the following morning which offered this cool Spinal Tap video attempting to explain why GP "11": URL: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ll7rWiY5obI While at the opening session, reality began to set in and I had my first flash of panic -- 130 people will be attending our presentation! The next hour leading up to the presentation was absolutely worst than Dante's Inferno as I felt I was going through more than the 3 realms of death myself, with no hopes of being rescued by Virgil. After the opening of our presentation, things began flowing and growing progressively smooth with time being our only enemy. We had a good number of questions throughout and received positive feedback by the end of the session. However, we went over t...

Yesterday, after an afternoon catching up with Leslie and David, I was finally able to link up to the rest of the team staying at the Ramada, namely Mark Rockwell, Richard Whaley, and Darren Hunt from IBG. After weighing the possibility of leaving the hotel for dinner vs. eating at the restaurant by the lobby, we decided for the hotel's restaurant. This is the crew that went to dinner: Left to Right: Mariano Gomez, Mark Rockwell, MVP Leslie Vail, Richard Whaley, David Musgrave, Darren Hunt Today, the morning started with a breakfast at the hotel. The hotel shuttled us to the Microsoft campus. I have to admit, the new Vision building is amazing! The Horizon building also underwent some upgrades getting some new war rooms and training areas. Here are some pictures from the Vision building: Panoramic view of the Vision (left) and Horizon (right) buildings Vision building A few in our group were attending eOne's eXtender classes, while David and I went to cat...

Following my Journey to the Microsoft Dynamics GP Technical Conference 2009 , I arrived in Minneapolis without a hitch and 20 minutes before the original schedule of 10:10 AM CST - hat tip goes out to Delta! We waited 2 minutes at a staging area on the runway before ground control authorized the pilots to taxi to the arrival gate. My arrival gate at Minneapolis International was F13 and I had to walk over to gate C2, approximately a good mile, adding to the walk I did earlier in the morning from the parking lot at Hartsfield-Jackson International. The following is the Lindbergh terminal layout at Minneapolis International: I had a relatively short layover as my flight to Fargo was departing at 11:25 AM CST, but could not make the rest of the day without a coffee. So I went over to Starbucks and picked up my favorite: a double-tall mocha with wip . Upon boarding, I sat next to United States Air Force Lt. Sarah Reich who happened to be an Officer and Communications specialist en rout...

This morning I got up (with a bump on the side from my wife) at 5:00, a bit too early for my scheduled trip to the Microsoft Dynamics GP Technical Conference 2009 , which will take me through the beautiful city of Minneapolis, where I will be transferring planes to get to Fargo. Given that I live in Atlanta, a major hub in the United States, it's just about right that you give yourself enough time to depart. By 5:30 I was ready and decided to drive my car and park at the airport for the days I will be out... I was at the airport by 6:15 after what seemed like a very uneventful morning in the Atlanta traffic. In fact, there was nothing, no one on the road. Surprising? Very much so considering Atlanta's traffic is ranked 3rd in the US for congestion. the one thing I did not count on was the fact that the check in counter was located a good 600 meters away from the parking lot. May not seem as much, but try that when you have to stroll around a big bag and a carry on (laptop). ...