Feature - Show User, Date, and Time Last Marked Incomplete When Changing an Incomplete Order
Version: 8.5 and Above
Background
In Elliott Sales Order editing, when the user is in the order entry line item or billing screen, the order is flagged as "Incomplete." This is a status to notify all other users not to process this order because it is currently being edited. In some rare situations, like a power failure, the network produces an error and Elliott crashes. As a result, the order may end up becoming incomplete. Most users will not be able to bring up an incomplete order. Users with higher privileges (like an Admin user defined through Global User Security setup), may bring up an incomplete order and receive the following message:
If this order becomes incomplete due to some exceptional scenario, then the admin user may answer "Yes" to the above message and make the order complete.
On the other hand, it also a possibility that another user is in the middle of editing this order without an exceptional scenario. If the second user answers "Yes" to the above message in that scenario, then two users will be editing the same order at the same time. There will be a database integrity issue for this order and that is not desirable. This issue is especially likely for a larger organization. Hence, in this enhancement, we will provide information regarding when the order last became incomplete and who last worked on it. See sample screen below:
If the order just become incomplete 5 minutes ago, then it is likely this order is in the middle of order entry. The user should answer "No." If this order become incomplete several days ago, it is likely this is an exceptional scenario. The user should answer "Yes." If the user can't decide, he/she can talk to the other user that make the order incomplete to confirm if he/she is in the middle of editing this order.
This feature is also applicable to the Elliott event, INCTOCOM, which triggers when sales orders are changed from incomplete to complete. For more information about that event, check out this link.
The more technical sections of this article assume a basic familiarity with attributes. If you do not know what an attribute is, check out this link, but it is not necessary for understanding the feature.
Feature
In this new feature, when a user goes to Order Entry Change and brings up an order that's flagged as "incomplete," the following message will show up. If the user has sufficient privilege, the system will ask the user to confirm whether to continue. If the user chooses to continue, the order will become complete and return to a normal state. See sample screen below:
What are the benefits of this? If a user pulls up an order and it was marked incomplete 30 seconds ago, then it is highly likely another user is in the middle of entering the order, and the user would be wise to not continue. Two salespeople competing to enter the same order produces messy results. On the other hand, if an order was marked incomplete a week ago, it is likely that something such as a power failure occurred and a salesperson simply forgot the order wasn't marked complete. A user can therefore make a better decision whether to mark an order as complete based on the timestamp.
Setup
To activate this feature, go to Utility > Global Setup > cop-Func > order Header screen. Press Enter twice to bring up the third screen, where you will see the new Global Setup flag, "43. Track Sales Order Incomplete Event?" Mark this as "Y" to activate this new feature.
Technical Details
The information on the user and date/time stamp when the order become incomplete is stored in the order attribute. The following information is not necessary to use the feature, but could be useful for further understanding.
The _SO2INCOMPLETE Attribute
If you aren't familiar with attributes already, read about them here. What's relevant here is that when the Global Setup flag "Track Sales Order Incomplete Event?" is set to "Y," if it doesn't exist already a new attribute internal to Elliott called _SO2INCOMPLETE will be created. The underscore up front indicates that this is an internal attribute as opposed to one that might be created by you, the user. The _SO2INCOMPLETE attribute will store up to five timestamps. Each timestamp records when the sales order was marked incomplete.
(Optional) Using INCTOCOM Event
There is an event in Elliott called INCTOCOM that triggers when an incomplete sales order is made complete. INCTOCOM synergizes well with this feature.
The INCTOCOM event can activated in your Customer File Maintenance. If you bring up a customer In Elliott and click on the lightning bolt icon for Events, you can press F5 and bring up a list of all possible events you would like to track for the associated customer. One of those events is labeled "Program: CP0101, Type: INCTOCOM." You can choose various settings for how you want your event to notify you.
Modified Programs: CP0101.CBL, NSCTLINI.CBL, NSCTLMN5.CBL
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