Elliott V8.0 Control Center

The Control Center replaces the Elliott main menu and module menus from previous releases.  From the Control Center, you can launch nearly every feature of Elliott into a new process, independent of all other Elliott processes.  The Control Center looks like this:

Across the top is a toolbar that provides access to common tasks.  Hover the mouse over a toolbar button to see a brief description of the task.

Down the left side is a hierarchical treeview named Groups and Filters containing a list of the companies, and within the company a list of modules, and within the module a list of task types the user may run.  There also is a special group of Most Used tasks that is maintained automatically by Elliott.  The user may also create one or more favorite groups of tasks by right clicking on the company node and choosing “Add New Group.”  Once new groups are created, you can populate the groups with tasks from multiple modules and types by just dragging and dropping tasks onto the new group.  Selecting a node in this treeview will cause the applicable tasks to be listed on the right.

The right side contains a list of Elliott tasks that belong to the selected treeview node.

You may change the size and location of your Control Center window, and it will be saved the next time you start the Control Center.  Similarly, you can adjust the relative width of the treeview and listview portions of the screen, and that will be saved as well.

Toolbar Tasks

• Setup (User Preferences):  Click here to override the system-wide defaults for Elliott processing -- for example email settings. The changes you make here only apply to your particular desktop.
• Elliott (Next Elliott Process):  Click this button (or press F9) to go to the next open Elliott process on your computer.  This functionality is available on all Elliott processes.
• Notes (User Notes):  Click this button to launch the notes application for notes related to your user id.
• eContacts (Global eContacts):  Click here to launch your Global eContacts task. You can also launch this function by using EL800GE.EXE in the Bin folder.
• Ticklers (Supervisor Ticklers):  Click this button to launch your Supervisor Ticklers where you can see your ticklers and those of your subordinates.
• Email (eContacts Processor):  Click here to start the eContacts Processor (a.k.a., Mass Email). You can also launch this function by using EL800ME.EXE in the Bin folder.
• Export (Export Processor):  Click this button to launch the Export Processor. You can also launch this function by using “EL800ME.EXE –E” in the Bin Folder.
• Spooled (Spooled Reports):  Click here to launch the new Spooled Reports Manager.
• MostUsed (Most Used Tasks):  Click this button to see a list of the tasks you have used most recently.  This list is maintained automatically by the Control Center.
• Bigger (Make fonts and icons bigger):  Press this button to make the fonts and icons bigger for the Control Center.
• Smaller (Make fonts and icons smaller):  Press this button to make the fonts and icons smaller.
• Help:  Click here to bring up Web-based help information for the highlighted treeview node or listview task, or help for the Control Center.

Groups and Filters

This area is used primarily to select a corresponding list of tasks in the listview to its right.  There are some additional options also, depending on the node that is selected:

• Top node (Elliott Business Software):  Right click on this node to select one of the following tasks:
• Add New Company
• Password Setup
• Setup (User preferences)
• Hide Companies:  Select this option if you have some companies that you rarely use. Check off the companies you don’t want to see every day.  Later, you can use this option to make some companies visible once again.

• Company nodes: When you click on a company node, the list of tasks you can use in that company is created, if it hasn’t already been created (you will see a small “+” sign to the left of the company name when it is done).  Further, you can right click on a company node to select one of the following options:
• Add new group:  Select this option to create a favorite group that you can then populate with the specific tasks that you want in that group (see Customizing Control Center, below).
• Spooled Reports:  This option will start a Spooled Reports Manager task for the selected company.
• Module nodes:  When you click on a module node, like Accounts Payable, you will see the available tasks for that module to the right.  When you double click on a module node, it will expand to show the task types for that module, or contract back to just the module, if the task types were shown.  Right click on a module node to select one of the following options:
• Run:  Use this option to start a module-specific menu (like the A/R menu) if you want to use the V7.5 menu structure instead of launching separate tasks from the Control Center.
• Spooled Reports:  This option will start a Spooled Reports Manager task for the selected company with the selected module highlighted.
• Help:  This option will bring up Web-based help for the selected module.
• Task Type nodes:  When you click on one of these nodes (like Inquiry, Maintenance, etc.), the tasks on the right will be restricted to that kind of task. 

Available Tasks

The right side of the screen, below the toolbar buttons, is the listview containing the tasks that are available, according to the treeview node selected on the left.  It has the following columns:

• Task Description:  This is a short description of the task, preceded by an icon -- an arrow for most tasks or a star for the most-used tasks.  The color of the icon indicates the relative risk of running the task, from green (low risk) to yellow (moderate risk) to red (higher risk).
• Frequency columns:  For Processing and Report task types, there are six frequency columns: (D)aily, (W)eekly, (M)onthly, (Q)uarterly, (Y)early and (O)ther.  Tasks can have multiple frequencies.  For other task types, the frequency columns are hidden.
• Program:  The Elliott program (Help-ID) called for this task.
• Sequence number:  This represents the default sequence of the task within task type.
• Last Run By Me:  Each time you run the task, this timestamp is updated.

You may sort the tasks by clicking on any column header.

To launch a task, highlight it and press the Enter key or double click a task.  You may launch up to 10 tasks at once – simply highlight multiple tasks and press the Enter key.

If you right click on a task, the following options will appear:

• Rename:  If you logged in as SUPERVISOR, you can select this option to change the name of the task as it will appear for all users.
• Restore name:  This option allows the SUPERVISOR only to restore the original name of the task.
• Run:  This is the same as double clicking the task.
• Copy:  Select this option to copy a task into a user group by dragging and dropping it.
• Delete:  This option allows you to delete a task from a custom user group only; for standard groups, it will be grayed out.
• Frequency:  This allows you to change the frequency of a Processing or Report task, or to restore the original frequency.
• Risk:  If you logged in as SUPERVISOR, you can change the risk level of the task here.
• Sequence:  Selecting this option presents two more options:
• Move task(s):  Allows you to change the sequence of tasks by dragging them up or down in the list.  This only works when you do not have multiple task types in the list.
• Restore default:  This option sorts the list back into the original sequence.
• Help:  This will launch Web-based help for the selected task.

Running Special Programs

If you need to run a program that is not available in the Control Center navigation, you can use the Run Special… pulldown from the main File menu (this replaces the MSPL=FIX option in Elliott V7.x).  For security reasons, this menu item is available only when you log in as SUPERVISOR. 

After the File -> Run Special menu item is chosen, the following dialog is shown:

Here, you enter the name of the COBOL program you wish to run and, optionally, the abbreviation of the package where it exists or from which the special program will call additional programs.  When you specify a module library, the .LBR files associated with that package are opened and the programs in those .LBR files are made available.  If you leave Module Library blank, the INT or GNT extension program must exist in the startup (i.e.,< root>\Bin) directory.  When you press OK, the special program is launched in a separate process. Generally speaking, special programs are used for data conversion or fixing on a one-time basis. Therefore, they are not part of the Elliott Control Center navigation system.

The values on this dialog are saved in the registry and will be the default values the next time you use this function on this workstation.

Customizing the Control Center

The tasks in the Control Center may be customized at two levels:

• When user SUPERVISOR customizes the Control Center, those changes will apply to everyone using the company that was customized. 
• Further, each user may create user groups for his/her purposes only, containing tasks from any module or task type within the same company.

To add a new custom group, highlight the company node in the treeview on the left and do the following:

• Right click on the company node.
• Select Add new group.
• Type the name of the new group and press Enter.
• Click on any module node or task type node in the same company and drag-and-drop one or more tasks from the list of tasks onto the new user group node.

You may add additional tasks from any other module or task type in the same company.

Any user can make the following customizations to the tasks in the listview on the right:

• Change Frequency by right clicking on the task and selecting Frequency.
• Change the sequence in the list by dragging the task up or down the list when the treeview node on the left has a Task Type selected.

Additionally, SUPERVISOR can change the description of the task and the risk level.

Note: All customizations to a company done by SUPERVISOR will be the defaults for all other users in that company.

Task Icons

The SUPERVISOR user has the ability to assign different icons for the tasks that each user will see across all companies.

To change the image associated with a task, the SUPERVISOR user can right-click on the task, select Change Image, then Select Image… and a list of available images will be displayed:

The SUPERVISOR user can select an image, then press OK, and that selected image will be shown for that task in the Control Center for all users of all companies.

Command Line Options

For Elliott 8.0 - 8.2, the Control Center can be started with the following options to change its initial behavior:

• EL800.EXE /CO:nn /G:xxxx:  This option tells Control Center to position to the specified company and group.
• EL800.EXE /CO:nn /R:xxxx:  This options tells Control Center to position to the selected company and group and start all the tasks associated with that group.

For Elliott 8.5, you will use the following instead:

• EL850CC.EXE /CO:nn /G:xxxx
• EL850CC.EXE /CO:nn /R:xxxx

Keep in mind that we recommend run from local path for Elliott 8.5, so you need to put the local path in front of the above command line.

The following 8.0 - 8.2. example tells the Control Center to position to company 01 and the group called “Accounting Tasks,” and to start all the tasks in that group:

EL800.EXE /CO:01 /R:”Accounting Tasks”

Note that the company must be specified as a 2-digit number and that group names with embedded spaces must be enclosed in quotes.

Legacy Screens

The less graphical screens in Elliott, like Customer Maintenance, are referred to as Legacy Screens.  They all have a similar appearance, except for the content in the main area of the screen:

There are a few differences between V7.5 and V8.0 Legacy Screens:

• V8.0 Legacy Screens operate in their own process, independent of the Control Center.  You may launch as many of these as the resources of your computer allow.
• In V8.0, the 2^nd toolbar button, a globe, has the purpose of going to the next Elliott process.  By repeatedly pressing this button (or the F9 key) you can cycle among the open Elliott processes.
• The font processing is more intuitive in V8.0:
• Press the Font button (it looks like two letter “T”s) to bring up a combobox that displays a list of scalable font names (like “Lucida Console”) and some specific non-scalable fonts and sizes (like “08x12 Terminal”).
• Change the font by selecting a font name in this combobox.
• You can change the size of the selected scalable font in two ways:
• Clicking the Font Bigger (“A+”) button or Font Smaller (“A-“) button button to the right of the Font button will increase or decrease the size of the font, respectively.
• Resize the window by dragging the bottom right corner of the screen.  When you are done changing the size of the window, Elliott will use the size of the selected font that is closest to the new screen dimensions.
• If you select a non-scalable font in the combobox (one with a dimension and font name), the “A+” and “A-“ buttons on the toolbar will be grayed out, and you will not be able to resize the screen – the size of the screen is determined by the size of the font.
• Each task you launch from the Control Center will remember its location on your desktop for the next time it is used.
• V8.0 legacy screens support a new auto-link feature for telephone numbers and email addresses.  If the user right-clicks on a piece of text on the screen that is in the format of a telephone number or an email address, a popup menu will display an option to dial the number or start an email.
• Currently, 10- or 12-digit phone numbers that contain only 0-9, dash and period are supported. Elliott supports this function through Windows Telephony API. To use this feature, you will need a digital phone system that supports Telephony API.
• Valid email addresses are supported.

Three Application User Interfaces for Legacy Screens

Elliott V8.0 legacy screens can be run in three different user interface modes:

• PC:  This mode is the standard mode.  It has small toolbar buttons and its menus are normal Windows menus that are meant to be used with a mouse.

• Tablet:  This mode is suitable for running on tablet devices (like iPads, Surface Pros or Android tablets).  It favors a touch interface over a mouse.  It has two rows of toolbar buttons and its menus are presented as buttons.

• Mobile:  This mode is for running on mobile devices with very little screen area.  It has two rows of large toolbar buttons and its menus are presented as buttons.

Each user may select the application UI style by clicking the Setup button on the Control Center, then the Change format… button on the Input/Fonts tab:

The following dialog box will appear where the desired user interface can be selected:

Support Function Keys through Barcode Scanning

With the Tablets and Mobile user interface, you may now touch the function keys on the screen instead of touching the keyboard.  In some situations, it may be more efficient if you don’t touch the keyboard and the screen at all. Certain applications for the warehouse, like “Shipping Verification”, are designed for barcode scanning as the primary input.  If the user can scan a barcode to cause Elliott to think that a certain function key is pressed, then user can just operate with a barcode scanner, improving efficiency.

To support this function in Elliott V8.0, if you can make the following characters as "code 128" barcode, then Elliott will recognize them as the corresponding function keys:

• ~UP
• ~DOWN
• ~PAGEUP
• ~PAGEDOWN
• ~ENTER (recommend implementing as generic ASCII Code 13)
• ~ESCAPE (recommend implementing as generic ASCII Code 27)
• ~F1
• ~F2
• ~F3
• ~F4
• ~F5
• ~F6
• ~F7
• ~F8
• ~F9

Within Elliott V8 applications, inside any input field, the system recognizes the special character tilde "~" and expects to see one of those combinations above to follow. When that happens, Elliott will convert the input "~" value into the corresponding function key.

You may produce these function key barcodes through any commercial barcode software like Bartender. For your convenience, we are providing these barcodes below. You can simply print this page out and use it.

Keep in mind that these barcodes are only recognized as function keys inside Elliott V8 applications.  If you scan them outside of Elliott V8, they would just be recognized as their corresponding ASCII values.

Since the Enter and Escape keys are ASCII codes, they can be implemented as generic Code 128 barcodes directly.  They are provided below for your convenience.  Keep in mind that these two barcodes are not only recognizable when you scan in Elliott V8, they can be recognized by other applications as well:

Legacy Screen Behavior Alternative

By default, when a task returns to its first menu, pressing the ESC key will terminate the process.  Some users of V7.5 may find this behavior difficult to adapt to.  There are two things that may help:

• Instead of launching individual tasks from the Control Center, instead launch a legacy screen that starts with a module’s main menu, like ARMENU.  When started in that way, as a task is completed, pressing the ESC key will return to the module menu rather than terminating the process.  To launch a module’s main menu, highlight a module node in the treeview, right click it and choose Run.
• In Setup / Preferences, on the Input\Fonts tab, in the ESC Key Behavior section, select the Prompt before closing window option.  This option, when checked, will not terminate the process when the task has returned to the original menu and ESC is pressed – instead, the user will be prompted to confirm the termination, and can decide not to terminate.

A Productivity Example

You can combine a few of the new features of Elliott to create a very productive desktop environment.  For example, you can create a new user group, like the one called “My Accounting” in the screen below and then drag several related tasks to the group:

Then highlight many or all the tasks in this group and press the Enter key:

The highlighted tasks are all launched and located where they last were on the desktop.  This example shows how you can quickly launch several related tasks onto your desktop to jump-start your work with Elliott.