Microsoft Dynamics Navision- An Overview
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Transcript of Microsoft Dynamics Navision- An Overview
Navision Attain® Overview 3.60
Navision Attain® Overview 3.60
NOTICE
This material is for informational purposes only. Navision a/s disclaims all
warranties and conditions with regard to use of the material for other
purposes. Navision a/s shall not, at any time, be liable for any special, direct, indirect or consequential damages, whether in an action of contract,
negligence or other action arising out of or in connection with the use or performance of the material. This material is subject to change without
notice.
According to Danish copyright legislation it is against the law to reproduce
any part of this material in any form or by any means without the
permission of Navision a/s.
The software described is supplied under license and must be used and
copied in accordance with the enclosed license terms and conditions.
COPYRIGHT NOTICE
Copyright 2002 Navision a/s, Frydenlunds Allé 6, 2950 Vedbaek,
Denmark. All rights reserved.
TRADEMARKS
The trademarks referenced herein and marked with either TM or are either trademarks or registered trademarks of Navision a/s or Navision
Development a/s. However, the trademarks Microsoft, Windows, Windows NT, SQL Server and BackOffice are either registered trademarks or
trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other
countries.
Any rights not expressly granted herein are reserved.
The trademarks of Navision a/s and Navision Development a/s are listed on this Web site: http://trademarks.navision.com
The Arial font was used.
Published by Navision a/s.
Published in Denmark 2002.
DocID: AT-360-SST-001-V1.00.W1W1
TABLE OF CONTENTS
CHAPTER 1.
INTRODUCTION 1-1
1.1 About Navision Attain Overview Course 1-2
1.2 Installing Navision Attain 1-4
CHAPTER 2.
FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT 2-1
2.1 General Ledger 2-2
2.2 Sales & Receivables 2-12
2.3 Purchases & Payables 2-18
2.4 Fixed Assets 2-24
2.5 Resources 2-28
2.6 Jobs 2-33
2.7 Human Resources 2-35
2.8 Review Questions 2-40
CHAPTER 3.
SUPPLY CHAIN COLLABORATION 3-1
3.1 Inventory 3-2
3.2 Warehouse Management 3-11
3.3 Warehouse Management Systems (WMS) 3-
14
3.4 Manufacturing 3-18
TABLE OF CONTENTS
3.5 Capacity Requirements Planning 3-26
3.6 Review Questions 3-32
CHAPTER 4.
CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT 4-1
4.1 CRM – Marketing & Sales 4-2
4.2 CRM – Service 4-8
4.3 Review Questions 4-13
CHAPTER 5.
TECHNOLOGY 5-1
5.1 C/SIDE Development Environment 5-2
5.2 Server Options 5-7
5.3 Navision Attain Application Server 5-10
5.4 Multilanguage Functionality 5-12
5.5 Commerce Gateway 5-15
5.6 Commerce Portal 5-18
5.7 User Portal 5-23
5.8 Review Questions 5-27
Appendix A. I
INDEX 1
PREFACE
Navision Attain is a cost effective, end-to-end business solution that is
integrated, upgradeable and adaptable for all mid-market needs. It’s
intended for companies with annual revenue of 5 - 250 million US dollars. It includes functionality to help organizations reduce the burden of daily
administrative tasks and optimize internal and external communication and interaction.
This course is a general overview of all application areas in Navision Attain.
Below you can see the curriculum for Navision Attain:
This course is designed for students who want to pass the Navision Attain Overview test and enter into the Navision Attain Certification Program.
Preface
Chapter 1.
Introduction
This chapter describes the overall structure of the
Navision Attain Overview course and how to install Navision Attain on your computer.
The chapter contains these sections:
1.1 About Navision Attain Overview
1.2 Installing Navision Attain
1-2 Navision Attain® Overview
1.1 ABOUT NAVISION ATTAIN OVERVIEW COURSE
This Navision Attain Overview Course is primarily a self-study course
designed to give you an overview of all application areas in Navision Attain.
Course Organization
The course consists of the following chapters:
• Financial Management
• Supply Chain Collaboration
• Relationship Management
• Technology
• Appendix A: Cronus International Company History
Target Audience
The course is primarily aimed at new NSC employees who want a general overview of Navision Attain either for the purpose of demonstrating it to
customers or as a basis for going on to further specialist training. It can also be used for end users.
Course Prerequisites
None.
Course Objectives
The course gives a basic introduction and overview of Navision Attain to new NSC employees.
Course Overview
Chapter 2, Financial Management, introduces you to the General Ledger,
Sales & Receivables, Purchases & Payables, Fixed Assets, Resources,
Jobs, and Human Resources application areas.
Chapter 3, Supply Chain Collaboration, provides you with information about
the Distribution (including Inventory and Warehouse Management), Manufacturing, and Capacity Requirements Planning application areas.
Introduction 1-3
Chapter 4, Customer Relationship Management, introduces you to the Relationship Management and the Service Management application areas.
Chapter 5, Technology, introduces you to the C/SIDE development
environment, the GUI interface, the Multilanguage features, the application server and the server options (databases) available. Furthermore it
introduces you to Commerce Portal, Commerce Gateway and User Portal.
Course Duration
The course is primarily designed as a self-study course. We recommend that the course is taught in one day.
Dates
The dates in the course material are in the American format. In order to avoid confusion when reading the material, it is a good idea to change the
date format in Windows before starting the training session.
The working date is set at 01/25/01 (January 25, 2001).
Demonstration Data
All demonstration data in Navision Attain are based on a fictitious company, CRONUS International Ltd. The demonstration data required is sometimes
set up only in one location. To make sure that you have access to the relevant data, you must log on using the appropriate location as the log on
name. You will learn how to do this as part of the course.
1-4 Navision Attain® Overview
1.2 INSTALLING NAVISION ATTAIN
Before beginning the course, you must install Navision Attain on your
computer. Your installation CD contains the required Navision Attain granules.
The installation procedure is described below. The browser will automatically load the install file when you insert the CD. If the browser
does not load the install file, you can open it manually:
1 On the Start menu, click Run...
2 In the Run window, in the Open: field, enter x:\startcd.exe (replace x
with the letter that represents your CD-ROM drive) .
3 Click OK.
Then follow this procedure:
1 Insert the CD-ROM. The browser displays your options.
2 Click Client. A new window appears.
3 Click Navision Attain Client for Windows® 98, Windows NT™ 4.0 (Intel) and Windows 2000. The installation now begins.
4 In the File Download window, click Run this program from its current location to select it and click OK. A security warning appears.
5 Click Yes.
6 The Navision Attain W1 Installation Wizard window welcomes you to the setup wizard. Click Next>.
7 In the User Name: and Organization: fields enter your customer information. Click Next>.
8 Click All users or Only for me to select the desired option. Click
Next>.
9 Click the Complete field to select the setup type and click Next>.
10 Click Install to indicate that you are ready to install the program.
The installation process begins.
Introduction 1-5
11 Click Finish to complete the installation of Navision Attain.
Chapter 2.
Financial Management
This chapter contains an overview of the features
in the application areas included in the Financial Management product suite.
Before you can take further specialist training and certification in this area, you must pass the
Navision Attain Essentials Test. Then you can take the Financial Management course.
This chapter contains the following sections:
2.1 General Ledger
2.2 Sales & Receivables
2.3 Purchases & Payables
2.4 Fixed Assets
2.5 Resources
2.6 Jobs
2.7 Human Resources
2.8 Review Questions
2-2 Navision Attain® Overview
2.1 GENERAL LEDGER
The General Ledger application area is the center of the company’s
accounts. It gives you an overview of the financial situation of your company.
This application area contains the features that are used with a company’s general ledger: The chart of accounts, general journals, account schedules,
budgets, bank accounts, multiple currencies and consolidation and all the
reports and registers related to the general ledger.
In addition to account schedules, the General Ledger application area
provides other tools for analyzing financial information using dimension information. These let you identify income-generating areas or products,
avoid losses, adjust unrealistic budgets and so on.
For reporting to customs and tax authorities, the program provides the ability to calculate and report VAT and sales tax, and can also assist in
completing INTRASTAT reports required in the EU.
Setting Up a Company
You must enter certain basic information before the program can be used for the company’s daily accounting work.
The information you must record in the General Ledger application area is:
• The company’s name and address
• The chart of accounts
• Posting groups
• VAT information
• The opening balances and entries for all accounts
Depending on the features you plan to use in Navision Attain you may need
to enter additional information.
Chart of Accounts
The core of a company is the chart of accounts, that is, the list of the G/L
accounts to which all G/L entries are posted. You use the Chart of Accounts window to enter and view your G/L accounts and account
Financial Management 2-3
balances. The drilldown features in the program allow you to see the ledger entries that make up the balance of an account.
You create the chart of accounts in the same way you create new G/L
accounts. You can set up new G/L accounts in the Chart of Accounts window (displayed below) or in the G/L Account Card window. Click
General Ledger, Chart of Accounts to see the Chart of Accounts window.
General Journals
General journals enable you to post transactions to general ledger
accounts and other accounts, such as customer accounts, vendor accounts, and bank accounts.
The entries can be directly posted from the General Ledger application area, but they can also come from the Sales & Receivables, Purchases &
Payables and Fixed Assets application areas. The information contained in
these journals is temporary and can be changed before you post the journal. Some journals are also posted as part of a batch job routine. This
is common in the Jobs and Inventory application areas.
Once a journal is posted, transactions cannot be deleted, but you can
reverse them by posting additional entries.
Tracing Transactions
All transactions that have been posted are stored in registers. The tracing
feature enables you to trace the origin of all entries using either source codes or reason codes. You can also easily trace all related entries that
were posted with a specific journal by using the Navigate feature, which shows you all entries (grouped by type) that are related to a user-selected
entry.
2-4 Navision Attain® Overview
Managing VAT
When you post a journal line in the General Ledger application area and
the entry contains a VAT code, the program creates a VAT entry. You can
see the VAT entries by choosing General Ledger, Registers and opening the Registers window, then clicking VAT Entries.
Several VAT calculation types required for trading in the EU and other countries are available. These include normal VAT transactions, reverse
VAT transactions and full VAT transactions.
The program also contains some special tables to manage the tasks
necessary for settling VAT and reporting to the customs and tax authorities.
You can use these tables to have the program:
• Calculate the VAT due for a period.
• Prepare and print a VAT statement, which can be copied directly to the giro form.
• Print a list of sales to EU countries (on paper or to a diskette).
Account Schedules
You use account schedules to analyze figures in G/L accounts, to compare G/L entries in different periods, or to compare G/L entries with G/L budget
entries. For example, you can view the G/L entries as percentages of the
budget entries.
Account schedules can be used to make both simple and complex
customized financial statements and management reports. By utilizing the analytical capabilities of the company dimension features, you can analyze
your G/L accounts in even greater detail.
You can also export your account schedules to Microsoft Excel. This
allows you to:
• Further format your financial data using the formatting options in Microsoft Excel.
• Distribute your customized financial statements and management reports to parties that do not have access to the program.
The demonstration company comes with some example account schedules
such as the account schedule below, which performs the “acid-test” analysis (to see the window click General Ledger, Account Schedules):
Financial Management 2-5
Budgets
You can create budgets in the general ledger application area by using the Budget window. You can create as many budgets as you like. You can
create simple G/L Account budgets for specific periods. You can also use the company dimensions features when entering the budget to create
detailed budgets. With dimensions, it is possible to create detailed sales budgets by customer or item for each sales account in the G/L. If you want
to limit a budget so that it applies only to specific dimensions or business
units, you can set a filter using the Filters tab in the Budget window. Then you can enter your budget figures.
You can also export budgets to Microsoft Excel and import budgets from Microsoft Excel. You can import many Excel files into the same budget.
The export feature allows you to distribute budget information to parties
that do not have access to the program. Likewise the import feature allows you to consolidate budget information from parties that do not have access
to the program.
Here is an example of the Budget window (click General Ledger, Budgets
to view the window):
2-6 Navision Attain® Overview
Dimensions
The dimensions feature in Navision Attain helps you answer questions
about your business. By using dimensions on posted entries and budget entries, you have the ability to monitor how individual units (for example, a
responsible department or region) are performing and to compare performance with other units (such as previous periods and budgeted
amounts).
You can ensure the consistency of data by setting up rules for dimensions. You determine how dimensions are combined in order to make sure that
they reflect company policy. You can also support the way your business operates by defining default dimensions. Default dimensions may be set up
for all accounts including G/L accounts, customer and vendor accounts. For
each default, you can define posting rules that determine the way dimension information may be posted. This ensures quicker data entry with
fewer errors.
You can change existing dimensions to reflect your business processes:
• You can name them in a way that reflects your company’s reporting practices and the requirements of your employees.
• When you no longer require a particular dimension, you can simply block it from use.
• You can structure values in a hierarchy that mirrors your existing reporting structures.
Financial Management 2-7
• You can change dimensions (or add new ones) as often as you like – without changing your accounting structure.
Traditionally, analysis of financial information in the general ledger has
been made possible by creating a detailed chart of accounts with many accounts. By using the analytical capabilities of dimensions, you can
reduce the need to create a large number of detailed accounts in the chart
of accounts.
Analysis Views
Using dimensions in Navision Attain, you can create analysis views. Each analysis view provides a unique way of gathering and viewing G/L entries
posted with dimensions based on specific criteria. This information can be
filtered for certain accounts, periods, budgets, and dimension values, for example. From an analysis view, you can drill down to the exact G/L entries
that have contributed to the view you are seeing.
You can easily create a library of views for the reports you use in your
company, and manipulate and scrutinize analysis views to investigate possible trends that can affect the way that you do business. You can
reproduce all of this information in printed reports, web reports in HTML
format, and Excel, using account schedules.
An example of dimension analysis using the CAMPAIGN analysis view in
the demonstration company can be seen below (Click General Ledger, Analysis by Dimensions.)
2-8 Navision Attain® Overview
Bank Accounts
You can manage any number of bank accounts with any number of
different banks. These accounts can be either deposit accounts or loan
accounts. You can set up a bank account in the local currency or in a foreign currency. The program also provides the ability to reconcile the
bank statement transactions with the entries in the bank account.
Each bank account has a card containing a variety of information. Here is
an example of a bank account card (click General Ledger, Bank Accounts to view the window):
Foreign Trade and Multiple Currencies
The foreign trade features in Navision Attain allow you to handle foreign currencies.
You can manage:
• Foreign currency transactions with your customers and vendors
• Posting of foreign exchange gains and losses
• Keeping track of foreign exchange rates
Here is the Currencies window, which you use to manage foreign currency
gains and losses and keep track of exchange rates (click General Ledger,
Setup, General, Currencies to open it):
Financial Management 2-9
Additional Reporting Currency
You can also select a second currency, in addition to the local currency, to be used for financial reporting.
For companies in EMU countries, this enables you to report results in both your local currency and euro. Companies in non-EMU countries may also
wish to use euro as an additional reporting currency, if they regularly trade
with EMU countries. The additional reporting currency also enables foreign subsidiary companies to report financial information in the currency of the
parent company.
Consolidation of Financial Information from Subsidiary Companies
For companies with subsidiary companies, it is possible to consolidate the financial information into a parent company in Navision Attain. Subsidiary
companies are set up as business units in the parent company. The
program can also consolidate foreign subsidiaries since the currency can be defined for each business unit.
You can consolidate information from a company in the same Navision Attain database or you can consolidate information for a subsidiary from a
file. As long as the file contains the necessary information and is in the
required format, you can consolidate information from subsidiaries using different accounting software.
Extensible Business Reporting Language (XBRL)
Navision Attain offers you the advantages of producing reports using
XBRL. Extensible Business Reporting Language (XBRL) is a global financial reporting initiative that has been undertaken by numerous ERP
Software products and international accounting organizations. The main
purpose of this initiative is to provide a standard for uniform reporting of
2-10 Navision Attain® Overview
financial information for banks, investors, and any other users of financial information. The goal of the initiative is to create a method for exchange of
financial information in a global market place and provide a format of
consistent financial information for analysis across companies.
INTRASTAT Reporting in the EU
EU companies must report their trade with other countries. The program
contains some special tables to manage the tasks necessary for reporting to the customs and tax authorities. You can use these tables to have the
program:
• Prepare and print the monthly INTRASTAT report, which can be copied directly to the form provided by the tax authority.
• Print a list of transactions with EU countries (on paper or to a diskette).
Converting to the Euro
Navision Attain is euro compliant. An additional tool, called the Euro Conversion Tool, is available to perform the following conversion processes:
• Convert all the company's local currency amounts to euro
• Convert EMU currency amounts and open documents for customers and vendors to euro
• Convert EMU currency bank accounts to euro
Financial Management 2-11
When you convert the company's local currency to euro, a history of the transactions in the original local currency may be kept if required. For
customers, vendors and bank accounts, a history of the transactions in the
original EMU currency is always kept.
2-12 Navision Attain® Overview
2.2 SALES & RECEIVABLES
You use the features in the Sales & Receivables application area to
manage sales and accounts receivable through individual accounts for each customer.
This application area contains all the features that are used with a company’s sales: Customer cards, sales and cash receipt journals, quotes,
orders, invoices and credit memos, as well as reports, documents, entry
registers and posted documents related to sales.
The Sales & Receivables application area is fully integrated with the
general ledger. This means that when you post a transaction (an invoice, for example), the program automatically posts all necessary transactions to
the sales account, the receivables account, and possible discount and VAT
accounts.
Sales & Receivables has facilities for complete customer and sales
management in an international environment.
Customer Cards
You use the customer card to set up information on all your customers.
You must set up a card for each customer. On the card you enter basic
information, such as name, address and discounts available to the
customer. To open the window, click Sales & Receivables, Customers:
Invoicing
When you post a sales invoice, the program creates a posted sales invoice.
Financial Management 2-13
You can view it by clicking Sales & Receivables, Posted Invoices:
Partial Shipping and Invoicing and Combined Shipments
Partial shipments are shipments of parts of an order. This occurs when some of the ordered items are in stock and others are backordered. The
backordered items are then shipped in a separate shipment. In Navision Attain, there are no limits on the number of shipments that can be made for
an order. Partial invoicing is when you invoice for a partial shipment before the remaining units have been shipped.
It is also possible to combine the shipments of several orders into one large
shipment using the Combine Shipments feature.
Alternative Invoicing and Shipping and Drop Shipments
You can invoice a different customer than the person or company that ordered the goods. In Navision Attain, the sell-to customeris the customer
that ordered the goods or resources. The bill-to customer is the customer to
which the bill is sent.
In some cases, you may want to sell an item that you do not have in stock
and have one of your vendors ship the item directly to the customer. The program can easily handle these drop shipments due to the integration
between the Sales and Receivables and Purchases & Payables application areas.
2-14 Navision Attain® Overview
Item Discounts on Sales
Navision Attain has three types of item discounts:
• Quantity discounts – discounts that apply when a customer buys more than a certain quantity of an item
• Invoice discounts – discounts that can apply to specific customers and can require a minimum invoice amount
• Customer/Item discounts – discounts that apply for certain combinations of customer and item
Below is an example of the Customer Invoice Discounts window. To
open it from the customer card, click Sales, Invoice Discounts:
Cash Receipts
You use the cash receipt journals to register payments from customers.
Cash refunds given to customers may also be handled using the cash receipt journal. A cash receipt journal is a type of general journal, so you
can use it to post transactions to G/L, bank, customer, vendor and fixed
assets accounts.
The program allows you to apply a single cash receipt or refund to several
outstanding sales invoices and sales credit memos. You can apply the cash receipt or refund at the same time as you post it or you can apply the
cash receipt after you have posted it.
The program also enables you to set up payment discount terms offered to your customers to encourage early settlement of outstanding invoices.
To open the Cash Receipt Journal window, click Sales & Receivables, Cash Receipt Journals:
Financial Management 2-15
Sales Credit Memos
You can create a sales credit memo when a customer returns an item, but
you can also use it to compensate a customer with a sales allowance or to correct an erroneous sales invoice. You can apply a credit memo to a
specific invoice, reducing the amount outstanding for the invoice, including
the possible payment discount.
To view the Sales Credit Memo window, click Sales & Receivables, Credit
Memos:
Reminders
Reminders are used to highlight accounts where customer payments are overdue.
2-16 Navision Attain® Overview
You can define an unlimited number of reminder terms to accommodate the various reminder procedures that may be required. To open the
Reminder window, click Sales & Receivables, Periodic Activities,
Reminders:
Finance Charge Memos
If a customer has not paid an invoice on time, you may want to charge
them interest on the overdue payment.
A finance charge memo is the document created by Navision Attain
containing the details of the overdue payment and the finance charges that
have been applied. To open the Finance Charge Memo window, click Sales & Receivables, Periodic Activities, Finance Charge Memos.
Financial Management 2-17
Tracking Packages
You can use Navision Attain to access the Internet and track shipments.
The automatic tracking function can be activated only for a posted
shipment.
Integration with Other Application Areas
The Sales & Receivables application area is also integrated with the Jobs, Resources and Fixed Assets application areas. All job sales and resource
sales must be performed through the sales invoice. You can also sell fixed assets in sales invoices and sales orders.
2-18 Navision Attain® Overview
2.3 PURCHASES & PAYABLES
You use the features in the Purchases & Payables application area to
manage your purchases and accounts payable through individual accounts for each vendor.
This application area contains all the features used with a company’s purchases: Vendor cards, purchase and payment journals, requisition
worksheets, quotes, orders, invoices and credit memos, as well as reports,
documents, entry registers and posted documents related to purchases.
The features in the Purchases & Payables application are similar to the
features in the Sales & Receivables area.
Vendor Cards
You use vendor cards to set up information on all your vendors.
You must set up a card for each vendor. On the card, you enter basic information such as name, address and the kinds of discounts that are
available. The vendor card looks like this (click Purchases & Payables, Vendors to open the window):
Purchase Invoicing
You can register purchase items in the program and update both inventory
and the general ledger by filling in and posting a purchase invoice. The
Purchase Invoice window looks like this (click Purchases & Payables, Invoices to open the window):
Financial Management 2-19
Alternative Shipping and Invoicing
You use alternative purchase invoicing when you receive the invoice from a different vendor than the person or company that you ordered the goods
from. The buy-from vendor is the vendor you placed the order with, while the pay-to vendor is the one you pay. You enter information about the pay-
to vendor on the Invoicing tab in the Purchase Invoice window:
2-20 Navision Attain® Overview
Partial Receipts and Partial Invoicing
Partial receipts occur when you receive the items from a purchase order in
more than one delivery. If the vendor invoices you for each partial receipt,
you can register the invoice by creating a partial invoice.
Item Discounts on Purchasing
There are three types of item discounts on purchases:
• Quantity discounts - discounts that apply when you buy more than a certain quantity of an item
• Vendor/Item discounts - discounts that apply for certain combinations of vendor and item
• Invoice discounts - discounts from specific vendors that can require a minimum invoice amount
Here is the Vendor Invoice Discounts window. The discount is calculated automatically when you fill in a purchase invoice. To view the window, go to
the vendor card and click Purchases, Invoice Discounts.
Cash Payments
You use the payment journals to register payments to vendors and other
outward payments. Cash refunds received from vendors may also be handled using the payment journal. A payment journal is a type of general
journal, so you can use it to post transactions to G/L, bank, customer,
vendor and fixed assets accounts.
You can make manual payments or you can have the program suggest
vendor payment amounts. You can also use the program to make
Financial Management 2-21
payments using printed computer checks.
The program allows you to apply a single payment or refund to several
outstanding purchase invoices and purchase credit memos. You can apply
the payment or refund at the same time as you post it or you can apply the payment after you have posted it.
The program also enables you to keep track of payment discount terms offered by vendors to encourage your early settlement of outstanding
invoices.
To open the Payment Journal window, click Purchases & Payables,
Payment Journals:
Purchase Credit Memos
You can create a purchase credit memo when you return an item to a
vendor, but you can also use it to record a purchase allowance negotiated with your vendor or to correct an erroneous purchase invoice. You can
apply a credit memo to a specific invoice, reducing the amount outstanding for the invoice, including the possible payment discount.
To view a posted credit memo in the Posted Purchase Credit Memo
window, click Purchases & Payables, Posted Credit Memos:
2-22 Navision Attain® Overview
Item Reordering and Inventory Replenishment
If you have inventory items with relatively constant turnover rates, you can use the requisition worksheet features to keep track of when to order. The
requisition worksheet can be used to suggest which items to reorder and quantity of items to reorder. You can then use the requisition worksheet to
create purchase orders based on the suggestions. To view the requisition
worksheet, click Purchases & Payables, Requisition Worksheets.
Integration with Other Application Areas
The Purchases & Payables application area is also integrated with the Jobs and Fixed Assets application areas. You can purchase items for use in a
job with a purchase invoice. You can also purchase fixed assets with
Financial Management 2-23
purchase invoices and purchase orders.
2-24 Navision Attain® Overview
2.4 FIXED ASSETS
You use Fixed Assets to obtain an overview of your company’s fixed assets
and to ensure correct periodic depreciation.
This application area includes all the features necessary to manage fixed
assets, such as fixed asset cards, insurance cards, FA journals, FA G/L and FA reclassification journals, insurance journals, and reports and
registers related to fixed assets.
Fixed Assets gives you a comprehensive resource for organizing, managing and accounting for your company’s fixed assets. It also enables
you to keep track of your maintenance costs, manage insurance policies related to fixed assets, post fixed asset transactions and generate various
reports and statistics.
Fixed Asset Cards
For each fixed asset, you must set up a card containing information about
the asset. Buildings or production equipment can be set up as main assets with component lists.
A fixed asset can be split up into several fixed assets, and several fixed assets can be combined into one. If a fixed asset is partially disposed, it
must be separated into two fixed assets, and then one of them can be sold.
Fixed assets can be grouped in various ways, for example, by class, department or location.
You can set up budgeted assets. This makes it possible to include any anticipated acquisitions and sales in reports. You can see fixed asset
cards by clicking Fixed Assets (to get to the Fixed Assets Main Menu), and
then Fixed Assets. The window looks like this:
Financial Management 2-25
Depreciation
The Fixed Assets application area provides several different depreciation
methods such as straight line and declining balance as well as the option of
creating customized depreciation methods. You can set up multiple depreciation books to accommodate different kinds of depreciation. A batch
job is used to calculate periodic depreciation. To see the FA depreciation books for an asset, click Fixed Assets, Fixed Assets, find the fixed asset
card for the relevant asset and click Fixed Asset, Depreciation Books. The window looks like this:
Maintenance
For each asset, you can record maintenance costs and the next service
date. Keeping track of maintenance expenses can be important for budgeting purposes and for making decisions about whether to replace a
fixed asset. You register maintenance costs in the Maintenance Registration window. To open it from a fixed asset card, click Fixed Asset,
Maintenance Registration:
2-26 Navision Attain® Overview
Insurance
Each fixed asset can be attached to one or more insurance policies. You
can therefore easily verify that insurance policy amounts are in accordance with the value of the assets that are linked to the policy. This also makes it
easy to monitor annual insurance premiums. You keep track of your
insurance policies on the insurance card. To open it, click Fixed Assets, Insurance.
Posting Transactions:
You do all posting in the Fixed Assets application area from journals. There are four different journals:
• The FA G/L journal
• The FA journal
• The FA reclassification journal
• The Insurance journal
Financial Management 2-27
Statistics and Reports
For each fixed asset depreciation book, there is a statistics window that
provides a quick overview of the book value, depreciable basis,
accumulated depreciation, and gains or losses on sales. Each main asset has its own statistics window.
There are several reports available. Some of these can be tailored to meet specific needs.
2-28 Navision Attain® Overview
2.5 RESOURCES
In the Resources application area, you define resources, which can either
be personnel or machines. You may link the individual resources to resource groups.
This application area contains all the features that are used with a company’s resource management: Individual resources, resource groups,
capacity planning, resource journals, as well as reports and registers
related to resources.
Resources is the application area for optimal management of personnel
and/or machines.
Resource Cards
You set up new resources on resource cards. To view the resource cards,
click Resources (for the Resources Main Menu), and then Resources. The window looks like this:
Resource Groups
You can work with resources as individual entities or as groups. Any
number of resources can be assigned to a resource group.
Posting Resource Usage
You post usage and sales of your resources for internal use and statistics
in the Resource Journal window. The entries do not have any connection to G/L accounts and cannot be posted to the general ledger (in contrast to
job entries).
Financial Management 2-29
Resource Capacity
You may need to increase the capacity of resources (for example,
technicians) regularly over a period.
A resource’s capacity indicates how much of the resource is available in a specified period.
You can assign or modify capacities to your individual resources or to resource groups. For example, for employees you might want to enter the
available man-hours. For machines, you could enter the production capacity for a time frame. It is possible to enter capacity by day, week,
month, quarter, year, or accounting period. You can record resource
capacities in the Resource Capacity window. To view it, click Resources, Resource Capacity.
Allocating Resources to Jobs
You can allocate a resource or a resource group’s capacity to one or several jobs.
You can do this either from the Resources application area or the Jobs application area.
You use the Resource Allocated per Job window to view and change the
amounts of measuring units for resources allocated to the various jobs in different time periods. To view the window, go to the Resource Capacity
window and click Planning, Resource Allocated per Job.
2-30 Navision Attain® Overview
Resource Allocated per Service Order
You can use the Resource Allocated per Service Order window to view
the amounts of units of measure for resources allocated to the various service orders in different periods. To view the window from the resource
card, click Planning, Resource Allocated per Service Order.
Resource Availability
The Resource Availability window shows a scrollable summary of resource capacities. The window is divided into lines showing the entire
capacity, the quantity allocated to jobs on order, the capacity assigned to
jobs on quote, the availability after order and the remaining capacity after all jobs on quote or order. To open the window from the resource card, click
Planning, Resource Availability.
Modifying Resources
You can update resources and resource groups on the resource card. You
can delete resources from the Resource Group window.
Financial Management 2-31
Resource and Job Integration
The Resources application area and the Jobs application area are
integrated.
You can allocate the capacity of a resource or a resource group to one or several jobs.
Resource Journals
The Resource Journals feature enables you to keep track of your use of
resources and their profitability.
You can post usage and sales of your resources in the resource journal,
and you can generate statistics from this information for internal
management purposes. To see a resource journal, click Resources, Resource Journal:
Resource Statistics
You can see all of the transactions recorded in job journals, resource
journals or (with some limitations) sales documents in the Resource Statistics window. To open the window from the resource card, click
Resource, Resource Statistics.
2-32 Navision Attain® Overview
Financial Management 2-33
2.6 JOBS
You use the Jobs application area for detailed planning and management
of the costing for any long-term job or project activity. You can also use it for many types of services and consultancy tasks.
Successful job management requires an up-to-date overview, detailed planning and the ability to carry out follow-up analysis using objective data.
This application area contains all the features that are used with a
company’s job and project management: For example, Job cards, job budgets, job journals, as well as reports and registers related to resources.
Job Budgets
You use the Job Budget window to set up a budget for a job. You can set
up a budget for each job. The budget is used to plan the resources you
allocate to a job.
The budget can be either very general with few entries or it can contain
more entries that are divided into activity levels. Click Jobs, Budgets to view the job budgets.
Job Journals
You can use the job journals to:
• Post job usage of resources, items and general ledger resources.
• Apply job ledger and item ledger entries.
• Assign entries to phases, tasks, and steps.
2-34 Navision Attain® Overview
• Reconcile resources.
You can view the job journal by clicking Jobs, Job Journals. The window
looks like this:
Job Sales
The integration with the Sales & Receivables application area allows you to perform job sales. All job sales must be performed using the Sales Invoice.
Financial Management 2-35
2.7 HUMAN RESOURCES
Human Resources is a fully integrated application area that enables you to
register and update personnel information about employees effectively.
This application area includes all the features that are used in the human
resources department of a company: Employee cards, absence registration, and reports related to employees.
This makes personnel management more effective through the optimal use
of employee data.
Employees
You use the employee card to register all employee information. To view the window, click Human Resources, Employees:
Absence
Absence codes help you keep track of the absences of employees and the cause of the absences. To open the Employee Absences window from
the employee card, click Employee, Absences. The window looks like this:
2-36 Navision Attain® Overview
Grounds for Termination
You use the Grounds for Termination window to set up reasons that employees might leave the company. To open the window, click Human
Resources, Setup, Grounds for Termination:
Employment Contracts
You use employment contract codes to set up the types of contracts the
company has entered into with its employees. To open the Employment Contracts window, click Human Resources, Setup, Employment
Contracts. The window looks like this:
Financial Management 2-37
Qualification
You enter qualification codes to specify various employee qualifications. To
open the Employee Qualifications window from the employee card, click
Employee, Qualifications:
Relatives
You enter codes for relatives to register the precise relationship of an
employee’s relatives or close contacts to each employee. To open the Employee Relatives window from the employee card, click Employee,
Relative.
2-38 Navision Attain® Overview
Miscellaneous Articles
You can set up codes and descriptions for the benefits your employees receive and articles owned by the company that are in the possession of
individuals. You do this in the Misc. Article Information window. To open the window from the employee card, click Employee, Misc. Article
Information:
Confidential Information
You use confidential information codes to register confidential aspects of
an individual’s employment, such as salaries, stock option plans, pensions, and so on. You record confidential information about an employee in the
Confidential Information window. To open the window from the employee
card, click Employee, Confidential Information. The window looks like this:
Financial Management 2-39
2-40 Navision Attain® Overview
2.8 REVIEW QUESTIONS
1 These questions are for self-study, to ensure that you have
understood the material in this chapter.
2 What are the five things you must do in the General Ledger
application area before you can use the program for accounting work?
3 Describe the VAT-related tasks that the program can perform.
4 Explain what you use account schedules for.
5 How many budgets can you create in Navision Attain for a single company?
6 Explain the advantages of using dimensions.
7 What can the foreign currency features in Navision Attain do?
8 Explain the difference between the sell-to customer and the bill-to
customer.
9 Describe the three different types of discounts you can use with
customers.
10 Describe a partial receipt.
11 How do you open the FA Depreciation Books window for an asset?
12 Which window do you use to modify or assign capacities for
resources?
13 Describe the different ways you can view resource allocation.
14 Describe what you can use job journals for.
15 Describe the types of information you can record in Navision Attain about employees.
Financial Management 2-41
Chapter 3.
Supply Chain Collaboration
The Supply Chain Collaboration product suite
includes the Manufacturing and Distribution application areas. Distribution covers the
Warehouse Management application area in the Navision Attain main menu.
If you want to take further specialist training and certification in this area, you must first pass the
Navision Attain Essentials Test. After that you
can take the Distribution course and the Manufacturing course.
This chapter contains the following sections:
3.1 Inventory
3.2 Warehouse Management
3.3 Warehouse Management Systems (WMS)
3.4 Manufacturing
3.5 Capacity Requirements Planning
3.6 Review Questions
3-2 Navision Attain® Overview
3.1 INVENTORY
The Inventory application area contains all the features that a company
needs to manage its inventory: item cards to record and maintain information about individual items, item and BOM journals to register
changes in inventory, and reports and registers related to items and BOMs.
As the inventory application area is integrated with other Navision Attain
application areas, the inventory is automatically updated when transactions
of inventory increase and decrease are posted from any operational area in the company. This provides flexible inventory support across the entire
organization.
Item Cards
You use item cards to enter basic information about an item in your
inventory, such as item number, description, unit of measure, as well as invoicing, ordering and reporting information. There is one card for each
item. Each card contains several tabs with different types of information about the item. To see an item card, click Inventory, Items.
Stockkeeping Units
Stockkeeping units do not replace item cards, but they are related to them.
Stockkeeping units allow you to differentiate information about an item for a specific location (such as a warehouse or distribution center) or a specific
variant (such as different shelf numbers and different replenishment information) for the same item.
It is important to note that the information on the stockkeeping unit card has
priority over the information on the item card. To see a stockkeeping unit
Supply Chain Collaboration 3-3
card, click Inventory, Stockkeeping Units.
Nonstock Items
The Nonstock Item table contains information about items that your
company sells but does not carry in inventory. You would usually handle the sale of a nonstock item in one of two ways:
Drop
Shipment
The item is shipped from the vendor directly to the customer. You
buy and sell the item but do not handle, stock or deliver it.
Special Order You purchase a nonstock item from the vendor especially for a
customer, receive it at your warehouse and ship it to the
customer, either by itself or in combination with other items on the
sales order.
To see a nonstock item card, click Inventory, Nonstock Items:
3-4 Navision Attain® Overview
Item Journals
You use item journals to adjust inventory in connection with purchases,
sales, and positive and negative adjustments.
The information you enter in the item journal is temporary and can be changed as long as it is still in the journal. When you post the journal, the
information is transferred to entries on individual accounts. To open the Item Journal window, click Inventory, Item Journals.
Item Reclassification Journals
You use item reclassification journals to adjust inventory when you transfer
items between different locations. To insert lines in the item journal, click
the first empty line and fill in the fields.
When the journal is filled in, you can choose to post, post and print a report,
or print a test report only. To open the Item Reclass. Journal window, click Inventory, Item Reclass. Journals.
Supply Chain Collaboration 3-5
Physical Inventory Journals
You use physical inventory journals to maintain an up-to-date record of
your inventory at different locations. The physical inventory feature can also assist you in taking a physical inventory by comparing the actual quantity
on hand, as determined by a physical count, with the quantity on hand
calculated by the program. If there are any differences, you must record and post them.
When you post the journal, the program creates a physical inventory ledger entry for every journal line and an item ledger entry for each journal line on
which the actual quantity on hand, as determined by the physical count, is
different from the quantity on hand calculated and recorded by the program. To see the Phys. Inventory Journal window, click Inventory,
Phys. Inventory Journals:
3-6 Navision Attain® Overview
BOM Journals
You use the BOM journals to produce bills of material (BOMs).
To produce a BOM, you must enter it into the BOM journal and post it from
there. The program automatically makes a negative adjustment to inventory for the items that are included in the BOM and a positive adjustment for the
BOM. To open the BOM Journal window, click Inventory, BOM Journal.
Revaluation Journals
The inventory value of an item can change over time, for example, as a result of damage or age.
If you want to change the inventory value of an item or a specific item ledger entry, you must use the revaluation journal.
You can also use the revaluation journal to correct incorrect posted
documents.
The revaluation journal lets you see the existing value of an item and
assign a new value to it. To open the Revaluation Journal window, click Inventory, Revaluation Journals.
Supply Chain Collaboration 3-7
Item Substitution
You can substitute an item with another when the desired item is out of
stock. You can also use this feature when the alternatives are cheaper and have a higher profit margin. You must fill in substitution information for an
individual item in the Item Substitution Entry window. To open the
window, go to the item card for the relevant item, then click Item, Substitutions:
Item Cross-References
You can identify your customers’ preferences by cross-referencing any
customer code, internal code, or vendor code. You do this in the Item Cross Reference Entries window. To view the window, go to the item card
of the relevant item, then click Item, Cross References.
3-8 Navision Attain® Overview
Location Transfers
Sometimes you need to transfer items from one location to another, so that the receiving location can fill a customer order. You transfer items from one
location to another with a transfer order. To open the Transfer Order window, click Inventory, Transfer Orders:
You can track the movement of inventory between different locations whenever you want to:
• Get an overview and report inventory in transit
• Apply and trace additional costs
Item Tracking
The item tracking setup consists of three elements; item tracking codes
setup, serial and lot number setup, and item setup. An item tracking code
Supply Chain Collaboration 3-9
defines which item parameters (serial number, lot number, or both) the program will use to track the items and in which operational areas. When a
company wants to assign serial and lot numbers to items automatically, it
needs to set up number series that the program will use. To be able to track a specific item, a company must first set it up for item tracking by
applying a particular item tracking code.
You set up item tracking codes in the Item Tracking Codes window. To
open the window, click Inventory, Setup, Item Tracking Codes:
Web Access to Information and Data Exchange with Customers and Vendors
In the Web Sources window, you can see the search engines that you can use when accessing information about your contact companies on the
Internet, such as Yahoo. If your Web source is a Web site, you cannot search for a search word. To view the Web Sources window, click
Relationship Management, Setup, Company, Web Sources.
Order Promising
In Navision Attain, the date calculation functionality and the Order
Promising feature are the cornerstone of managing sales orders. The program calculates the delivery and shipment dates that meet the dates
requested by customers based on availability dates.
The program operates with two concepts:
• available to promise (ATP), and
• capable to promise (CTP).
ATP is used in connection with the date calculation functionality and is
3-10 Navision Attain® Overview
based on the inventory reservation system. When the ATP function is used, the program performs the availability check of the uncommitted
(unreserved) portion of a company's inventory in terms of planned
production, purchase, transfers and sales return. Based on the availability date of the items, the delivery date is calculated.
CTP is used to perform “what if” scenarios. If no items are available in inventory and there are no inbound orders scheduled, the program can
calculate the earliest date that items can be available if they are produced, bought or transferred from another location. From the availability date of
the items, the program calculates the delivery date at the customer, creates
order lines for this date and reserves the inventory.
With the date calculation functionality, companies can also make estimates
concerning the expected dates for order receipts from their vendors.
To handle sales, purchase and transfer orders efficiently and to calculate
the exact and believable dates for receipt, delivery or shipments, the
program offers the company a calendar feature. When scheduling dates, the program offsets warehouse handling time and the shipping time against
non-working dates and holidays specified on a calendar.
Supply Chain Collaboration 3-11
3.2 WAREHOUSE MANAGEMENT
The Warehouse Management application area helps you organize the
receipt, put-away, assigning, picking, and shipping of items to and from your warehouse.
Item Flow
The flow of an item through the warehouse can be described by the
activities you perform with the item. The five basic warehouse activities
each have a separate menu item in the Warehouse Management menu:
• You use a receipt document when you register items received at the warehouse. When you post the warehouse receipt, the items are registered as part of your inventory.
To open the Warehouse Receipt window, click Warehouse Management, Receipts.
• In a put away document, you plan the task of putting away items that have been received and registered. When items have been put away and posted, they are available to be picked.
You put away items in the Warehouse Put-away window. To open the
window, click Warehouse Management, Put-aways.
3-12 Navision Attain® Overview
• A shipment document is used by the warehouse manager to make a request for items to be picked from inventory for shipment to specific customers. The manager can optimize the organization of the pick activity by applying filters to the shipment lines.
To open the Warehouse Shipment window, click Warehouse Management, Shipments.
• In a pick document, you locate your pick request and then sort it, if necessary, for example, by customer, due date, shelf/bin number, or any other filter option.
To open the Warehouse Pick window, click Warehouse Management, Picks.
Supply Chain Collaboration 3-13
• Ship is where you organize the shipments that are about to leave the warehouse. You can apply a number of filters, for example, shipping agent, shipping method or due date.
3-14 Navision Attain® Overview
3.3 WAREHOUSE MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS (WMS)
WMS is an advanced edition of the basic Warehouse Management
application area. It helps you handle items and warehouse routines at zone and bin level, when receiving, putting away, picking, and shipping items to
and from your warehouse. It also establishes routines to optimize the use of space within the physical parameters of the warehouse.
The item flow is identical to that of the basic warehouse functionality. The
difference between basic Warehouse Management and WMS is noticeable when you set up the warehouse for the first time. There are multiple
functionalities on the location cards to handle items at zone and bin level.
Location Cards
You set up a location card for each location. To view the location card, click
Warehouse Management, Setup, Locations. The Zones and Bins tab looks like this:
To activate the WMS functionality for the current location, click the Use Zones and Bins check box to add a check mark. The Receipt, Shipment, Adjustment, Production and Cross-Dock fields contain the default bins the program uses when creating a new document within these activities.
On the Zone and Bin Policies tab you can fill in additional information about how the program should handle pick and put away.
Supply Chain Collaboration 3-15
There are worksheets for pick and put-away to optimize these activities.
Moving Items within the Warehouse
WMS allows you to move items within the warehouse without a source document. Movement is a two-step process. To move an item you must make a request from a movement worksheet:
1 To open the movement worksheet, click Warehouse Management, Movement Worksheets.
You must fill in the request with the items to be moved, as well as information on where to take and place the items with detailed zone and bin information.
2 When you are finished filling in the movement information, click
Functions, Create Movement. The movement document is created and can be viewed in the Warehouse Movement window. To view
the window, click Warehouse Management, Movements.
3-16 Navision Attain® Overview
Bin Replenishment
Bin replenishment optimizes the use of space within the warehouse. The
program uses bin ranking to suggest optimization. When setting up your
warehouse, you assign ranking numbers to your bins to indicate which bins have priority over the others when picking and putting away. Bin
replenishment operates from the movement worksheet, running a batch job calculating (according to bin ranking and minimum and maximum defined
quantity for the individual bin) where to optimize.
Internal Pick and Put-away
Internal pick and put-away allows you to make picks and put-aways without
a source document. You access these from the main menu by clicking Warehouse Management, Internal Picks and Warehouse Management,
Internal Put-aways.
A Bin Creation Tool
You can use the Bin Creation Worksheet to simplify setting up and
maintaining your bin creation procedure. To view the worksheet click Warehouse Management, Periodic Activities, Bin Creation Worksheet.
Supply Chain Collaboration 3-17
You can run a batch job from the worksheet to create multiple bins. To run the batch job, click Functions, Calculate Bins and fill in the Calculate Bins window:
3-18 Navision Attain® Overview
3.4 MANUFACTURING
Navision Attain for manufacturing helps you respond quickly to rapidly
changing customer demands.
Basic Manufacturing
Orders
The manufacturing application area includes features for processing sales,
purchase, production, service and transfer orders.
Production Bills Of Material (BOM), including Phantom BOMs
Manufacturers use production BOMs to monitor usage of items and
components that go into a parent assembly. The BOM shows the quantity of each component required to assemble the item. The products to be
manufactured consist of individual items, subassemblies and other
production BOMs (phantom BOMs). Subassemblies are used at the next level of the production BOMs to build other assemblies. You work with
BOMs in the Production BOM window. To open it, click Manufacturing, Production BOM:
Version Management of BOMs and Routings
The version principle enables you to manage several versions of
production BOMs or routings. The structure of the production BOM or
routing version corresponds to the structure of the production BOMs. The production BOM version consists of the production BOM version header
and lines, and the routing version consists of the routing version header
Supply Chain Collaboration 3-19
and routing lines. The basic difference is in the time validity of the versions. The validity is defined by the starting date. You can see version information
in the Version No. and Active Version fields in the Production BOM window.
Production Orders
You can manage all your production with Navision Attain. You can plan for material and capacities by creating production orders.
Simulated production orders are simulations or examples of production orders. A simulated production order has no influence on the planning of
orders.
You usually create planned production orders when you run the Calculate Plan and Make Orders from Planning batch jobs, but you can also create
planned production orders manually.
Note that planned production orders are deleted during every regeneration
of the planning worksheet, unless you change the status of the production
order from planned to firm planned. This is why we do not recommend that you create or modify planned production orders manually.
You can create firm planned production orders directly from a sales order. Firm planned production orders are included in the calculation of the net
requirement.
You use released production orders only to post consumption and output.
The Calculate Plan batch job does not automatically create released
production orders. You can release a production order by changing the
3-20 Navision Attain® Overview
status of the production order. You can also take a sales order and immediately turn it into a released production order.
A finished production order is the last phase of a production order. The
production is finished, the cost is calculated and the finished items posted to inventory. You cannot change any information in the fields of the
Finished Production Order table because you can no longer post to the production order. To view the Finished Production Order window, click
Manufacturing, Finished Prod. Orders.
Planning of Production Orders from Sales Orders
Sales orders created in the Sales &Receivables application area can be
turned into production orders. This allows you to generate a standard production order, a project order, or a multiline production order.
Reservation System for Hard and Soft Allocation
You can reserve items for production orders.
You must distinguish between reservations for production order lines and production order components
You reserve items in the Reservation window. To open it, first click
Manufacturing, Planning Worksheets, to open a planning worksheet. Fill in a line specifying the item to be reserved and the due date, then click
Functions, Reserve. The window looks like this:
Supply Chain Collaboration 3-21
Blanket Orders
A blanket sales order represents a framework for an agreement between
you and a customer. When you have finished filling in the blanket sales order, you can convert it to one or more sales orders.
Serial and Lot Number Processing
When you set up items with lot tracking, you can assign the lot number
series and the serial number series to the item by filling in the Serial Nos. and Lot Nos. fields on the Item Tracking tab of the item card:
Flexible Costing System
The program uses FIFO as the default costing method if you do not
manually fill in the Costing Method field on the item card for each item.
You can also choose the LIFO, specific, average, or standard costing method.
3-22 Navision Attain® Overview
Your choice of costing method determines the way that the program calculates unit cost by making assumptions about the flow of physical items
through your company.
Multi-dimensional Tracking and Pegging
With the order tracking functionality you can trace the connection of a
supply to its corresponding demand. This is useful when you want to find the original demand that created a specific production order or purchase
order. You can also use this functionality to see the production order or purchase order that supplies a particular demand.
You can, for example, track from either a purchase order or a production
order to find the sales order that causes the demand. You can also track from a sales order to find the production order or purchase order that
supplies that demand.
The order tracking feature shows the interdependence of sales orders,
production orders, and purchase orders. To view the Order Tracking
window, go to the desired order and click on the relevant line to highlight it. Then click Functions, Order Tracking:
Forward, Backward and Manual Flushing Supported
You use the forward flushing method to have the program automatically calculate and post consumption. It automatically reduces the inventory of
components before they are issued, at the time a scheduled receipt for their parents or assemblies is created via a bill-of-material explosion.
The backward flushing method also automatically calculates and posts the
consumption. It automatically reduces the inventory of components after completion of an activity on the components' upper level parent item that is
Supply Chain Collaboration 3-23
based on what should have been used as specified in the bill of materials.
You use the manual flushing method if you want to post consumption
manually by using the output journal. You select the flushing method in the
Flushing Method field on the Manufacturing tab on the item card (click Inventory, Items to view the item card).
Consumption and Output Journals
You use the consumption journal to post consumption to production orders
manually. In a consumption journal, you enter the relevant information, such as the posting date, production order number, item number and
quantity. The information you enter in a journal is temporary and can be changed as long as it is in the journal. To open the consumption journal,
click Manufacturing, Consumption Journals:
3-24 Navision Attain® Overview
Production Reports
The Manufacturing application area includes several reports related to
production, for example the Where-Used List report, which displays a list of
the BOMs that the selected items are components of. To print the report, click Reports, highlight the line with Where-Used(Top Level), fill in the fields
on the tabs and click Print:
Order Promising
The order promising function is a tool for calculating the earliest possible
date that an item is available for shipment or delivery. It also creates requisition lines for those dates that you accept.
With the order promising feature, you can promise the best possible
shipping and/or delivery date for an order.
Multiple Locations in Planning
The multiple locations means that you can manage and handle inventory in more than one location (for example, warehouses in Atlanta, New York,
and Los Angeles) from one database to:
• Gain a complete real-time business overview.
• Create cost and profit centers.
• Manage inventory levels and item costs differently at each warehouse.
Forecast and Master Production Schedule (MPS)
You can set up a production forecast for different time intervals. You do this by clicking one of the buttons in the lower left-hand corner of the
Production Forecast window: 1 (Day), 7 (Week), 31 (Month), 3 (Quarter),
Supply Chain Collaboration 3-25
12 (Year) and three horizontal lines (Accounting Period).
You can calculate a master production schedule (MPS). The results of the
MPS calculation appear in the planning worksheet as order proposals, and
you can edit them. Afterwards, you can calculate a materials requirement plan (MRP).
Intelligent MRP Scheduling
When you calculate a net change plan, the program plans only for those
items that have had the following types of changes to their demand-supply pattern since the last planning.
When you calculate a regenerative plan, the program plans for all items.
This might be necessary if there have been changes to the standard data or capacity since the last planning, which would affect the total plan and,
therefore, all items.
Action messages occur when the program detects a problem or a potential
problem in the balance of supply and demand.
Simultaneous Planning of Materials, Capacities and Costs
In the Manufacturing application area, you can use the planning features to
plan the use of materials, capacities and costs for production orders.
Item Availability Windows Allow Planners to View the Results of MRP Immediately
You can check item availability by period, by variant, and by location.
Multiple Worksheets for the Review of Various Production Options
In Navision Attain, you can work with multiple worksheets and hold a planning run open at the same time. This lets you compare two or more
versions of a plan. The results of the newest planning appear as positive adjustments, if any adjustments are needed.
3-26 Navision Attain® Overview
3.5 CAPACITY REQUIREMENTS PLANNING
Machine Centers
The Machine Center is used to record information about all your machine centers.
Managing capacities is an important part of managing the manufacturing process of the company. In Navision Attain, you use the Machine Center table to do this. This table contains information used by a range of facilities
that can help you with your capacity requirements planning, for example, the available capacity, and the default values for process, setup, wait and
move times.
Each machine center must also have an identifying number. When you
enter the machine center number elsewhere in the program, the program
will automatically use information from the card for that particular machine center. The information in the Machine Center table is displayed on the
machine center card. To open the window, click Cap. Reqts. Planning, Machine Centers:
Work Centers
In Navision Attain, a work center comprises a number of machine centers.
Managing capacities is an important part of managing the manufacturing
process of the company. In Navision Attain, you use the Work Center table
for that purpose. The Work Center table contains information used by a range of facilities that can help you do your capacity requirements planning,
such as calculating available capacity and efficiency.
You can assign different machine centers to each work center. For each
machine center that you want to assign to a work center, you must enter
Supply Chain Collaboration 3-27
the number of the work center in the Work Center No. field on the machine center card.
Every work center must also have an identifying number. When you enter a
work center number elsewhere in the program, the program will automatically use information from that particular work center's card.
By assigning a subcontractor to a work center you can manage external work related to the manufacturing process. To see the work center card,
click Cap. Reqts. Planning, Work Centers.
Routings
Manufacturing companies use routings to show the production process.
The routings form the basis of production planning and control. Routings
include detailed information about the method of manufacturing of a particular item. It includes the operations to be performed and their
sequence. You can also include information about tools, personnel and quality measures. For each product, routings contain a step-by-step set of
instructions that describe how the product is made.
Navision Attain allows you to specify the production process in either time
or capacity, and it supports the production of part families, that is, the same
or similar items can be manufactured with a single routing.
The routing is the basis for process scheduling, capacity scheduling,
material need scheduling (production-synchronized planning) and the production documents.
In order to be able to work with routings, you must set up the capacity
planning standard data first.
The routings are assigned to the items in the item's standard data.
3-28 Navision Attain® Overview
You fill in routing information in the Routings window. On the routing lines, you enter the data for the machine or work center that processes the
product. To open the window, click Cap. Reqts. Planning, Routings.
Capacity Journals
You use capacity journals to adjust capacity in connection with production orders and positive and negative adjustments. In a capacity journal, you
enter the relevant information, such as the posting date, work center or
machine center number and time used. The information you enter in a journal is temporary and can be changed as long as it is in the journal.
After you post a journal, the journal will be empty (unless the journal is a recurring journal), and the transactions will be posted to the work center or
machine center. You can view the results of posting a journal in the ledger entry windows and register windows. To open the Capacity Journal window, click Cap. Reqts. Planning, Capacity Journals.
Supply Chain Collaboration 3-29
Finite Loading
If you want to assign finite loading instead of the default infinite load that
other resources accept, you can set up capacity constrained resources for those areas that you regard as critical and mark them to accept a finite
load.
Shop Calendars and Work Shifts
You use the shop calendar to preset capacity availability. This presetting is
done in steps and is systematically refined up to the final calendar date of the specific capacity.
You can set up many different shop calendars and then assign a shop
calendar to every work center.
You must assign a work shift to every calendar day. Normally, one work
shift is used per calendar, however, if you need to, you can enter several different work shifts in one calendar.
‘Send Ahead’ Functionality for Just-in-Time (JIT) Production
The send ahead quantity is the minimum quantity in an operation that you
want to process in order to start the next operation. If you enter a quantity
in this field, the program overlaps the current operation at this machine center with the next operation. The purpose of specifying the send-ahead
quantity is to optimize the lead times of the production order.
3-30 Navision Attain® Overview
Routing Link Codes
You can assign BOM line positions and/or routing lines to a routing link
code. In this way, you can make the necessary changes in one place in the
program without changing all the BOM positions.
Scrap and Stop Codes
Scrap codes are used to identify why an item has been scrapped. After you have set up the scrap codes, you can enter them in the posting lines of the
output journal and the capacity journal.
Stop codes are used to identify why a machine center has stopped. After
you have set up the stop codes, you can enter them in the posting lines of
the output journal and the capacity journal.
Automatic Flushing
The forward or backward flushing method in the work center or machine center provides automatic recording of expected output.
You use the forward flushing method to automatically reduce the inventory
of components before they are issued, at the time a scheduled receipt for their parents or assemblies is created via a bill-of-material explosion.
You use the backward flushing method to automatically reduce the inventory of components after completion of an activity on the components'
upper level parent item that is based on what should have been used as specified in the bill of material.
Additional Manufacturing-related Features of Navision Attain
Unit of Measure
With the unit of measure features you can:
• Set up an unlimited number of unit of measure codes.
• Attach a base unit of measure code to each item.
• Specify an unlimited number of alternative unit of measure codes for each item and define a conversion factor for each alternative unit of measure code.
• Specify a default unit of measure code for sales transactions.
Supply Chain Collaboration 3-31
• Set up an unlimited number of translations for each unit of measure code (one translation for each language code you have set up).
Item Variants
In Navision Attain you can specify variants of items. This is useful if you have a large number of almost identical items that vary only in color, for
example. Instead of setting up each variant as a separate item, you can set
up one item and then specify the various colors as variants of the item.
Handling of Foreign Items in Inventory
You can use alternative prices to indicate that a certain price should be used when invoicing in a foreign currency.
Availability of Items
If you want to know how many units of an item will be available in the near future, you can view an availability plan.
You can check the availability of an item by period, variant, or location.
3-32 Navision Attain® Overview
3.6 REVIEW QUESTIONS
These questions are for self-study to help ensure that you have understood
the material in this chapter.
1 Describe the difference between an item card and a stockkeeping unit
card.
2 In which window do you record information about an item that is
always delivered to the customer by drop shipment?
3 Describe the difference between an item journal and an item reclassification journal (in terms of what each is used for).
4 Describe a BOM and how the program adjusts inventory when you create a BOM.
5 What do you use the Item Substitution Entry window for?
6 What do you use the Item Cross-Reference Entries window for?
7 Describe the flow of items through a warehouse and identify which
Warehouse Management window you use in each step.
8 What do you use location cards for?
9 What do you use the Production BOM window for?
10 Explain the difference between simulated production orders, planned
production orders and firm planned production orders.
11 Describe how to open the Reservation window and what you use it for.
12 Explain the difference between forward, backward and manual flushing.
13 Describe the relationship between machine centers and work centers.
14 What are capacity journals used for?
15 Explain what routings are in Navision Attain.
Supply Chain Collaboration 3-33
Chapter 4.
Customer Relationship Management
The Customer Relationship Management product suite includes the CRM – Marketing & Sales and
the CRM – Service application areas. They can be used to manage every interaction with your
customers, vendors, consultants, and so on.
You can take further specialist training and pass
the Navision Attain Essentials Test. After that you
can take the CRM – Service, and the CRM – Marketing & Sales courses.
This chapter contains the following sections:
4.1 CRM – Marketing & Sales
4.2 CRM – Service
4.3 Review Questions
4-2 Navision Attain® Overview
4.1 CRM – MARKETING & SALES
CRM – Marketing & Sales is a marketing and sales tool developed for
companies with small sales and marketing teams, a limited number of customers, and a sales cycle that is not complex. The front-office tool is
fully integrated with Navision Attain.
CRM – Marketing & Sales gives you complete and accurate information to
improve the quality of every business interaction.
Contact Management
With Contact Management you can maintain an overview of your contacts
and record your contact information for all your business relations. For each contact you can specify the individual contact people you have at the
contact company. Duplicate check automatically alerts you if you enter
contact information that already exists. You can categorize your contacts based on your own profiling criteria. Contact Management allows you to
personalize your approach to your contacts.
You use the contact card to record information about your contacts.
Navision Attain 3.60 is integrated with Microsoft TAPI (Telephony Application Programming Interface). By using TAPI compliant telecom
devices, you can call a contact simply by clicking a button on the
Communication tab on the contact card (the small telephone icon next to the telephone or mobile phone number). Contact Management is tightly
integrated with the Sales & Receivables application area. This means that, for example, you can issue quotes to prospects or create sales documents
for specific contact persons. To view the contact card, click Relationship
Management, Contacts, then click the Communication tab:
Customer Relationship Management 4-3
Contact Search
The Contact Search feature allows you to find a contact in the database
even if you cannot remember the exact details of the contact. You can even
misspell a search string and still find the contact you are looking for. This feature is available not only from the Relationship Management main menu
but also from wizards, the contact list and the contact card. To limit the search, you can search across different fields (for example Name,
Address, Telephone No. and E-Mail Address) and tables (Contact, Interaction Log Entry, To-do, Opportunity, Rlshp. Mgt. Comment Line), or you can search across all tables. To open the window, click
4-4 Navision Attain® Overview
Task Management
With Task Management you can organize your campaign, marketing and
sales tasks. You can create to-do lists for yourself. To-dos can be linked to
contacts and/or campaigns. You can assign tasks, composed of several to-dos, to other users or teams of users recorded in the program. Activities
can be composed from several to-dos.
The To-dos window allows you to view existing to-dos in a number of
ways. For example you can choose to view the number of to-dos or the contact number involved, grouped by campaign, salesperson, team, or
contact. To open the window, click Relationship Management, To-dos.
Contact Classification
You can classify your contacts into different categories and tailor your
marketing messages to suit the individual needs of the customer.
Contact Classification classifies your customers based on criteria specified
by you, for example, to group contacts in terms of revenue. This feature provides crucial information for campaign planning, for targeting your
contacts more specifically and for streamlining your sales and marketing messages.
A contact rating system is provided to let you set up specifically tailored
ratings reflecting, for example, the importance or loyalty of your customers, vendors and partners. You can have the ratings displayed on the contact
card for quick reference and update.
Customer Relationship Management 4-5
Campaign Management
Campaign Management allows you to organize campaigns based on
market segments you create yourself. You can segment your contacts
based on specific criteria, such as, sales, contact profiles and interactions.
You can reuse existing segments, for example, specify whether or not
these segments are to be updated every time new information on the contact is entered, or ‘freeze’ the group for follow-up activities, such as
direct mailing.
You can mail merge the identified segment with a Microsoft Word
document or send any other file type to the contacts in your segment. You
can send copies of the same document to people of different nationalities each in their native language.
You enter information about a campaign on the campaign card. To open the window, click Relationship Management, Campaigns:
Document Management & Interaction Log
You can log the interactions that you have with your contacts, such as a telephone call, a meeting or a letter. If an interaction contains a document,
you can save it under the relevant contact, and Document Management
helps you keep track of the document in question.
All Navision documents that you send to your contact, such as sales orders
or quotes, can be logged and retrieved and used at a later stage. You get an accurate and up-to-date account of all your interactions with the contact.
Opportunity Management
With Opportunity Management you can keep track of sales opportunities. Salespeople have an overview of what is in the pipeline and can plan
4-6 Navision Attain® Overview
ahead accordingly.
Opportunity Management helps you divide your sales process into different
stages. You can view existing opportunities in the Opportunities window.
The Opportunities window allows you to view existing opportunities in a number of ways. For example you can choose to view the number of
opportunities or the value of the opportunities (calculated in a variety of ways), grouped by campaign, salesperson, or contact. To open the
window, click Relationship Management, Opportunities:
Outlook Client Integration
Most CRM users build relationships with their contacts using calendar and
task management tools, and much of the external communication takes place through MS Outlook. Therefore integration between Navision Attain
and MS Outlook is vital to the CRM user's performance.
With the Outlook Client Integration feature you can schedule meetings in Outlook and see the to-dos in Attain before the meeting, and when the
meeting has taken place, you can log it in the Interaction Log Entries window as an interaction. The scheduling capabilities in Outlook allow you
to plan and execute to-dos you have been assigned, and in Attain you can
create activities for customers and contact persons.
Whenever information (for example, a to-do or a contact) is entered in
Attain, this information is automatically updated in MS Outlook. There is no need to update the same information twice in two different applications.
Customer Relationship Management 4-7
E-Mail Logging for Microsoft Exchange
This feature integrates Navision Attain with the MS Outlook e-mail service.
All your e-mail correspondence, both inbound and outbound, can be logged
automatically or manually in Attain and can therefore be shared with your colleagues to ensure that they have instant access to the latest
communications with business contacts.
This solution is server-based and requires Microsoft Exchange Server.
Making the solution server-based ensures that e-mails are kept in their natural environment instead of lowering performance by storing the e-mails
on the application server. The integration with MS Outlook further allows
you to use the built-in features in Outlook. For example, you can set up rules in Outlook that direct certain types of e-mail to specific folders for
subsequent, automatic logging in Attain.
4-8 Navision Attain® Overview
4.2 CRM – SERVICE
CRM – Service makes it profitable for you to deliver superior customer
service. It helps you take customer satisfaction one step further and exceed your customers’ expectations. You can:
• Quickly and easily access customer service history.
• Anticipate customer needs.
• Maintain real-time records, such as the date, time and technician assigned to each customer order.
Service Order Management
You can register after-sales issues including service requests, services
due, service orders, and repair requests. Service requests can be initiated
(by customers or automatically), according to the terms stipulated in a service contract.
Critical data in service order handling can be entered from a call-center or repair shop. You can register ad hoc or one-off service orders. You can
access complete service order history, service order quotes and loaner
management through the Service Order Log. You create a service order in the Service Order window. To open the window, click Service
Management, Orders:
Customer Relationship Management 4-9
Service Price Management
Having a well thought-out service price strategy is one of the means
companies use to gain an overview and control of the costs involved in
providing service, and to eventually increase the profitability of their service operations. We have redesigned the service price management feature in
CRM – Service to give companies an effective tool to support their service price strategy, whether it is simple or complex.
The redesigned service price management allows the setup of service price groups to take into consideration the service item (or service item group) as
well as the type of fault the service task involves. Service price groups can
be set up for a limited period of time, and/or for a specific customer or currency. Price calculation structures can be used as templates to assign a
price to a service task. For example, this makes it possible to assign specific items included in the service price as well as the type of work
included. And to ensure that the right prices are applied, it is possible to
assign fixed, minimum, or maximum prices, depending on agreements with customers. Service price group statistics allow you to keep track of the
profitability of each service price group.
Service Item Management
With Service Item Management you can create a database for all your service items and parts, including contract information, component
management, BOM reference and warranty information.
You can access the Service Level Agreement for information on, for example, response times.
You can register all items and spare parts with serial numbers as well as any replacement equipment technicians may use, and then link them to the
Service Item Log. You can track all spare parts and equipment. You can
access key business indicators on service items in the Trendscape Analysis feature.
You keep track of service item information on the service item card. To open the window, click Service Management, Service Items.
4-10 Navision Attain® Overview
Service Contract Management
With service contracts you can set up an agreement with the customer
concerning the service level to be delivered. You can access information on contract history, contract renewal, and contract templates in Contract
Management.
Service contracts give you the option to record details on service levels, response times, and discount levels as well as the service history of each
contract, including used service items and parts and man-hours.
With Contract Management you can enable flexible invoicing, contract
profitability measurement, and contract quotes. You set up service contracts in the Service Contract window. To open the window, click
Service Management, Contracts:
Customer Relationship Management 4-11
Planning and Dispatching
You can assign personnel to work orders with Planning and Dispatching. It
also allows you to log details such as work order status. Service personnel and field technicians can be filtered according to availability and skills. You
can gain an overview of service task prioritization, service loads, and task escalations.
Job Scheduling
With Job Scheduling, you can automate service-oriented tasks, for
example, generate preventative service orders, service contract renewals
or service contract invoicing. You can also set up Job Scheduler to perform automatic checks on whether there are any batches to be processed on a
specific date.
You set up job scheduling in the Job Scheduler Setup window. To open
the window, click Service Management, Setup, Job Scheduler, Setup:
4-12 Navision Attain® Overview
Customer Relationship Management 4-13
4.3 REVIEW QUESTIONS
These questions are for self-study to help ensure that you have understood
the material in this chapter.
1 Which window can you use to get an overview of campaign, marketing
and sales tasks?
2 Describe how CRM-Marketing & Sales interacts with Microsoft
Outlook.
3 Describe what you can use segments for.
4 What is an interaction in CRM – Marketing & Sales?
5 What is an opportunity in CRM – Marketing & Sales?
6 Describe the different ways you can view opportunities in the
Opportunities window.
7 What do you use the Service Item Card for?
8 What kinds of information can you access in Service Contract
Management?
9 What is the purpose of the Job Scheduler window?
Chapter 5.
Technology
This chapter covers the more technical aspects of
using Navision Attain.
The chapter is divided into the following sections:
5.1 C/SIDE Development Environment
5.2 Server Options
5.3 Navision Attain Application Server
5.4 Multilanguage Functionality
5.5 Commerce Gateway
5.6 Commerce Portal
5.7 User Portal
5.8 Review Questions
5-2 Navision Attain® Overview
5.1 C/SIDE DEVELOPMENT ENVIRONMENT
The development environment in Navision Attain is called C/SIDE
(Client/Server Integrated Development Environment). The major benefits of C/SIDE are:
• All application areas for Navision Attain are developed in C/SIDE.
• It contains all the tools to build on and customize the application.
• It includes the executables in the program subdirectory on the hard disk.
• It contains the code needed to interpret the application objects, development system tools (editors, debugger, and so on), the database management system (DBMS) and the operating system interface.
C/SIDE consists of three central systems:
• Fourth-generation language (4GL) development system
• Database management system
• Special database functions
Object Designer
The Object Designer enables you to develop applications in C/SIDE. From
the Object Designer, you can run an application object or start an
application object designer, for example, the Form Designer. You use the application object designers to modify the design of an existing application
object or to create a new application object. Note that special permission is required to use this tool.
There are five types of application objects:
• Tables
• Forms
• Codeunits
• Reports
Technology 5-3
• Dataports
To open the Object Designer, click Tools, Object Designer. The following
window appears:
Application Objects
C/SIDE uses object-oriented programming technology. An object is a self-
contained module of data and its associated processing.
All objects in C/SIDE are assigned a number for identification purposes.
• Objects 0-9,999 have been developed by Navision a/s.
• Objects 10,000-49,999 have been developed by Navision Territory Representatives (NTRs).
• Objects 50,000-99,999 are available for Navision Solution Centers (NSCs).
• Objects 1,000,000- 98,999,999 are available for add-on products.
Tables
All information in the database is stored in tables. Each table contains one
kind of information, such as journal lines, posted entries and basic
information.
There are different kinds of tables:
• Normal tables display information that the user can work with. The Customer table is an example of a normal table.
5-4 Navision Attain® Overview
• System tables are tables that the system creates automatically. The DBMS uses the system tables to manage, among other things, system security and permissions. The User table is an example of a system table.
• Temporary tables act as buffers for table data in your C/AL programs. You can do almost anything with a temporary table that you can do with a normal database table. A temporary table is not stored in the database but is held in memory on your workstation until you close the table.
• Virtual tables contain information that the system provides. You cannot change the information that these tables contain. The system computes virtual tables at runtime. The Date and Session tables are examples of such virtual tables.
Forms
Forms are used to enter and display data. For example, you can use a form
to enter information about new customers or to update and review information about existing customers.
Reports
Reports are used to print information from a database. They can be used to
structure and summarize information, and they can be used to print documents, such as invoices. They can also be used to process data
without printing anything.
You can use the Report Designer to customize and modify existing reports. To create a new report, you must open the New Report window from the
Object Designer. To do so, click Report, and then click New. The following window appears:
Technology 5-5
The report wizard guides you through the design of the report:
Dataports
A dataport is an object type that is used to import data from and export data to external text files, for example, comma-separated files.
Codeunits
A codeunit is an object type that contains functions written in C/AL code.
For more information about the Object Designer, see the manual
Application Designer's Guide.
C/AL – The Programming Language
C/AL is a fourth-generation programming language (4GL) that:
• is used to create functions.
• controls how individual database objects interact.
• includes standard functions for reading, writing and modifying table data.
When you program in C/AL, you use statements. There are the following
different types of statements: compound statements, conditional
statements, repetitive statements, EXIT statements and WITH statements.
For more information about C/AL, see the manual C/AL Programming
Guide or the Navision Attain Programming training material.
5-6 Navision Attain® Overview
The Graphical User Interface (GUI)
The user interface is designed so that it is easy to use if you are already
familiar with Microsoft products. The user interface has many benefits
including the facts that many windows can be open at the same time and that the GUI follows the same design principles throughout Navision Attain.
Special Facilities in Navision Attain
Navision Attain fulfills the requirements of a business management solution
by supplying tools for entering and managing information and always satisfying the current accounting laws. Navision Attain also contains some
very special facilities, which are listed below. Becoming familiar with these
facilities will help you to fully utilize the program in your daily work.
Navision Attain provides:
• direct access from one table to another.
• easy data entry.
• information in multiple dimensions.
• automatic calculation of amounts and quantities.
• information on what is included in a calculated amount.
• filtering of information.
• sorting with one or more keys.
• pictures of items or a company logo on the screen together with the associated information.
• connections to mail merge, spreadsheet applications and presentation graphics programs.
Technology 5-7
5.2 SERVER OPTIONS
Navision Attain has two database options:
• Navision Attain Database Server (scalable up to 128 GB)
• The Microsoft SQL Server Option for Navision Attain based on Microsoft SQL Server (scalable beyond 128 GB)Database Features
Here are some of the features of the two database server options for
Navision Attain:
Navision Attain Database Server Microsoft SQL Server Option
Relational Relational
Version Management Version Management
Commit Rollback Commit Rollback
SIFT Technology SIFT Technology
Client Server Client Server
Optimistic Concurrency
Transaction Logs
Database Level Security
Record Level Security
Some of these features are described briefly below.
For more information about the database features, see the manual Application Designer's Guide.
Sum-Indexed Flow Technology - SIFT
SIFT is the basis of FlowFields. It is a feature in the database that allows
you to have sums calculated very quickly by maintaining SumIndexes. There are columns in which the figures in SumIndexFields are constantly
being summed. When you want a sum calculated, the program does not
have to calculate the sum by going through a large number of entries in the database. The sum is calculated quickly when the program subtracts one
5-8 Navision Attain® Overview
figure in a SumIndex from another. The updated sum can be seen in a FlowField every time you open a window that contains a FlowField, or
when you set a filter on a balance field.
Version Management
Version management builds on a principle that ensures that a user always
starts a task with the latest updated complete version of the data. The user can work with this version of the data, change it, and add new data. After
this, the new data will become part of a new version of the database.
Optimistic Concurrency
Navision Attain uses a technique called optimistic concurrency. With
optimistic concurrency, you always have access to the record you want to work with. Thus, if two or more users try to access the same data in the
database at the same time, they will all be allowed to do so.
Database Level Security
This means the access that the users have to the data in the database can
be defined in terms of the tables that they have access to.
Record Level Security
This means the access that the users have to the data in the database can be defined in terms of the records that they have access to.
The Logical Structures in Your Database
The database is organized in units of fields, records, tables and companies.
This section describes the basic principles of these structures.
Fields
A field is the smallest logical structure used in the C/SIDE database. A
field is used to hold a single piece of information, such as a name like John or an amount like 2,352.00. Any particular field can only contain information
of one specific data type. The C/SIDE database system distinguishes
between 17 different types of data.
Fields are assembled into a structure called a record. On its own, a field is
not very useful, as it can hold only a limited amount of information. By assembling these small pieces of information into records, we get a much
Technology 5-9
more flexible "information-holder" that is better organized, keeping fields together that belong together.
Records
A record is a logical structure assembled from an arbitrary number of fields. It is used to store a single entry in the database. The fields in a record are
used to store information about important properties of the entry. Records are organized in tables. An example of a record is a number of fields with
information about a single customer.
Tables
A table can be thought of as an N by M matrix. Each of the N rows
describes a record and each of the M columns describes a field in the record. An example of a table is the Customer table, which contains a
record for each customer. Each company in a database contains a number of tables.
Companies
A company is the largest logical structure used in a C/SIDE database. A company may be considered to be a subdatabase; its primary use is to
separate and group large portions of data in a database. A company can contain private tables as well as tables shared with other companies.
5-10 Navision Attain® Overview
5.3 NAVISION ATTAIN APPLICATION SERVER
Navision Attain Application Server is a middle-tier server, which executes
business logic without user intervention. With Navision Attain Application Server, it is possible to communicate with external services. Navision Attain
Application Server acts as a client towards a database server and can act as a server for other services. When you start Navision Attain Application
Server, it opens a predefined database and executes C/AL code in a
predefined codeunit.
To understand more about how Navision Attain Application Server
communicates with external services, see the online Help project Development Guide for Communication Components.
No User Interface
Navision Attain Application Server runs without displaying anything on a screen and therefore requires no user interaction. This means that error
messages cannot be displayed to the user. Instead, error messages are logged in the NT event log. The user can, however, interact with Navision
Attain Application Server through the Navision Attain Application Server Manager.
Navision Attain Application Server Manager
You can install Navision Attain Application Server as a service and manage it through the Navision Attain Application Server Manager, which is a
Microsoft Management Console snap-in. With the Navision Attain Application Server Manager, you can see which Navision Attain Application
Server properties you have set. You can also add and reconfigure Navision
Attain Application Server.
Navision Application Server versus Navision Server
It is important to distinguish between Navision Application Server and Navision Server, the latter being a database server. For more information
about Navision Server, see the manual Installation & System Management: Navision Attain Application Server.
Running More Than One Application Server
It is possible to run more than one Navision Attain Application Server with the same database or with different databases, but Windows Installer can
only install one Navision Attain Application Server on each computer. This
Technology 5-11
is because Windows Installer checks for existing Navision Attain Application Server installations.
To install more than one Navision Attain Application Server, you must copy
all files that belong to the previously installed Navision Attain Application Server to another target folder. Which files to copy depends on whether
you are using Navision Attain Database Server or Microsoft SQL Server.
For more information about Navision Attain Application Server, see the
manual Installation & System Management: Navision Attain Application Server.
5-12 Navision Attain® Overview
5.4 MULTILANGUAGE FUNCTIONALITY
The multilanguage functionality in Navision Attain helps your employees
work more efficiently. You can switch to virtually any language on the fly. Every employee can work in the language of his or her choice, allowing
your organization to respond quickly and efficiently to international business opportunities.
Speak Your Employees' Language
Navision Attain helps employees become more efficient by eliminating language barriers among your multilingual workforce.
Users of Navision Attain can work in the language of their choice. For example, a Swiss user can run their version of Navision Attain in German,
French or Italian. The local functionality is, however, still Swiss. If the user
prefers French, but wants to send a report to an Italian colleague, he can do so in Italian. This means that, for example, French and Italian
colleagues can work side by side on the same database or even share a workstation.
What’s more, you can change languages on the fly; you do not have to close down the application and log on again just to switch languages. The
real-time functionality saves you time. It gives you fast access to the
information you need to work more efficiently – in your own language.
Speak Your Customer’s Language
With Navision Attain, your customer service improves because you can do business in the language preferred by your customer. For example, if a
Polish customer wants invoices in his native language, you can easily print
the invoices in Polish from your Navision Attain application. You can therefore communicate more efficiently with both existing and potential
customers and partners around the globe.
Adding a Language Layer
In order to let the user select a certain language from the Tools menu, that language must be present as a granule in the license file. The application
must also be translated to that language, so that you can import it into the
database either as a text file or as a language module. Either you can export all text strings and translate them in a translation tool, such as the
Navision Localization Workbench, or you can enter the translation of the text strings directly in the Multilanguage Editor.
Technology 5-13
Multilanguage Editor
You access the Multilanguage Editor window by opening an object from
the Object Designer, clicking View, Properties to open the Properties window and clicking the AssistButton in the CaptionML property. In the Multilanguage Editor window, you can click the AssistButton in the
Language field and select your language from the list that appears, or you may simply enter the three-letter abbreviation and move the cursor to the
Value field. The system then replaces the abbreviation with the full language description. In the Value field, enter the correct term for this
object in this language. To save your entry, you must click OK before
exiting the window.
Developing Multilanguage-Enabled Applications
When you develop in a multilanguage-enabled environment, it is important to remember the following three rules of thumb:
• Everything has a Name property in (United States) English.
• Text constants replace text strings, such as error messages.
• Everything that the user will see must have a Caption property.
Before you start working in a multilanguage-enabled database, you should set the application language to (United States) English. You do this by
clicking Tools, Languages and selecting English (United States).
In Navision Attain, the code base is English (United States). This means
that the Name property of, for example, an object must always be English
(United States).
The code base in English (United States) includes, among other things, the
following:
• Object names
• Field names
• Function and variable names
• Comments
• Option strings
5-14 Navision Attain® Overview
• Control names
For more information about how to develop multilanguage-enabled
applications, see the manual Application Designer's Guide.
Technology 5-15
5.5 COMMERCE GATEWAY
The above diagram illustrates how Commerce Gateway, together with
Microsoft BizTalk Server, enables companies to share a common language and thus exchange business data electronically. In this diagram, the data is
exchanged over the Internet.
It is often the case that companies store their data and documents in different systems. This can cause problems when they want to do business
with each other. While electronic data interchange (EDI) solutions have been around for decades, this technology has not delivered a common
framework that all companies can easily use.
Commerce Gateway opens up Navision Attain so that companies can electronically exchange trading documents with their business partners
irrespective of each other’s conversion requirements and data formats. This means that companies can streamline their business processes and reduce
transaction costs. Commerce Gateway also makes it easier for companies
Commerce Gateway
SAP
BTS OEM
BTS CG CG BTS
OEM Legends
CG
BTS
OEM
SAP
Commerce Gateway
Microsoft BizTalk Server
3rd Party Products
SAP
5-16 Navision Attain® Overview
to meet the changing demands of their trading partners regardless of the industry they are in, the system that they use or the standards that their
partners require. Commerce Gateway supports the most common trading
documents.
Integration with Microsoft BizTalk Server
Commerce Gateway provides integration with Microsoft BizTalk Server 2000. BizTalk Server is a data and business process integration server,
which facilitates e-commerce business processes. It comprises a document interchange engine, a business process execution engine, and a set of
business document and server management tools. There are also tools for
managing trading partner relationships and for tracking transactions.
BizTalk Server uses the industry-standard extensible markup language
(XML) technology. Using XML, you can map data between virtually any two data formats, including EDIFACT, SAP IDOC and flat files. You can also
map between the documents that you have specified in your partner setup.
This is handled in a graphical user interface, which makes it easy to create new document maps or change existing ones.
BizTalk includes a design framework for implementing standard XML schemas and a set of XML tags used in messages sent between
applications.
New Functionality Integrated into the Navision Attain User Interface
As an integrated part of the Navision Attain user interface, Commerce
Gateway makes it easy to learn the new functionality. For example, users can browse trading agreements by clicking and drilling down in the same
intuitive and consistent way as in the rest of the program. This means that a sales employee or an office clerk can concentrate on the new features in
Navision Attain, and does not have to think about the fact that a BizTalk
Server is running “underneath” the application. Only superusers responsible for setup, administration and maintenance of the BizTalk
Server and the Trading Partner Agreements interact directly with the BizTalk Server.
Commerce Gateway functionality has been added to the Sales & Receivables, Purchases & Payables, and Inventory application areas in
Navision Attain. Furthermore, you can access BizTalk administration items
from the main menu (by clicking General Ledger, Setup, BizTalk).
Technology 5-17
What about Companies that Need EDI Functionality?
The Commerce Gateway solution still provides companies with access to
EDI functionality. The BizTalk Server can convert EDI and IDOCS (a SAP
standard) to XML. EDI was developed primarily for trading transactions, however, so it has a narrower scope of functionality than BizTalk. BizTalk
Server offers the following advantages over EDI:
• It handles all aspects of communication between e-business partners.
• It ensures both reliability and security.
• It offers the possibility of mapping the content between two different XML schemas. This means that e-commerce partners can use their own schemas.
• It offers direct support for a variety of data and information that will be needed in the future (for example, product information and media data such as pictures, sound and video).
BizTalk Server offers EDI users more functionality than Value-Adding
Network (VAN) operators can supply. Also, BizTalk Server enables companies to administer their trading relationships in a much more cost-
efficient way.
5-18 Navision Attain® Overview
5.6 COMMERCE PORTAL
Commerce Portal is an e-commerce solution that enables Web-based
trading, self-service and other forms of collaboration between a company and all its supply chain partners.
Commerce Portal makes it easy for partners - customers, vendors and others - to serve themselves directly from their Web portal – anytime,
anywhere. They can maintain and query data and documents across the
range of functions found in Navision Attain (depending on their particular role and the access rights that have been defined).
The following picture illustrates how Navision Attain, together with Microsoft Commerce Server 2000 enables you to access and update data in
Navision Attain over the Internet or an intranet from a Web browser.
This section describes some Commerce Portal features. The following are key features of Commerce Portal:
• Data is maintained only in Navision Attain.
• You can create multiple Web sites.
• You can define the permissions of your Web portal users based on roles.
• You can set up automatic e-mail notifications to Web portal users and colleagues in connection with specific events in the process of handling a sales or purchase order.
Technology 5-19
• You can set up specific language-dependent text and descriptions to be used on your Web portal.
• You can increase the efficiency of your purchasing activity by listing items you want to order on your Web portal and inviting your vendors to participate in a reverse auction.
• Web pages are maintained from within Navision Attain.
• Commerce Portal has full integration with the rest of the Navision Attain application.
• Commerce Portal supports the picture formats GIF and JPG.
Maintaining Data
To work with Commerce Portal, Navision Attain users do not have to
familiarize themselves with a new user interface. From Navision Attain, they can update the Web portal user and item information, handle sales
quotes, sales orders and reverse auctions and conduct similar activities.
Customer information on the Customer card and Contact card can also be maintained from the Web portal, for example, while you are visiting your
customers.
All data relevant to the Commerce Portal is synchronized with (by being
copied to) the SQL Server database so that the data is actually stored in
both the Navision Attain database and the SQL Server database. The system automatically synchronizes the SQL Server database and,
subsequently, the Web pages on your Web portal with the Navision Attain database.
Multiple Web Sites
With Commerce Portal, you can create multiple Web sites. For example,
you can create a new Web site while the old one is still online. Also each
Web portal user or group of Web portal users can be assigned to specific Web sites, which means that they can access only these Web sites. In
addition, you can set up the templates for copying basic information to the different types of users on the Web site. You can also define which
notification processes are to be used for the Web site.
Roles and Permissions
Commerce Portal allows you to create Web portal users, give them roles
5-20 Navision Attain® Overview
and modify the rights of these users and roles from within Navision Attain. This means that several types of Web portal users can engage in business
activities with your company or browse your Web portal. Different roles
have different permissions to perform different activities, such as business, maintenance or administration activities.
E-Mail Notification
In Commerce Portal, you can set up various notifications. These
notifications are used in the following circumstances:
• To notify the users of your Web portal of specific events or the status of their orders and offers, and of their new password and/or user IDs.
• To notify yourself or your colleagues of information entered by users of your Web portal.
During the processing of information entered by a Web portal user, you might want to send information or status reports to that user. This is done
by setting up notifications for each step that the different information types
can go through: for example, confirmation of a sales quote, shipping of a sales order, confirmation of an offer made on a reverse auction or the
creation of a Commerce Portal user ID and password. For each notification, you can write one or more texts that will automatically be sent to the
customer via e-mail. For example, whenever a sales order is shipped, the Web portal user will automatically receive an e-mail saying so.
The same functionality informs your colleagues of the creation of new Web
portal users, new sales quotes or new offers on reverse auctions. One of your colleagues or a group of your colleagues will receive an e-mail, for
example, containing information about the new Web portal user, new sales quote or new offer on the reverse auction.
Multilanguage Functionality
You can set up specific language-dependent text and descriptions to be used on your Web portal when the Web portal user’s language is not the
standard language of your Navision Attain installation. Commerce Portal automatically uses the text and descriptions defined for the chosen
language in the MultiLanguage table and the Item Translation table.
Reverse Auction
You can ease your purchasing process by creating a reverse auction. A
Technology 5-21
reverse auction is when you put a demand for purchasing products to one or more vendors on the Web portal. The participating vendors can then
respond to your auction by placing an offer on the Web portal, stating
delivery time, quantity and price.
Maintaining Web Pages
When your Web portal is up and running, you might want to make adjustments or changes. For example, you may want to change the
welcoming text that greets the Web portal users when they open the first page of your Web portal. This is easily done from within Navision Attain.
You do not have to change the text in the HTML code, nor do you need the
assistance of an ASP programmer. You simply change the text as you would change the text in any other application area of Navision Attain. You
can also change the pictures on your Web pages within Navision Attain.
Integration
The Commerce Portal is fully integrated with the rest of the Navision Attain
application areas.
This means that if, for example, a new customer places an order through
your Web portal, then their customer information is inserted automatically in the Customer table in the Navision Attain database. When you set up your
Web site, you define templates for each of your different types of Web portal users. The information on the templates will be copied to the new
user. The templates can contain basic information that you want all new
users created through your Web portal to have, as well as the permissions you want to grant them.
If an existing Web portal user places an order through your Web portal, they will receive all discounts that they are entitled to. In fact, everything will
work just as if the order was entered manually in the Sales Quote window
in Navision Attain. You can even grant trusted customers permission to create sales orders and you can choose to reject or accept the sales
quotes manually.
By using their user ID and password, each Web portal user can sign in to
your Web portal and view their previously entered information, such as orders, credit memos, offers on reverse auctions and financial statements.
In addition, depending on how you have set up your Web portal, you can
reorder items on the basis of previous orders. It is also possible for Web portal users to monitor the status of their current orders or offers.
5-22 Navision Attain® Overview
There is no separate table for the items you sell through your Web portal. All maintenance and updating uses the item card in the Inventory
application area of Navision Attain. So, whenever you update your prices or
the name or the availability of an item is changed, it is immediately reflected in your Web portal.
An order placed on your Web portal is no different than one created from within Navision Attain; there is full integration with the general ledger
through posting.
A sales order placed by a Web portal user is posted like any other sales
order in Navision Attain, and will therefore result in the same general ledger
entries, customer ledger entries, item ledger entries, and so on.
Technology 5-23
5.7 USER PORTAL
User Portal is a Web solution that gives users a single point of entry to
personal, team, corporate and external information. User Portal enables users to access Navision Attain data from a Web browser, utilizing the
latest Navision technology and functionality from Microsoft Digital Dashboard. User Portal is part of the e-business strategy of Navision a/s to
Web-enable Navision products.
User Portal makes it easy for users to access data in Navision Attain, no matter where they are working. Remote users, such as traveling sales
representatives, can immediately access their personal activity pages. User Portal delivers all the critical information users need to their own activity
page, helping them become more productive. All that is needed is access
to a Microsoft browser (Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.0 or later).
With User Portal, users can have access to all the information that supports
the roles they play in their organization. They can initiate searches for relevant role-based information from any source. For example, when a
sales representative needs information on customer accounts and sales history, they can easily access the relevant and up-to-date information from
Navision Attain.
User Portal enables users to tailor their personal home page to fit their needs. They can select from available Web parts, such as stock tickers,
recent business news and Navision Attain Web parts. Navision Attain Web parts can also be personalized so that, for example, a user can see both
the standard Item Sales Top 10 and the personalized My Item Sales Top
10.
Digital Dashboards
User Portal is based on the Microsoft Digital Dashboard framework. A digital dashboard is a powerful tool that knowledge workers can use to view
their daily activities, collaborate with coworkers and gain insight into the performance of the company. It ensures that knowledge workers have the
information they need to properly assess and act upon business
opportunities.
The digital dashboard concept is derived from the dashboards found in real
life. For example, cars and airplanes have dashboards that aid users in driving a car or flying a plane safely. When you are in the role of a driver,
you need to be able to monitor speed, gas level, and engine temperature
whereas pilots also need to monitor altitude, for example. So the
5-24 Navision Attain® Overview
dashboards are equipped with carefully designed gauges and controls that aid the user in performing the tasks relevant to their role.
In addition, digital dashboards are designed to support a role. The available
gauges are called Web parts and instead of monitoring speed and altitude, they monitor business data, specific tasks and other relevant information.
As with physical dashboards, you must go through a predesign analysis identifying the roles and their workflows when you are developing digital
dashboards.
In User Portal, digital dashboards are used to create activity centers.
Activity Center
An activity center contains all the links and views a user needs when acting in a certain role. Each user has one activity center for each role they are
assigned to.
An activity center contains an assortment of Web parts organized in views,
and will typically contain the user's predefined application role menu called
My Frequent Tasks. This menu provides links to other views and tasks such as My Item Sales Top 10 and Search.
The current User Portal demonstration product contains two activity centers:
• Sales
• Product Designer
Web Parts
The Web parts are the gauges on the dashboards. In other words, activity centers are made up of Web parts. Once a Web part has been designed, it
can be reused in different activity centers.
Web parts are components that contain any kind of Web-based technology.
As described earlier, they are Microsoft Digital Dashboard’s way of
modeling gauges from a real-world dashboard. For example, a speedometer would be considered one Web part.
The Web parts are used to build activity centers. Once a Web part is designed, it can be used in one or more activity centers. Web parts can add
general functionality to an activity center or they can add specialized
Technology 5-25
functionality.
Some general Web parts are:
• Favorites
• Frequent Tasks
• Recently Visited Pages
They add the general functionality to an activity center that you can find on
most Web sites. Other Web parts are highly specialized for one activity center.
Web parts can also contain information from external sources, for example, ticker stock prices, Microsoft Outlook, Microsoft NetMeeting and Web sites
with recent business news.
Infrastructure
User Portal uses the dataport feature within Navision Attain as a gateway
for inbound and outbound data.
To facilitate this, User Portal Application Server acts as a middle-tier data
server for the Web server application responding to requests for data and processing updates. You must not confuse User Portal Application Server
with Navision Attain Application Server. User Portal Application Server is
designed specifically for User Portal and you cannot use Navision Attain Application Server for a User Portal solution.
Data and updates are exchanged as XML-formatted messages. A user interface renderer manages the translation of the XML data to HTML
pages.
A portal developer creates dataports in the User Portal Application Server to import and export data in XML format. The developer also creates Web
part handlers in XML format and XSL style sheets that together form the basis for displaying the data in a browser. This is called the meta user
interface (meta UI).
The meta UI is itself an XML format made up of a number of pre-defined
interface components. A renderer then takes the meta UI (in XML format)
and generates the required HTML for the Web browser.
5-26 Navision Attain® Overview
In adopting this model, User Portal:
• Leverages the latest technologies to place Navision Attain information online.
• Allows for fully validated updates back into Navision Attain, observing the business application logic and rules.
• Provides an abstract user interface description, allowing Navision Attain to determine the user interface presentation on the browser and establish an overall product identity.
Technology 5-27
5.8 REVIEW QUESTIONS
These questions are for self-study to help ensure that you have understood
the material in this chapter.
1 Name the five types of objects in C/SIDE.
2 Name the four types of tables in C/SIDE.
3 What is a codeunit?
4 Which database servers can Navision Attain be installed on?
5 Explain what SIFT is.
6 Define/describe the following and the relationship between them: a
record, a field, a table, a company.
7 Describe the features of Navision Attain Application Server.
8 Describe the multilanguage features in Navision Attain.
9 Describe the features of Commerce Gateway.
10 Describe the features of Commerce Portal.
11 Describe the features of User Portal.
12 Define the following: an activity center, a Web part.
5-28 Navision Attain® Overview
Appendix A.
Cronus International Company History
This document recounts the story thus far of Cronus International Ltd., the Navision Attain
demonstration company. It contains the following sections:
Company History
Company Organization
Products & Services
Opportunities & Strategies
A Look Forward
II Cronus International Company History
Company History
In 1985, John Roberts founded and became Managing Director of Cronus
International Ltd. Originally, the company was a subcontractor of cabinets
for Supernova Inc. Supernova Inc. went bankrupt in 1991 and Cronus International Ltd. was reorganized after writing off significant losses
associated with the bankruptcy.
As part of the 1991 reorganization, Cronus International Ltd. became a
corporation with the family of John Roberts as principle shareholders. At that time, management chose Navision Financials to aid them in their
restructuring of the company and help keep tighter control over their
finances, as required by their principal creditors. The company shifted its focus to the marketing and sale of a line of modular office furniture, which
John Roberts, a trained carpenter and joiner, had been working on for some time. The series was called OLYMPIC. The company produced
some of the components in its own factory and some were purchased from
subcontractors. The series was and continues to be a great success and the company has grown steadily and significantly.
In the late nineties, the company decided to further emphasize manufacturing. In this connection, it added manufacturing functionality to
its existing installation of Navision Financials. It also undertook the manufacture of a line of bicycles. Cronus does the final assembly of the
bicycles with parts manufactured elsewhere, as well as in-house
manufacturing of some bicycle subassemblies. A natural development, which has arisen from the manufacturing functionality, is that sales and
distribution have been further emphasized by Cronus.
In the merger-mania business climate of the late nineties, Cronus
International Ltd. acquired a company that manufactures, distributes and
services computer hardware in order to expand its line of products and services. In conjunction with this, Cronus added distribution and service
management functionality to its Navision Financials installation. The added distribution functionality will aid the growing international concern in
distributing all of their various products, not only the new line of copiers. They are now a multinational company with warehouses and stocks in
various locations throughout the world.
Cronus International Ltd. is interested in delving into the rapidly growing e-commerce market. In this stead, it has added a line of interior design items
to complement the OLYMPIC series. The company also added a line of outdoor sportswear to complement the bicycles, which it will now
aggressively seek to sell via the Internet, using Commerce Portal.
Cronus International Company History III
To ensure that individuals not are forgotten in the focus on e-commerce, new product lines and increased marketing efforts, John Roberts has
decided to focus on treating different customers differently. Therefore,
Cronus has decided to upgrade to the new Navision Attain, a comprehensive, integrated business solution that includes Service
Management and Relationship Management functionality for handling customer relationship management.
IV Cronus International Company History
Company Organization
As a rapidly growing company with a diversified product line, Cronus
International Ltd. will continue its traditional focus on selling directly to
consumers, while adding a business-to-business focus to its business strategy.
The company, which went public in 1998, has grown from 60 employees in 1993 to nearly 850 today.
The founder, John Roberts (JR), a trained carpenter and joiner, has become CEO of the company and is responsible for overseeing all of its
operations.
Sales Manager Peter Schmidt (PS), is in charge of the sales of the OLYMPIC line of office furniture. Because of the increased responsibilities
associated with the new product lines, Mr. Schmidt has been promoted to Vice President of Sales and will oversee the entire sales force of all product
lines.
Foreman Richard Quist (RQ) is responsible for the production of the OLYMPIC office furniture. This includes a close working relationship with
vendors to ensure that supplies are sufficient for production needs.
Juan Hernandez (JH) is responsible for purchases. He works closely with
Richard Quist. He also has been responsible for negotiating the tightened business relationships that Cronus has entered into recently with several of
its vendors.
Interior design consultant Mary Fioretto (MF) has designed the new line of interior decorating items to go with the OLYMPIC series. Because of her
background in clothing design, she also has overseen the design of the line of activewear, which will be sold via the Internet.
The new Sales Manager, Carl Owens (CO), is an expert on relationship
management and will be in charge of sales campaigns. Mr. Lewis has a growing sales force to assist him with the many campaigns.
With the addition of copiers to its product line, Cronus needed a Service Manager, so they hired Kate Decker (KD), to fill that position. She has ten
years of experience in the customer service field and served as an expert consultant for the development of the service management functionality for
Navision Attain.
Cronus’ new focus on e-commerce has necessitated a Web Team, headed by Web Manager, Jason Martin (JM). Mr. Owens, an experienced web
Cronus International Company History V
programmer himself, will supervise the team of writers and web programmers on the Web Team.
In order to properly market the new product lines, Cronus felt it was
necessary to hire a Marketing Manager. Maria Bedford (MB), who has ten years of experience in the sporting goods market, will focus on marketing
the bicycle and activewear lines.
Alice Hart (AH) is the office manager of the headquarters office. She is an
expert party planner and is responsible for all company functions.
VI Cronus International Company History
Products & Services
OLYMPIC Office Furniture
This line of highly successful office furniture is the cornerstone of Cronus’
business. It has enabled Cronus to become the market leader in the domestic market and is ranked number three in two large export markets.
Interior Decorating Items
To complement the office furniture line, Cronus has added a line of interior
decorating items which will be sold via the Internet using Navision Attain solution suite for e-commerce.
Bicycles
Cronus has manufactured bicycles since the late nineties. The company will use their Navision Attain that supports relationship management to
make a targeted effort to sell them.
Activewear & Accessories
In conjunction with the bicycle marketing campaign, Cronus has added a
line of outdoor activewear and accessories. This includes clothing and accessories for bicycling and an active lifestyle.
Computer Hardware
In serving companies’ office furniture needs, Cronus noticed a need in
many companies for quality computer hardware and associated service agreements. They acquired a computer hardware company to fill this need
and will use Navision Attain service management functionality to provide
maintenance and repair services for computer customers.
Cronus International Company History VII
Opportunities & Strategies
As any company which has grown enormously in a short time, Cronus
International Ltd. suffers from growing pains. One of the ways in which it
will meet the challenges is by upgrading its Navision Financials installation to the new Navision Attain, which includes six fully integrated solution
suites for financial management, relationship management, e-commerce, analytics, distribution and manufacturing—everything a company like
Cronus needs. Some of the challenges faced by Cronus International Ltd. include:
Selling the Bicycles
Cronus has been manufacturing bicycles for a number of years but has never made selling them a priority. The sales staff will undertake a sales
campaign, specifically targeting customers who will be interested in the bicycles. To plan and execute this campaign, they will employ the
Relationship Management functionality that is part of their new Navision
Attain installation. This will enable Cronus to target only the potential customers whose profile is included in a segment. Relationship
Management will enable Cronus to ensure that the expenditure of the campaign pays back. Navision Attain will also help Cronus optimize stock
turnover rates by taking sales budgets into account when purchasing and manufacturing.
Distribution
With the expansion in product lines, Cronus has increased interest in issues surrounding distribution. The company will set up Responsibility
Centers, which manage a number of warehouses. This will allow for increased efficiency in shipping and warehousing, so that customers can
receive their goods more quickly by having them sent from the nearest
warehouse. This will be handled centrally by the distribution solution suite, enabling access to up-to-date information on orders and shipments.
Cronus will be better able to handle orders, stocks, and shipments and efficiently handle transfers from one warehouse to another or one country
to another.
E-Commerce
At least two of Cronus’ new product lines—the interior design items and the
activewear and accessories—will be sold directly to consumers via the Internet. Cronus has implemented Navision Attain with its e-commerce
solution suite to fill e-commerce needs. This will allow Cronus to both catalog and categorize the items in multiple configurations, targeting
VIII Cronus International Company History
specific customer wants and needs.
B2B
It has been decided that business relationships with major suppliers should
be tightened in order to save on the handling of orders and invoices, as well as more efficiently handle distribution. Thus, Cronus International Ltd.
has entered into strategic business partnerships with a number of suppliers. One of these partners is the supplier of the interior design items
which will be sold online. Orders and shipments will be made through the Navision Commerce Gateway B2B connection. This will save both
companies time and money and increase the efficiency of orders, stocks
and shipments.
Service Management
With the purchase of the computer hardware firm, Cronus International Ltd. enters into a field where they have little prior experience. The company
has service agreements with its hardware customers. The Service
Management functionality of their new Navision Attain installation will enable Cronus to efficiently honor and maintain these agreements,
providing maintenance and repair services for these customers.
Sales Force
Due to steady growth in the sales force it has been increasingly important to share information within the company on all external contacts. Many
different people in different departments within the organization need to
have access to up-to-date information on all contacts and any correspondence with them. Cronus believes that these contacts should be
maintained on a personal basis. The functionality within Navision Attain that supports relationship management will aid Cronus in building stronger
personal relationships with suppliers and customers.
Cronus International Company History IX
A Look Forward
Things have changed dramatically in the business world since Cronus
International Ltd. started as a family business more than 15 years ago.
The company has changed as well. It would like to prepare for doing even more business online in the future. In order to plan for this, the company is
looking ahead and investigating possibilities for the future.
Expanded Commerce Portal Functionality
Cronus hopes to be able to implement Intelligent Cross-Selling and Product Recommendation features in their e-commerce solution. This would link to
their Navision Attain installation, helping them track customer needs and
target specific customer groups. Customers would get an individual, customized set of recommendations whenever they logged on, based on
their past purchases and based on purchases of similar items made by other customers. Better customer service is among the issues that Cronus
will examine in the near future.
Supply Chain
The company’s Commerce Gateway agreements along with CRM and
expanded distribution functionality are a step towards the supply chain of the future. Ideally, the company will have tightened business relationships
with vendors that will enable a transparency between back and front offices. This will enable Cronus to respond quickly and when needed to
changes in sales opportunities and production needs. It also will give them
greater flexibility in warehousing and shipping directly to customers.
Customer Relationship Management
As outlined above in conjunction with the expanded Commerce Portal, Cronus is interested in establishing closer relationships with its customers.
As a rapidly growing, large international company, Cronus will have to
consider ways of maintaining their CRM strategy as their sales force grows and places increasingly sophisticated demands upon the system--demands
such as the ability for a field sales or service force to have mobile synchronization with the database. When the time comes, Cronus is in
good hands with Navision Attain because of the Navision-Siebel integration for the front office.
X Cronus International Company History
INDEX
account
bank 2-2,2-3,2-8,2-11
customer 2-3,5-23
G/L 2-3,2-4,2-5,2-6,2-28
vendor 2-3,2-6
account schedule 2-2,2-4,2-5,2-7
activity center 5-24,5-25
adjustment
negative 3-4,3-6,3-25
positive 3-6,3-22
analysis view 2-7
available to promise 3-10
bank account 2-2,2-3,2-8,2-11
bill-to, customer 2-13
BOM 3-2,3-6,3-14,3-27,4-10
production 3-14
BOM, journal 3-2,3-6
budget 2-4,2-5,2-6,2-33
job 2-33
C/AL 5-4,5-5,5-6,5-10
campaign 4-5,4-6,4-7,VI,VII
capable to promise 3-10
capacity journal 3-25,3-27
capacity planning 2-28,3-25
capacity scheduling 3-24
card
campaign 4-6
contact 4-4
employee 2-35,2-37,2-38
item 3-2,3-3,3-7,3-8,3-17,3-19,4-10,5-22
machine center 3-23,3-24
nonstock item 3-3
resource 2-28,2-30,2-31,2-32
work center 3-24
cash receipt journal 2-12,2-14
chart of accounts 2-2,2-3,2-7
code
item tracking 3-9
reason 2-4
routing link 3-27
scrap 3-27
source 2-4
Index
stop 3-27
VAT 2-4
codeunit 5-5,5-10
consolidation 2-2
consumption journal 3-20
consumption, posting of 3-16,3-19,3-20
contact 3-9,4-4,4-5,4-6,4-7
contact card 4-4
costing method 3-18
credit memo
sales 2-14,2-15
currencies, multiple 2-2
currency
foreign 2-8,2-9,3-28
local 2-8,2-9,2-11
customer
bill-to 2-13
sell-to 2-13
customer, account 2-3,5-23
customs 2-2,2-4,2-11
dataport 5-5,5-25
depreciation book 2-25,2-27
Designer
Form 5-2
Object 5-2,5-3,5-4,5-5,5-13
Report 5-4
digital dashboard 5-23,5-24
dimension 2-2,2-5,2-6,2-7
discount, item 2-14,2-20
drilldown 2-3
drop shipment 2-13
e-commerce 5-16,5-17,5-18,II,III,IV,VI,VII,IX
employee absence 2-35
employee qualification 2-37
employee, card 2-35,2-37,2-38
employment contract 2-36
EMU 2-9,2-11
EU 2-2,2-4,2-10,2-11
exchange rates, foreign 2-9
filter 2-5,2-7,3-12,4-11,5-8
finance charge memo 2-17
flushing
backward 3-19,3-27
forward 3-19,3-27
manual 3-19
Form Designer 5-2
G/L account 2-3,2-4,2-5,2-6,2-28
general journal 2-2,2-14,2-20
general ledger 2-2,2-3,2-5,2-7,2-12,2-18,2-29,2-33,5-22
human resources 2-35
interaction 4-4,4-7,5-10
invoice
sales 2-13,2-14,2-15,2-17
item
card 3-2,3-3,3-7,3-8,3-17,3-19,4-10,5-22
journal 3-4
nonstock 3-3
item reclassification journal 3-4
item tracking code 3-9
item, journal 3-4
item, nonstock 3-3
job 2-3,2-17,2-22,2-29,2-31,2-33,2-34,4-11
budget 2-33
journal 2-31,2-33,2-34
journal
BOM 3-2,3-6
capacity 3-25,3-27
cash receipt 2-12,2-14
consumption 3-20
item 3-4
item reclassification 3-4
job 2-31,2-33,2-34
output 3-19,3-27
physical inventory 3-5
resource 2-28,2-31
revaluation 3-7
journal, capacity 3-27
journal, output 3-27
machine center 3-23,3-25,3-26,3-27
market segment 4-6,VII
material need scheduling 3-24
measure, unit of 3-2,3-27,3-28
multilanguage 5-12,5-13,5-14
multiple currencies, using 2-2
Navigate 2-4
nonstock item 3-3
Object Designer 5-2,5-3,5-4,5-5,5-13
opening balance 2-2
opportunity 4-7,5-12,5-23,VII,IX
order
production 3-15,3-16,3-18,3-20,3-22,3-25,3-26
promising 3-21
sales 2-17,3-3,3-9,3-15,3-16,3-17,3-18,4-7,5-19,5-20,5-22
tracking 3-18
Index
order promising 3-21
order tracking 3-18
output journal 3-19,3-27
partial shipment 2-13
permission 5-2,5-22
physical inventory journal 3-5
portal, user 5-25
portal, Web 5-18,5-19,5-20,5-21,5-22
price, alternative 3-28
process scheduling 3-24
production
BOM 3-14
forecast 3-21
order 3-15,3-16,3-18,3-20,3-22,3-25,3-26
production order
firm planned 3-15,3-16
planned 3-15
profile VII
quote
sales 5-19,5-20,5-22
reason code 2-4
receivable, accounts 2-12
reminder 2-16
Report Designer 5-4
resource 2-17,2-24,2-28,2-29,2-30,2-31
card 2-28,2-30,2-31,2-32
group 2-28,2-29,2-31
journal 2-28,2-31
revaluation journal 3-7
reverse auction 5-19,5-20,5-21,5-22
role 5-18,5-23,5-24
routing 3-14,3-24,3-25,3-27
sales
credit memo 2-14,2-15
invoice 2-13,2-14,2-15,2-17
order 2-17,3-3,3-9,3-15,3-16,3-17,3-18,4-
7,5-19,5-20,5-22
quote 5-19,5-20,5-22
tax 2-2
sales order, blanket 3-17
segment 4-6,VII
sell-to, customer 2-13
service
contract 4-9,4-11
item 4-10
order 2-30,4-9,4-11
service contract 4-10
shop calendar 3-26
source code 2-4
stockkeeping unit 3-3
subsidiary 2-9,2-10
tax, sales 2-2
to-do 4-5
unit of measure 3-2,3-27,3-28
user portal 5-25
VAT
calculation 2-4
code 2-4
entry 2-4
vendor, account 2-3,2-6
Web part 5-23,5-24,5-25
Web portal 5-18,5-19,5-20,5-21,5-22
work center 3-23,3-24,3-25,3-26,3-27
XBRL 2-10