Sage has given their current 2010 roadmaps for their MAS 90 and MAS 200 products. These roadmaps are not guaranteed, but do show Sage’s priorities so far as introduction of new features.
Sage MAS 90 and MAS 200 version 4.40 has now shipped, with the Inventory, Purchase Order, Bill of Materials modules upgraded to their business framework, previously done for GL, AP, AR & Sales Order. 4.40 adds many usability features to these modules, along with enhanced Custom Office features.
March 2010 will be the 1st 4.40 Product Update, in which Sage bundles former Extended Solutions (see *) into the standard product.
Product Update 1 scheduled for March will contain:
AR Enter cash receipts by invoice number (*AR 1200)
AR Ability to search by additional fields (*AR 1027)
AP Enter wire transfers in Accounts Payable Manual Check Entry
SO Prevent accidental re-use of a customer Purchase Order number in history (*SO 1096)
SO Control which items customers may purchase (*SO 1271)
SO Print a picking sheet with backorder line items
SO Prevent accidental printing of picking sheets twice
SO Quick print a picking sheet from sales order (*SO 1035)
PR Automatic application of multiple earnings codes per employee during a payroll run (*PR 1018)
JC Prevent accidental posting of costs to a closed job (*JC 1046)
Credit Card Processing Industry Security Compliance: PA-DSS Certified
Windows 7 (32 bit only) compatibility testing is currently in process for Sage MAS 90 and 200. Sage says Windows 7 compatibility information to be published by the end of March 2010.

Product Update 2 scheduled for June 2010 will contain:
Bank Reconciliation
Electronically reconcile your BR transactions between your software and bank (*BR1005)
Utilize Positive Pay to verify check information (amount, payee, etc.) prior to the bank’s payment, which helps protects against check fraud (*BR1004)
Business Insights Intelligence
New Advanced Analytics and Financial Reporting tool as an alternative to Frx.
Complex reporting and analysis with a familiar excel-like interface.
Single-user license comes free. Frx users can trade their add-on licenses for B.I.I. licenses.
MAS 200 only version 4.45 – targeted for 4th quarter 2010.
SQL server database support for MAS 200, business framework modules only (AR,AP,BM,GL,IM,PO,SO).
Bundled SQL server license will be available from Sage with MAS 200.
Note: this will initially be for new installations, with upgrades of existing installations available at a later, currently unspecified time.

Call us at 678-273-4010, ext 2 if you have questions about upgrading your MAS 90 or MAS 200 system this year.

Mas 90 & Mas 200 up to version 3.71 called this System Activity Log and is on the Library Master Utilities menu. Mas90 4.x versions call this the Activity Log and is on the Library Master Reports menu. If you have the E-Business Manager modules, use Web Error Log on the E-Business Manager Main menu to view a continuous record of significant Web Engine error events.

Use the Activity Log to view a continuous record of significant operating events (installing applications, or performing system startup, file maintenance, module period-end processing, Visual Integrator Import and Export Jobs run including #-records imported/exported.). This log also lists any error conditions that have occurred.

The log prints up to the last 999 events, deleting the oldest activity from the list as each new activity is added. Friendly Systems technical support often refers to this log when researching any system problems you may encounter.

Some of these errors are cryptic and often non-consequential errors, but major events such as module period-closings, company copies, GL Account and other renumberings and changes made with Utilities that may help you when researching those issues. It also lists the user-code to tell you what user initiated the event. Each of these logs includes a search-feature that allows you to locate events by date, user, company or event type.

You have probably heard that Sage has decided to phase out MAS 90 and 200 Extended Solutions. We’ve been developing and supporting MAS 90 and 200 solutions since 1990 As a Source Code Development Partner, we have full access to Extended Solutions source code.
Sage will begin to phase out Sage MAS 90 and 200 Extended Solutions, which were created to address specialized needs of unique businesses. This process includes incorporating the main features and functionality of many of the top Extended Solution titles into the core product. That additional functionality will be delivered over the next several releases and product updates.
Customers who own titles that will be retired and not incorporated into the core product, will begin to see those Extended Solution title(s) drop off their renewal notices. As of November 1, 2010, Sage will no longer support any retired Extended Solutions titles. Please make note that the 2009 year-end updates will be the last year-end updates for those titles.
Friendly Systems has the source code for the library of Extended Solutions, and is available to support and maintain these retired Extended Solutions, on a case by case basis.
Customers who own the select group of titles that contain features and functionality that will be phased into Sage MAS 90 and 200 ERP over the next few releases will continue to see their title(s) on their renewal notices. Also, they’ll continue to receive support until such time as the features and functionality are incorporated into the core product. Once their title has been incorporated into the core product, they will see that title drop off their renewals.

Recent economic conditions have accelerated the trend to bring open source principles to business software. Sourceforge publishes a Top 25 Projects at the end of each month, and as of August 31, the top 3 positions were all held by open source ERP programs.

The top of the list was PostBooks ERP & CRM by xTuple. This is also the product that Friendly Systems, after reviewing many of the open source ERP options for several months, has decided to become involved with.

There are two business models for open source – some make the software completely free, and others, like xTuple, have a dual license model. xTuple PostBooks Edition software is free, and the Standard and Manufacturing Editions are commercial offerings with both subscription and perpetual license pricing. The commercial editions offer additional features, but even the free PostBooks Edition is a true mid-market product. Though it has the features, such as multi-lingual and multi-currency, to be used internationally (and it is), xTuple is produced in the United States, and there is a company behind it, not just a community of programmers.

See our web page about xTuple for more information.

Sage offers many extended solution enhancements to its Mas 90 and Mas 200 software. Here are some examples:

AP Cash Basis Accounting and History Posting
AP Distribution Table in Invoice Entry: Pre-defined tables of GL acct’s and percentages to allocate expenses
AP Electronic Payment – post check entries to NACHA format files
AP Multi-Company Aging and Multi-Company Vendor Synchronization
AR Ship to Addresses (if you aren’t using the Sales Order system) to allow multiple ship-to addresses
AR National Accounts – allows Bill-To Master-Customers
AR Multi-Company AR Customer Synchronization
Bank Rec Multi Company Bank Reconciliation
Bank Rec Positive Pay Export
Custom Office: Add User Defined Fields to Inventory Lot and Serial numbers
GL Multi-Company GL Account Synchronization
Inventory – Add Batch Processing for Inventory Transactions Entry
Inventory – Enhanced Alias Item Search and Entry
Inventory – Lot and Serial number Search and Inquiry
Payroll – Tax and Deduction Liability – Automatically create AP invoices for Payroll Employer Tax checks and “Other” deductions.
Payroll – Direct Deposit Interface puts direct deposits into NACHA files
Sales Order – Authorized Purchase Control by Customer or State
Sales Order – Multiple Sales Orders on Single Invoice
Sales Order – Commissions by Line Item – Override rates on Orders and Invoices on a line item basis.

Call Friendly Systems if you have a specific situation and we will research to see if there are existing Extended Solutions that can work for you.

What is Open Source Software, and what does it mean for small and medium businesses?

“Open Source” means that the source code for the software is freely available for review and modification. Some open source software is developed strictly by a group of volunteers, but there are many major projects which have corporate sponsors. For example, Sun has long financed the development of OpenOffice, a suite of word processor, spreadsheet, presentation and database programs very similar, and mostly compatible with, Microsoft Office, and MySQL, a SQL database that is probably the most common database in use on web sites in the world.

The word most commonly associated with “open source” is “free”. Free (as in “freedom”) because you have the source code and can make (or have someone make for you) modifications to suit your exact needs. Some open source software is also free as in “free beer”. OpenOffice and MySQL both fall into this category as well. Anyone can download, install and use either of those programs without paying Sun any license fees. Sun (and other companies) offer support services for a fee.

So if you need training, or need to have someone on call if problems occur, that is available, just like with proprietary commercial software. Using open source software does NOT mean you are on your own. Nor does it mean that you should expect services for the software will be free.
What does this mean for your business?

For one thing, you could test out OpenOffice. It looks and functions almost exactly like Microsoft Office 2003, and you can have both installed on the same machine while you try it out. Unless you have very complex documents or make extensive use of macros, you should be able to switch with no problem, and stop paying Microsoft Office license fees. I have even found one case where OpenOffice actually works better than Excel 2003 in opening exported spreadsheet from Crystal Reports.

One of the largest gatherings of open source software is at Sourceforge, a website which hosts software projects for developers. You can search for software there. You can also see some of the software that we use ourselves.

Friendly Systems One-Click Picking Sheet Printing enhancement for Sage MAS 90 and MAS 200 lets you print a Picking Sheet for an order with just one click directly from the Sales Order Entry screen. This allows you to quickly print a picking document that can be used to get the goods out the door. The system automatically returns to the Sales Order Entry screen so you can continue with the next order. Contact us for further information at 678-273-4010 ext 4.

If you need to integrate your data with other software packages or data transmissions, the Visual Integrator module is the tool to use. Easy selection of data to export or import is provided, with a variety of features and formats to accomplish different tasks. For example:

Bring vendor price changes into your Inventory item file quickly.
Export your items to excel, calculate new prices, then import new prices into inventory from excel.
Import Vendor Invoices into your AP system, rather than entering them manually.
Items scattered in multiple locations? Enter physical counts into excel, then import into the Mas90/200 Physical Count Entry file.
Validation logic is built into Visual Integrator to assure that the data being imported conforms to Sage MAS 90 and Sage MAS 200 rules.
User-Defined Fields­: If you have created user-defined fields in Sage MAS 90 or Sage MAS 200, these fields will appear automatically for selection when Visual Integrator operates on the entity to which they are attached (for example, customers or vendors). You can then export or import your user-defined field data.
Import Fields Conditionally ­Conditional importing allows a field to be assigned based on the value of another field. For example, the sales tax code can be assigned based on the state field in the customer address.
Put Import or Export Jobs on the menu, so you or anyone can easily run them any time. Jobs can also be passworded for security.
Selection and Skip Record Criteria­: Multiple selection criteria for picking certain records can be specified, using standard “nesting logic” criteria, (such as: and, or). Multiple criteria for skipping records can also be defined.
Contact us if you would like assistance in purchasing or using the Visual Integrator module.

Customer Actions—Customers have their choice of returning items for credit, replacement, or repair. You can credit the customer’s account, or apply it to a credit card. Replacement returns can be exchanged for the same item or an alternate item. A single entry marks an item for repair, and provides customer return instructions.
Item Actions—Actions can be assigned to each item after it is received and inspected. Items returned to stock can be sent to a return warehouse or the original selling warehouse. Unusable items can be returned to a scrap warehouse. Repair items are returned to a repair warehouse, fixed, and returned to the customer.
Vendor Actions—When the Purchase Order module is integrated with RMA, vendor actions of return for credit or return for replacement can be assigned to each item. Selecting these actions in RMA Receipts Entry causes the appropriate documents to be automatically created during the RMA transaction generation process.
Xpress Order Entry—If a customer can’t wait for you to receive the return before you ship the replacement, cross shipments can be originated by clicking on the Xpress Order Entry button from within RMA Data Entry. This activates Sales Order Entry, and populates a new order with the urgently requested item.
Calculate Restocking Fees—Restocking fees can be assigned by inventory product line or by individual item. You can even waive restocking fees for selected customers at the time of RMA entry, giving you the utmost in flexibility.
RMA Inquiry—You don’t need to know whether an RMA is still pending or has been received in order to find it. After entering an RMA number, the program automatically determines if the RMA is open or received, and displays the requested record.
Generate Transactions—This powerful program uses the information entered in RMA Receipts Entry, along with historical and customer information, to create all necessary documents, including sales orders, credit memos, vendor return orders, and purchase orders.
Return Reason Tracking—During RMA Entry, a return reason is assigned to each line. The reasons print on the Return Reason Report to help you identify potential quality or other customer satisfaction issues.
Receipts History—Full receipts history is tracked and all returns can be reviewed on the Receipts History Report. You can drill down to RMA information throughout the Sales Order and Accounts Receivable modules.