MainBoss Newswire

July 2001

Dear MainBoss User,

We are happy to reintroduce the MainBoss Newswire, an electronic newsletter containing news about upcoming releases, add-on programs, tradeshows, tips & tricks, and other noteworthy information that will help you keep up to date in your work with MainBoss. The Newswire will be e-mailed to all MainBoss users whenever newsworthy topics arise. If you have any suggestions on items that you would like to see covered, please feel free to e-mail me at daniela@mainboss.com.

On behalf of the MainBoss Staff,

Daniela Schumann

Customer Service Manager

800-563-0894 x214

info@mainboss.com

To unsubscribe, please reply to this message and type “Unsubscribe” in the first line of the email.

Topics:

1. MainBoss CMMS 2.8, MainBoss Work Request Notifier, and MainBoss @Requests 1.1 now available!
2. Power Outage corrupted your MainBoss database? No Problem! Here is a quick solution that may allow you to fix your own database in minutes!
3. Upcoming Tradeshows: ASHE 2001 in Tampa, Florida July 16 & 17, 2001

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Now Available: MainBoss CMMS 2.8, MainBoss Work Request Notifier, and MainBoss @Requests!

MainBoss CMMS 2.8

We at MainBoss are very excited to announce the release of MainBoss CMMS 2.8, Work Request Notifier 1.0, and MainBoss @Requests 1.1. With new features, reports, and improvements, MainBoss CMMS is better than ever and we’re sure you’ll love it! Here are some of the changes found in MainBoss 2.8:

• Several new fields have been added to let you record more information in a Vendor record (for example, your account number with the vendor and the vendor's email address).

• A new table lets you record contact information for people not covered by other tables. In particular, this table is used to record information on people who submit work requests. Therefore, the "Req. By" field in work orders and work requests is now a drop-down list showing the Contacts table. If a particular requestor does not appear in the Contacts table, there is a New Requestor button to add someone to the table.

• A new Quick Outside feature has been added to work orders so that you can quickly create a simple purchase order to cover the costs of labor or materials from outside contractors.

• Chargebacks are now recorded in a separate section of work orders. This allows for multiple chargebacks on the same work order.

• The Maintenance Status report is a new report that shows the most recent preventive maintenance work on a set of units and the next expected preventive maintenance on those same units.

• When entering unit costs, you may now specify more than two decimal places (as in 1.2345). When MainBoss calculates a unit cost from a total cost, MainBoss actually calculates the answer to 16 decimal places for maximum accuracy; however, you will only see four decimal places in reports. All reports display unit costs using four decimal places.

If you would like to view a complete list of the changes in MainBoss CMMS 2.8, please go to www.mainboss.com/english/products/whatsnew/index.shtml.

MainBoss @Requests 1.1

The MainBoss @Requests is an add-on program to MainBoss CMMS that lets people submit work requests by email. The software can automatically turn such email messages into work requests and deposit those requests directly into your MainBoss database. The person who submitted the problem is automatically informed by email of the progress on the request. For example, when someone in the maintenance department accepts the request and creates a work order from it, the submitter can be automatically informed via email. If you would like to find out more about @Requests and how it can improve your maintenance operations, please visit www.mainboss.com/products.

MainBoss Work Request Notifier

MainBoss Work Request Notifier is a free, optional add-on to the regular MainBoss CMMS package. The software notifies the user when new, open work requests are detected in the MainBoss databases. The user specifies a time interval that MainBoss Work Request Notifier should check for new, open work requests. If there are new work requests since the last time the check was performed, then some user-specified alerts will be issued to the user. The program puts an icon in Window's system-tray (the same place as the Window's volume control icon). Work Request Notifier will even work with a pager, to keep you informed while you’re away from your desk!

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Power Outage corrupted your MainBoss database? No Problem! Here is a quick solution that will allow you to fix your own database in minutes!

Sometimes power failures can corrupt one or more of your MainBoss files. Specifically, the header block of the particular file now may get a record count that doesn’t match the physical size of the file. You’ll know this problem has occurred when you try to open one or more MainBoss menus and you receive error messages that prevent any information from being displayed. For example, an error message might occur when you browse work orders and then try to edit an existing work order. The error message may then be:

File is not a Data File

Status –200 80137

C:\MainBoss\Maint\Labor.dbf

Rather than restoring a backup of MainBoss or sending your corrupted database to MainBoss technical support, you can now fix your own database. All you need is the DBFix program which you can download from our web site, www.mainboss.com. (Login to the Support Center and go to the software updates section.) Follow the instructions for downloading the software; then you can fix your database files with these simple steps:

1. Start MainBoss and login as Administrator.
2. Open the MainBoss Administration menu and attempt to re-index your database (go to the Administration menu, then click on Database, then choose Reindex).

Observe the error message that appears during the re-index operation and write down the filename (for example MAINT/LABOR.DBF). If you do not get an error message, you are done.

3. Exit from MainBoss.
4. Start the DBFIX program.
5. In DBFIX, click on File, then Open DBF, and open the file observed in step 2 (for example, C:\MainBoss\Maint\labor.dbf).
6. Now click on Analysis and choose Diagnostics. This screen allows you to examine the file.
7. Halfway down the window you will see a heading called Number of Records. Observe the number displayed beside From File Header compared to the number displayed next to From DOS. Adjust the Number of Records From File to match the Number of Records From DOS. For example, From File Header: 10617. From DOS: 10618. Therefore, change the 10617 to 10618.
8. Click OK and exit DBFix. Open MainBoss, return to Step 1 above to repeat the Reindex operation. You may have to do this several times if several files are corrupted.

Please note that some data may have been lost while the number of records are not equal. After you are able to use your database again, go through any actions that you took since the database got corrupted. You may have to re-enter some data. We also recommend that you run the Audit Program to check for any problems (go to the Administration menu, click on Database and choose Audit).

Any fixes to the MainBoss database are a nuisance and can be time consuming. We recommend that an Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS) be employed on any computer with a MainBoss database residing on it. Also be sure to make regular backups of your database and store these backups on a separate computer or on an external device such as CD-ROM, disk, or tape.

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Upcoming Tradeshow: ASHE 2001 in Tampa, FL

ASHE Conference and Technical Exhibition—held by the American Society for Healthcare Engineering—will be held at the Tampa Convention Center in Tampa, Florida from July 16^th to 17^th. Visit MainBoss at booth 701. To find out more about ASHE, visit their official website: http://www.ashe.org