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TOP Latest Features

Latest Features in TOP

	A/P Invoice Data Entry and Manual Check Entry at the invoice number field, you can enter Shift+? and TOP will start the invoice display with the invoices for the vendor entered and will not allow you to select an invoice for another vendor.
	Feature has been added to the A/P Vendor History Display on the Vendor Sub-Menu to display the General Ledger account numbers that were entered on the original invoice. You can also see the invoice header information and the GL accounts on the A/P Options Menu in Invoice History selection.
	Flag has been added to the A/P Vendor master for active or inactive vendors. Will not allow you to enter an invoice for a vendor that is inactive.
	Flag for active or inactive customers has been added to the customer master.
	Added utility programs to copy inventory items, customer status information, customer contacts to another company
	New I/C Excess Inventory report
	Adjustments, Issues and Receipts updated daily to the Item History file with kits now included in sales
	Automatic Invoice Generation Lookup now on the Order Entry Options Menu
	Option to print Item Sales by Customer Report by customer type
	New A/R open invoice report with option to list finance charge invoices only
	New G/L financial statement to compare prior month figures
	Added credit card security code to automatic invoice generation
	Added running balance to A/P Open Invoice Display print option
	New print option added to order print for printing bin and extension or bin location only
	Customer Analysis Report has an added option to print prior year for the current month comparison
	Cash Receipt postings to the General Ledger End-of-Day report are now separated by bank deposit code. This helps to simplify matching credit card deposits.
	Option to enter F1 for next available A/P manual check number. Can be used for entering transactions that don't have a check number.
	Added country of origin and tariff code to Item Master
	Added option to the Customer Label Print to print labels by salesperson with an additional label option to list the contact name
	S/A Salesperson by Customer by Item report now has an option to print either (D)etail or (S)ummary records
	Changed Inventory Transaction Report and Update to allow transaction postings to the General Ledger for receipts, issues and adjustments
	Modified Customer Analysis Report to sort by city and state, print city and state on the report with an option to output to a tab delimited text file
	Modified the Inventory update to the General Ledger to allow postings for adjustments, issues and receipts
	Option to enter sales tax only credit memos in Invoice Data Entry
	Added item summary to Customer Item Prior Year Report with an option to sort by item, PTD or YTD figures
	Advanced options to Item Royalty Report
	Option to use a replacement inventory item for a discontinued item during Order Entry
	Added changes for printing to Zebra label printer
	Option to only select statements for customers over 60 days past due.
	Item Sales by Month report prints six months of a year to a printer or twelve months of a year to a text file
	Option to print O/E Open Orders by Item Report in Item Bin Location order
	You can now enter credit card information in order and invoice data entry and NOT have it post to the cash receipts data entry file. You can also have only the last 4 digits of the credit card number print on orders, invoices and Customer Contact Maintenance by using a security group code.
	New salesperson report that includes first and second salesperson within a specified date range. Report lists salesperson code, zip code, customer code and name, state code, customer type, YTD and Prior Year sales.
	A/P invoice memo field now posts to the G/L End-of-Day.
	SCO UNIX and Windows customers can now download the TOP2000.P update from our support website .www.mindwarecorp.com --> Click on Downloads --> Right click on upgrade --> Save to the (S)hare drive on the Unix file server or the C:/TOP/TEMP folder in Windows and call Mindware to install.
	Added option to display the installation date and the current version of TOP on the Welcome Screen and issue a warning if your version of TOP is older than 365 days.
	New audit program to trace order and invoice input by writing records to an audit file when operators add, edit, print, delete, convert and update orders/invoices.
	NOF name now prints on the Daily Summary of Postings, AP check stub and Monthly Summary of Postings.
	New feature in 'Purchase Order Data Entry' allows you to enter an O/E order number for a particular customer and import the line items from the order into the purchase order.
	TOP purchase order information can be exported to a file and can become an order in TOP
	New order import program to interface with Trodat web orders

TOP March 2009 Newsletter

Thought For the Month

"The only reason people get lost in thought is because it's unfamiliar territory!"

Mindware Customers at CHA Show in Anaheim

The Craft and Hobby Association (CHA) held its winter convention and trade show at the Anaheim Convention Center in Anaheim, CA, January 24-28, 2009. It was the largest exhibition of its kind in the world. From an international product selection to unrivaled educational and networking events, the 2009 show brought the craft world together to showcase breaking industry trends, the latest product introductions and countless new ideas for 'going green'.

It was not just another trade show... it was the craft and hobby world's fair. There were over 900 exhibiters, over 16,000 attendees, 7,000 buyers and 60 countries represented at the show. The events included scrap booking, paper crafts, general crafts, art material and framing, fabric, quilting, needle crafts, imaging and license and design. There were international pavilions from Japan, Brazil, UK, Australia, Canada, Italy, France, Taiwan and India.

Mindware customers that exhibited at this year's show were Art Gone Wild & Friends, Hampton Art, Product Performers and JustRite Stampers.

Tips For 'Green' Computing

Research has said that the technology industry accounts for 2% of global carbon dioxide emissions, which matches the same percentage of emissions from the aviation industry! With so many people using a personal computer, there is no doubt it has a major impact. We all need to start thinking about green computing if you want to help fight global warming or just plain want to save money on energy. There are a few small things each one of us can do to help:

Your display screen is the biggest power consuming device, especially if it is an old CRT display. Flat panel monitors consume less than half of the power that a CRT burns. You might consider replacing your screen if you are using a CRT. If you are going to be away from your computer for awhile or overnight, hit the power button on the display. If you are going to be away for a weekend or longer, shut the entire system down instead of letting it go to 'sleep'.

You can also activate power saving options for you monitor by using the Power Options in Control Panel. Select to turn off your monitor anywhere from 1 minute to 5 hours when not in use.

Many of us like to have the screen saver display our vacation photos, fancy graphics, sports logos, but that actually consumes quite a bit of electricity to display because it requires the hard drive, video card and monitor to continuously consume electricity. If you want to save your screen and save power, set your screen saver option to "None" or "Blank" instead of anything that displays images.

Keep it digital! The popularity of digital music downloads has reduced the number of CDs manufactured by the music industry. Using an iPod or MP3 players instead of burning a CD reduces waste.

Numerous reports can be printed to a PDF file for future reference saving paper usage, toner cartridges and storage space.

Dispose of electronic equipment properly by using local recycling programs as the toxic waste in all electronics is substantial.

Internet Explorer History Search

Have you spent time searching for information on the web and after following several links, finally found the data you are looking for? Then you accidentally close the wrong tab and didn't pay any attention to the link where you found the information? This can be very time consuming but there is a way to find out all of the links you opened in one particular day, week or weeks. There are two different ways to display the search history:

1) Open Internet Explorer --> Press CTRL+SHIFT+H

2) Open Internet Explorer --> Click on Tools --> Click on Toolbars --> Select History

There will be a pane on the left side of your screen that will allow you to select the history to search for today, each day of the current week, last week, 2 and 3 weeks ago. You can also Click on the down arrow to select to further define the search by date, by site visited, by most visited sites or by order visited today.

Please Ban In-Flight Cell Phones!

Say goodbye to one of the last remaining phone-free havens.

Emirates Airlines is outfitting its planes with technology that will allow passengers to use their mobile phones in flight. The system went into effect for the first time this week on an Airbus A340 flight between Dubai and Casablanca. Emirates is partnering on the project with AeroMobile, which has developed technology that allows cellular phones to work at a low-enough level that they don't risk interfering with a plane's other systems. Emirates is shelling out $27 million to roll the system out fleetwide.

Perhaps hoping to allay passenger fears about being stuck next to a cell phone-wielding Chatty Charlie on a 13-hour flight to Tokyo, Emirates says passengers will only be allowed to make five or six calls per flight. And they point out that flight crews will have the power to turn the system on and off as needed, making it less likely that the woman sitting in 26D is able to initiate a conference call at 3 in the morning. Plus, the airline will ask all passengers to switch their phones to silent or vibrate when they board. This is great because as you know, that works really well at the movies or in church!

The airlines have been threatening to do this for years. American Airlines has tested technology developed by Qualcomm, and Air France and bmi have also experimented with the in-flight calls.

Depending on your point of view, this is either a great step forward or just another reason to dread boarding an airplane.

Should You Defrag Flash Drives?

Defragging speeds up a regular hard drive because of the way it works. The drive head has to move back and forth to read different parts of fragmented files, which slows things down. So defragging (moving all the parts of each file to be contiguous to each other) speeds up access.

Flash drives work very differently. They don't have drive heads or other moving parts and they can access a fragmented file just as quickly as one that's all contiguous. What's more, if you defrag a flash drive, you'll shorten its life because flash memory can only do a certain number of writes before it wears out. That's why you shouldn't defrag flash drives.

Mindware Remote Off-Site Backup

Be prepared is no longer just a boy scout motto - it is a call to action in looking out for your company's future. Fires, floods, hurricanes, tornados, earth quakes and even terror attacks all factor in to the continuity of your business.

You have probably increased the amount of historical data that you store on your file server electronically. To remain competitive and grow, you will most likely continue to do so in the future. You are storing customer records, open invoices, invoice history, cash receipts history, customer special pricing, contact information, card files, ship to addresses, purchase orders, vendor information, production data, financial information, and on and on . . . . .

Can you place a call to someone for a copy of your data if you lost all of your information? Or if you wanted to sell your company, what would you company be worth without all of your financial information? How many customers and vendors would you lose if they knew you didn't have safe, valid and secure backups?

If you have BackupEdge software installed on your file server, you now have an option to backup to a state of the art facility in Phoenix, Arizona. The location is served by two different power grids, uninterruptible power supplies and backup generators. The charge is $25.00 per month for the first company and $10.00 per month for each additional company. Please call Mindware to sign up for this service as soon as possible!

New Mindware Mailing List

Mindware Corporation has had customers request a way to communicate with other users in order to share information about how they are using TOP for different reasons or what features they use to better server their business needs. This information can now be shared with other Mindware Marking Device customers and will help benefit others who may not be aware of the many TOP features and upgrades.

A mailing list for TOP Marking Device users has been established for this purpose and you can post to this list by sending your email to mdlist@mindwarecorp.com. Each month you will receive an email with your login information and password. If you want to change your password or unsubscribe from the list you can send your request to Mdlist-request@mindwarecorp.com with the word HELP in the subject or in the body of the email.

Normally, Mailman will remind you of your mindwarecorp.com mailing list password once every month, although you can disable this if you prefer. It will also include instructions on how to unsubscribe or change your account options. There is a button on your options page that will email your current password to you if you need a reminder.

The Dangers of File Sharing

In light of the recent $220,000 judgment of a Minnesota woman for using a music sharing program, the dangers continue to grow for those that continue to use such file sharing programs. There is now a legal precedent for the music and movie industry to come after Internet users who are engaging in that type of activity.

The company Napster is credited with starting the peer-to-peer file sharing process and was taken to court to settle judgments against them, but is now a legitimate service. But there are still many users out there that thinks it is ok to download copyrighted material. It has always been illegal to share such movies, music and software.

Another problem with downloading shared material is that the software usually comes with spyware and adware and can damage your computer with viruses, worms and other malicious software. They can cause your computer and the Internet to run slower.

You should begin to check your desktop for unused icons and remove any that you are not familiar with. Click on the Start button and select All Programs and view the programs for items that you did not install. You can remove any of them by using the Add/Remove program section in Control Panel. If you find any of the P2P file sharing software installed on your PC, you need to run a scan on your computer for viruses, adware and spyware.

Once your feel like your computer is clean, make sure your employees or household members understand the legal, financial and infected computer consequences of using these kinds of programs.