Happy New Year!
We certainly hope that 2006 is a great year for you all. We have great plans for the coming year and we certainly hope they will be as exciting for you as for us.

The first thing you will notice is that, unlike all previous issues for the past eight years (and for 10 years before that when we had combined newsletters for all our products) this issue is being delivered on a Monday. We finally (duh!) realised that, due to the time difference, at least half of you weren't getting around to see this until the following Monday so we figured, why not take the extra time to put more stuff into each action-packed issue.

The second thing you will notice is that, once again we have begun to talk about a new version of SAFE. Yep it's true. Like taxes and a new season of American Idol, it's inevitable. What will SAFE8 look like? Well, not much different from SAFE7. The big difference is that under the hood, SAFE is being re-written to take advantage of the new releases of Microsoft SQL Server and the open source MySQL. Both are showing their first new versions in five years so a lot has changed. Why should you care about an engine that you almost never interact with? This issue will hopefully answer that burning question and 'incentivise' you to upgrade your database when you upgrade SAFE.

Also, thanks also for your consideration during Christmas Week. Despite rumours to the contrary, Christmas week is not a chance for us to slip off to the Bahamas. What it is,  rather, is an intense period of concentration since, for some of us, it is our first look at The Big Picture of any new SAFE release. Of course, each of us has looked at or worked on various bits, but the past week was an opportunity to see how it all fits together and to come up with a teaching plan so that we not only understand it's inner workings ourselves, but can explain it effectively to our user-base. So in a very real way, this is our most important week of the year and your patience benefits all of us greatly.
 

SQL Server 2005 Key To SAFE/8 (Go Get It Now!)
Microsoft's first upgrade to SQL Server in five long years is finally here and fully baked. It is jam packed with new features of interest to companies of all sizes. It comes in several different flavours, which we'll discuss in a moment, but first here are the benefits that all adopters will gain:

Speed!
The basic design of the engine has been re-done with an emphasis on executing various queries much faster. There are two emphases:

A new optimiser that fare more efficiently guesses the fastest way to gather data. This will benefit all users, especially when you are doing complex Queries in SAFE, or sorting a browse on an infrequently used column.

A new load balancer is way, way, way, way better at handling requests from multiple users. In previous versions of SQL Server, let's say that Fred started a complicated Query. SQL Server would devote all it's resources to that task. But if poor Brenda and Merv tried to start some sales orders while Fred's report was building, they very well could see their system slow down. SQL Server 2005 now very nicely balances these requests. In this scenario, as soon as SQL2005 sees Brenda and Merv start transactions, resources from Fred's report would be borrowed just enough to make Brenda and Merv's requests perform acceptably. The great thing about this is that, the more users you have, the more benefit you'll derive.

Different Flavours
There are four different versions of SQL2005. The vast majority of you will be concerned with three:

• Express
• Workgroup
• Standard

Express is free, Free, FREE! and will be used by smaller offices that are now using MSDE. The good news is that the maximum database size has been doubled from two to four gigabytes, so if you were starting to think you'd have to actually pay for SQL Server licences, this buys you some time--although there are some great reasons to get Workgroup or Standard anyway. Unfortunately, it is limited to one CPU and that means that it will not support the newer dual core processors.

Workgroup breaks out from the database size limitation of Express so it is appropriate for most of our small to medium sized customers. It supports two CPUs per server, so it makes the most of dual core CPUs. It also includes much better support (faster, more secure) for web based applications such as Ollie and WebSAFE. Plus it includes some very nice end user features such the new Report Builder.

Standard is the right choice for most of our mid-size to large customers. It gives you all that Workgroup does, plus...

• Support for 4 CPUs, more memory and 64 bit applications
• Easy import/export of data to other applications
• Database Mirroring and Snapshots (very cool!)
• Built-in Business Analysis

Features? We've Got Features
In addition to better performance, SQL2005 has quite a number of new features that will be useful to business of all sizes. Here is an overview of the main ones in which you'll be most interested:

Pivots
In all editions of SQL2005, you will be able to pivot data, as you can in Excel. For example, let's say you have an Employee Monthly Summary Report in SAFE like so...

A new Pivot option to various reports will let you instantly re-generate the same report to look like this...

This is far more than just a cosmetic device. Essentially now, any column in a report can immediately become a group with a subtotal without having to design a new report or save a Query. We'll be having articles on this new feature alone in upcoming issues.

Report Builder
Many of you started using Reporting Services in SAFE7. Or rather, you started using reports that we created for you which ran on Reporting Services in SQL2k. Many of you love the cool look of Reporting Services reports (especially your clients) and everyone loves how fast they run. On the other hand, very few of you had the courage to seek out a third party report writer and write your own reports. Well, if you get Workgroup or Standard Edition, you now get the included Report Builder and it's a doozy. It's packed with slick, slick features (like the ability to click on any report group and instantly display or hide details!), graphs and charts. If you are comfortable with the SAFE ReportWriter, or have any experience creating reports in Excel, you'll be a whiz with the new MS Report Builder.

Snapshots
Standard Edition has the ability to store a snapshot of your database at any moment in time, while users continue to work, and then almost instantly restore it for individual users at any later time. Snapshots are small so they don't take up nearly as much disk space as you might think. And users who work on a snapshot can have their edits flow through to the current data! In other words, you can have a user make changes based on a prior snapshot and then update the current version of SAFE while users work! Best of all, SAFE8 supports these snapshots directly. This will allow for almost fool-proof backup and restoration of data. If you discover mistakes that are days or even months old, you can correct them, simply by loading a snapshot from the previous known 'good' state and having SAFE automatically roll that change into the current data! Finally, you'll be able to have a complete audit trail at any point in time, even if data has been deleted---the deleted data remains in prior snapshots.

Built-In Mirroring
Standard Edition also features the ability to mirror data between two computers automatically--no additional software required. That means that SQL Server will instantly recover from data loss by immediately switching over to the mirrored hard disk in the event that the primary drive fails.

Notifications
If you haven't used them before, Notifications are tools where the database sends out a message based on various events. Notifications can be a pop-up message on screen, an e-mail, a page, or even a phone message using a compatible PBS. SQL2000 had some notification ability built-in, but not much---it was largely confined to paging someone or sending an e-mail if there was a catastrophic failure in the database. In SQL2005, notifications can be sent out based on just about any condition. For example, you could trigger a Notification if a customer has exceeded their credit limit, or if a particular SAFE user is attempting to update a particular table (or at an an unusual time of day.)

SQL2005 Notifications are intimately linked into SAFE8 and are comprehensive. Virtually any event that affects the database can now be monitored in Translog even if the event occurred outside of SAFE! For example, if someone attempts to access the database for any reason not through SAFE, you can get a notification e-mailed to you immediately. If someone is using SAFE outside of a certain date/time? You get a notification. If a customer attempts to place an order in Ollie for an item they have never ordered before? You can get a notification. If you can think up a rule, you can now monitor it in Translog and get an instant Notification from SQL Server. We provide the front-end through Translog---Notifications are set up using a system very similar to the current Query Manager. Here are a couple of examples of scripts you can create in SAFE to trigger Notifications:

Example #1
Procedure = 'GenerateOnePO' Combine='AND'
Field = 'VendorID' Operator = '=' Value = 'DATATEL' Combine='AND'
Field = 'POAmount' Operator = '>=' Value=1000
Message = 'A PO has been generated by ' & GLO:EmployeeID & ' which exceeds $1,000.'
SecurityID=1
Notify=1

...Send a notification to all members of Security Group 1 (Admins perhaps?) if someone in your office prints a P.O. using Vendor 'DATATEL' above $1,000.

Example #2
Procedure = 'Non-Simple Accounting'
Event = 'Any'
Time = 'Any'
Message = 'An update to your database has taken place outside of SAFE.'
SecurityID=1
Notify=1

...Send a notification to all members of Security Group 1 (Admins perhaps?) if there is an attempted update to your database that did not come from SAFE.

Head Spinning?
Hopefully not. Yeah, there's a lot of techno-gobbledygook in there, but it all boils down to these four main improvements:

• Much faster response times
• More security and awareness using Notifications
• Better output using the new Report Builder and Pivot feature
• More flexible data management and recovery using the new Snapshots and Mirroring

Do I Have To?
Of course, the first question amongst you hard-nosed, cost conscious, don't fix it if it ain't broke types will be 'do I gotta get SQL 2005?' Nope. You do not. SAFE8 will be 100% compatible with good old SQL2k. But, frankly? As impartial bystanders---who have nothing to gain financially from your decision, you'd be foolish to not give a hard look at SQL2005. It has so many upsides, and the upgrade costs are quite reasonable (actually free if you've been using MSDE!). Oh and by the way, we've been using SQL2005, first in beta for over two years, and now with the shipping version for three months, and it has never, we mean never hiccoughed. Not once. And the toughest part about upgrading? Typing in the 25 digit validation code. It really was a no-brainer.

Where Can I Learn More?
Well, first of all, we'll be having lots more discussions on SQL2005 in the months ahead as we roll out SAFE8. In the meantime, a great place to send the propellorheads in your company might be: http://www.microsoft.com/sql/default.mspx where there is a plethora of info on the various editions, examples of benefits, costs, and how to upgrade. If you need even more? Just drop us a note, of course.

Til Next Time!
 

Ciaran's Corner: The New Incentive Program
I've been training SAFE Users for over fifteen years. No, not at customer sites. Most of you have never had the unique joy of hearing my limpid voice drone on about 'order entry'. What I've been training y'all to do (or at least attempting to do) is to report bugs/problems/anomalies/things that go bump in the night in the way that makes it easiest for us to address. And I confess to you, my brothers and sisters, that I don't do a very good job.

I say that, because, we still get an amazing number of calls/notes from customers reporting a problem who happen to mention another problem just in passing. Typically, this will be expressed in some fashion as, "Oh, that? I dunno. I think that started after the last <program update/power outage/server upgrade/whatever>. We just work around it by...

I want you to imagine the look on our faces when we read something like the above. Forget eye colour, hair colour, weight, height. Just think of a cross between Kirk Douglas or Charleton Heston in Planet Of The Apes with teeth gritted and veins on necks bulging. In short, we hate reading that stuff.

There are lots of reasons why users don't always report problems and I only have so much time to rant today so I'll skip the why and cut to the chase. I want to encourage you to report problems. And by God, I'm willing to pay to if I have to. So...

As part of our Annual Customer Appreciation Discount, I am willing to pay you to report bugs. That's right. I'm going to pay people cash, greenbacks, shekels, lettuce, Jacksons. And not 'companies', I mean people.

I'll pay anyone five bucks to report a site specifc bug---something that isn't working properly at your site that should at least be caught by SAFE (no error message, for example). I'll double that and pay $10 to anyone who reports a verifiable program bug (something that would affect all SAFE users everywhere.) And for those? I don't even care if you're the first or the fiftieth person to report the same damned bug; if it's verifiable---you get paid, until we issue an update or patch. (If you report the bug after we issue a fix, you get bupkus.)

Why?
Three reasons:

1. Good PR. We want you to understand how much we want to get this stuff straightened out. Contrary to various conspiracy theories, we want to get every problem resolved. Fast. I know that many of you have never heard of a software company admitting that a product has bugs, but let's face it: they all do. No large program is perfect. From what I can see, we're better than anyone else in our industry and we see no harm in being straight up about flaws.

You see, we view SAFE more as an office building, and ourselves as real-estate developers. You guys are our tenants. Ever been in a building that was perfect or that didn't require periodic maintenance? Me either. They're just too complicated. So we try to be responsive landlords. And showing a willingness to fix a leaky faucet is just part of being good landlords.

2. More moolah. It doesn't make sense to leave problems uncorrected. It costs everyone money. The faster we get problems resolved, the more attention we can pay to creating products for which we can charge $$$.

3. There really is very little cost for us. There simply aren't that many legitimate bugs in SAFE; certainly not enough where these payouts would impact the bottom line. If we make even one customer feel like we care that didn't---hey it's the best ad money we could ever spend.

Procedure?
Just do what you've been doing (Next time I'll have another rant on how to most effectively communicate problems.) But for now, the main thing is to tell us who you are so you can get the dough and not Francine over in Accounts Payable or Ed the Owner/Sales Manager who already has enough money to go to Barbados every year. Forget Ed! Think of yourself!

In May, when we announce our Annual Discount for year twenty one, we'll send everyone who contributed a list of their reported bugs and, more importantly, a check.

But Wait There's More?
The person with the highest overall score will receive a fabulous Grand Prize which is so fabulous I haven't figured out what it is yet. But I've got five months to think it over and let me assure you right now that it will definitely be better than a set of steak knives! (OK, I'm not the most creative guy in the world, fine.) If you have suggestions on the Grand Prize, please do send them along.

Til Next Time!

Ciarān Marron
Technical Support Manager
cm@suntowersystems.com

THIS DOCUMENT IS PROVIDED FOR INFORMATIONAL PURPOSES ONLY. The information contained in this document represents the current view of Suntower Systems on the issues discussed as of the date of publication. Because Suntower Systems must respond to change in market conditions, it should not be interpreted to be a commitment on the part of Suntower Systems and Suntower Systems cannot guarantee the accuracy of any information presented after the date of publication. INFORMATION PROVIDED IN THIS DOCUMENT IS PROVIDED 'AS IS' WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EITHER EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND FREEDOM FROM INFRINGEMENT. The user assumes the entire risk as to the accuracy and the use of this document. This document may be copied and distributed subject to the following conditions:
1. All text must be copied without modification and all pages must be included.
2. All copies must contain Suntower Systems' copyright notice and any other notices
    provided therein
3. This document may not be distributed for profit.

End of E-News From The Suntower, Volume VIII #1