If you have SAP B1 ERP implemented in your organization, you are probably already familiar with internal reports, queries, XL Reporter and in this small publication we would like to give highlights on Crystal Reports. Each reporting tool has its own pluses and drawbacks, and you should try multiple tools, if your reporting needs are broad: from Financial reporting (Trial Balance, Balance Sheet, Profit and Loss, Cash Flow Statement) to Operation reporting (Sales by Regions and Items, Sales Commission Report, Project Profitability to name a few examples), plus if you need industry forms, such as Bill of Ladings, Agent Settlement Report:
1. XL Reporter. This reporting tool is very end user friendly and if you are accountant, who is neither comfortable nor familiar with SQL scripting, this report should fit your needs. This report is deploys Microsoft Excel tools and it has VBA extension to MS Excel. However this reports design tool works with predefined SB1 objects: Business Partner, Account, Item, Price List and similar, and you are limited in building custom links. And this is understandable – if you need advanced links in your report, you will need SQL view or Stored procedure as the report base – you can achieve this goal in Crystal Report.
2. Crystal Reports. If you are discovering Crystal Reports design through report building wizard, then you should listen SAP BO training class either online or face-to-face. However if you are report developer and work in IT department, then you should go to SQL view or stored procedure scripting. Stored procedure is the most powerful tool and its parameters should be translated to Crystal Report parameter. Stored Procedure allows you to build temporary tables within its boundaries – this should resolve complex unionizing and build staging tables if required. Stored procedure should be able to build very complex report – try to design something like Sales project profitability, based on incurred cost in Purchase Order Processing, Production (working hours and possible overhead).
3. SQL Server Reporting Services or SRS. This tool is web based, which should give you certain advantages if your organization has regional offices and international presence. SRS in its suitability is pretty similar to Crystal Reports and it bases its reports on SQL Views or SQL Stored Procedures.
4. Industry Forms. If you are thinking which reporting tool to deploy and how, the hint is simple – these reports should depict only one document: Sales Invoice, Purchase Order, Vendor Invoice in the format, required by your industry regulation. You can use Crystal Report (which could be integrated in your SAP B1 interface) as well as SRS (if you want to enable these reporting over the web).
Lizard Labs Log Parser Lizard GUI manages your text-based log data and enhances information storage and search functionality.
Lizard Labs, developer of professional system utilities and software for Microsoft Windows, offers an easy new way to manage all your businesss text-based information. Log Parser Lizard is an enhanced query software that digs through information in files seamlessly and efficiently.
This Log Parser GUI for Microsoft Log Parser 2.2 is a versatile system tool that provides quick access to log files, XML files, CSV files, as well as key data sources on the Microsoft Windows operating system, such as the event log, IIS log, the registry, the file system, and the Active Directory services. Now, businesses running Log Parser can use this query software to find exactly what they need exactly when they need it.
I know first-hand how challenging it can be to dig through all text-based files to find one item or issue, said Dimce Kuzmanov, lead developer and found of Lizard Labs, Because the Microsoft Log Parser command-line interface isnt very intuitive, weve created Log Parser Lizard to enhance the search functionality and to manage queries.
Log Parser Lizard can export query results into Microsoft Excel documents, PDF, XPS, as well as compile information into charts. There are a lot of helpful examples included in the installation package to help you start using Log Parser Lizard as your query software, web log analyzer, system log analyzer and universal log viewer.
This query software is available for free from Lizard Labs, with an enhanced version with deeper functionality once it is registered and paid for. By trying Log Parser Lizard for free, youll see first-hand how easy it is to find needed information in your log files, XML files and CSV files. Youll no longer have to use an unintuitive interface to search, and your queries are stored for future use.
Users can download Log Parser Lizard GUI, and view the rest of Lizard Labs software product offerings, at http://www.lizard-labs.net
Budgeting is important to your family’s financial health. Those with strong budgets tend to have their lives in much better order financially. Slowly, no matter what kind of income you have, you’ll see your net worth increase as you stick to your plan.
But what if your plan is weak?
Following is 10 steps to help improve your budget:
1. Use Microsoft Excel- Don’t waste your money on expensive budgeting programs. You can have a budget that is just as effective using some type of spreadsheet (Excel or Google Spreadsheets work fine). Simply learning a few formulas online, you can create a fully-customizable budget that adds, subtracts, multiplies, and divides any figures you need.
2. Determine Your Net Income- Doing a budget off a gross income makes it more difficult to compute. Taxes will be taken out of your check each time and that money may never be realized until you get your tax return back for the year. Be sure to calculate off a net figure; in other words, how much do you bring home monthly/weekly AFTER tax? You’ll have a better grip on what money you actually have to work with each month this way.
3. Determine Your Fixed Costs- What sort of expenses can you expect each month that don’t change? These are fixed costs, and you should have a category for them so you can see what are solidified expenses that can’t be avoided. Typically, your fixed cost line doesn’t have any wiggle-room. It could be a car payment, home mortgage, or insurance expense; these don’t change month to month.
4. Know Your Variable Costs- A variable cost is one that tends to do just that- vary. This could be your grocery bill, entertainment fund, misc. fund, gift fund, etc… From month to month, these tend to be a bit more flexible; if you know you’re going to be tight for money one month, look to you list of variable costs to cut where you can.
5. Every Dollar Needs a Spot- Make sure that every dollar has a place to go. There shouldn’t be any money at the end of the month that doesn’t have a job. Categorize where all of your money will go. If you fail to do this, you’ll end up spending what extra money could be saved!
6. Set Goals- If you have no end goal, you’ll fail with a budget! Is there a new home you’d like to get your hands on in the next 2 or 3 years? Maybe it’s the car you’ve been dreaming about since you were young. Whatever the case may be, have a goal and let that be your motivation to stick to that budget. If not, you will fail!
7. Save Your Receipts- If you don’t save every receipt, you’ll find that remembering all of your expenses will be tough! After making a purchase, make sure that you not only get a receipt but have a ready spot to put it. That way, at the end of the night when you’re updating your budget, you won’t let any expense fall through the cracks.
8. Update Your Budget Daily- This one is a must! Make sure you don’t wait until the end of the month to track all of your money’s goings and comings. You’ll find that your results will be inaccurate; and if that’s the case, what’s the point of your budget?!
9. Evaluate Each Month- If you’ll take a good solid 30 minutes at the end of the month to go over what happened with your money, you’ll have the statistics to help you see strengths and weaknesses; those numbers promote change. Otherwise, you might find that you’ve spent a lot and you know you need to change, but you won’t be able to identify those areas that need it most.
10. Have A Leisure Fund; Have Some Fun- You’re budget should create a little room to have a little fun! Budgets tend to have a bad reputation because they are often too restrictive. Allow you and your spouse to have a little fun with that hard earned money! Lay aside x-amount of dollars for a “leisure fund” each month to help keep your sanity. After all, you have to have a little fun with your money, right?!
One of the really cool parts aspects of Microsoft Excel is the functions Microsoft has created for you to use. This means that rather than have to develop a function from scratch you can use pre-built ones to do a plethora of tasks like Building your own Mortgage Calculator. The Mortgage Calculator or PMT function is just one of many Financial Functions available.
Okay, so how to build a mortgage calculator…
The first thing we have to do is to start by setting up a few basic headings. So lets begin by starting a new workbook and clicking in the first cell A1. Enter into cell address A1 the heading – Monthly Loan Repayments. Next off, enter into cell address A2 – Amount of Loan, cell address A3 – Interest Rate, cell address A4 – Length of Loan and then in A6 – Monthly Repayment.
In example mortgage calculator, we will take the Loan Amount, Interest Rate and Length of Loan and calculate your Monthly Repayment. Okay so in the corresponding field B1 enter the value of $200,000 and make sure you format the field as a currency. In cell B2 enter a value of 9.25% and format the field as a percentage and then finally enter in a value for the Length of the Loan as 25. The value you enter into the Length of the Loan field is in years.
Now its time to create the formula that will do your calculation for the Monthly Repayment. The function we will use for this calculation is called the PMT function. The PMT function always returns a negative number so one of the things we will need to do is to convert it into a positive number, but a little on that later.
There are three arguments we will use for this formula and they are -
= PMT(Monthly Interest Rate, Number of Payments, Amount Borrowed)
So to work out the Monthly Interest Rate we simply take the value in B3 and divide it by 12 – B3/12. The PMT function works on the basic of the number of payments you are going to make, so if we are going to make monthly payments on our mortgage we simply take the number of years in cell B4 and multiply it by 12 – B4 *12.
This means that to calculate the Monthly Repayment for our mortgage we need to enter the following formula -
= PMT(B3/12, B4*12, B2)
Now as I said before, the PMT function always returns a negative value, so to turn this into a positive value we simply type the PMT function with the Absolute Function encapsulating it as shown below -
= ABS(PMT(B3/12,B4*12,B2))
Simply type the formula above into the cell B6 and press the enter key. You must now format the cell address B6 as a currency and you can do that by simply pressing the Dollar Symbol on the Formatting Toolbar. As soon as you enter the formula and press enter you should get a result of $1712.76. If you do not get this answer, simply go back and make sure that you have entered the formula correctly.
The cool part about this Mortgage Calculator is that you can go back and change any one of the values in B2, B3 and B4 which are the Loan Amount, Interest Rate and Length of Loan to work out what your monthly mortgage repayments will be.
The cool part about this simple tool is that it tells you really quickly whether borrowing massive amounts from the bank is worth it and whether you can really afford that mortgage. Why not check out what your repayments will be if your interest rate went up by 2 or 3%, it can be really interesting to see the impact on your budget.
Simple tools like this can save you thousands of dollars and can also help you see what changes interest rates will have on your own budget. It is certainly worthwhile building yourself a Budgeting Spreadsheet and the mortgage calculator to work out just what you really can afford especially in these uncertain times.
Fact: tracking your spending is essential to working your way to financial freedom. Everybody knows that your best defense against financial hardship is simply knowing how much money is coming in vs. how much is going out. You need to make sure you’re making more than you’re spending.
How?
Well- you can SPEND money to budget on programs like Quicken, Pearbudget, Mint, Mvelopes, or YNAB. Many can provide you with resourceful tools that will help you keep your finances in check; however, you actually have to spend more money to use them! Aren’t you creating a budget to save money?
Solution: Use Microsoft Excel or Google Spreadsheets to create a monthly budget for you!
Following are some of the advantages to making Microsoft Excel or Google Spreadsheets your official financial planner:
1. Costs Nothing – Microsoft Excel is a program that most of us own. And if you are one of the rare people that don’t have your own copy, don’t go out and buy it! You can easily do the exact same thing the an Excel spreadsheet will do with a Google Docs spreadsheet- and that’s for free! The fact is a spreadsheet’s capabilities can do virtually everything you need them to. Most of your fancy financial software programs will cost you hundreds of dollars in the long run. Seems a little funny that you’re going to spend your money on something that is going to save it. Be resourceful; use a spreadsheet.
2. Easy to Set up – Whether you’re using Microsoft Excel or Google Spreadsheet, you’re not going to have a hard time setting them up. In fact, if you’ll just learn a couple of quick formulas, you’ll easily be able to make your numbers automatically add up, multiply, subtract, and divide when and where you need them to.
3. Simple – In my experience using financial budgeting software, they just aren’t that simple! The first one I ever bought was Quicken, and I found that it did too much. All I needed was something that I could customize to build a budget that worked for me; Quicken complicated things to a point where I didn’t even want to use it. It was not user-friendly at all, and that’s what I needed when it came to a monthly personal budget. Pearbudget.com and Youneedabudget.com do a pretty good job to keep things simple and if you ever did decide to pay money for a monthly budget, that’s what I would recommend; however, using a free spreadsheet will save you the money period, and it’s just as simple to use.
4. Fully Customizable – Why not use a budgeting software that enables you to completely customize what you need?! Choose your own colors, categories, sizes, fonts, styles, and structures to fit what you need. After all, everybody is different and one standardized budgeting software isn’t going to work for all! Fit your budget to your needs.
In conclusion, my personal recommendation when it comes to organizing your money is either a Microsoft Excel budgeting spreadsheet or a Google Docs Spreadsheet. Don’t waste your money on buying budgeting software. You’re pocket book will thank you for choosing an alternative route- budgeting for free!