Industrial and Financial IFS : Great Tips for using IFS Applications you might not know

Warning: Liveblogging. Prone to error, inaccuracy and terrible crimes against grammar and syntax. Post will be updated and improved over the next 48 hours.

IFS Presales Manager (UK)

Too often when you use IFS, you forget things you used to know, because you don't use them day-to-day. Here are some of my best tips. If you learn one new thing from this, then share those tips with your colleagues.

Broadcast Messages

This is the ability to show all users a message they see when they login. It's set up in the Solution Manager, and the user has to cancel out of it. It's a great way to warn people about backups - or link them to a webpage.

Displaying Text

In System options, you can change you text options to a more visible color - this is great for screen shots. It can make information sing more clearly.

Numeric Field Calculations

In every numeric field you can do calculations - just use the standard operator notation: + - / *.

Context Pane

It's a line along the bottom with useful information - you can customize and resequence it. Right hand click and a contextual menu item allows you to edit it.

Direct E-mail from an Output Channel

Only any IFS overview table, you can configure an output channel to send your highlighted lines as an e-mail. Useful if you're on the phone, and you want to send something to a college. This is true of any table anywhere in the system

Send a meeting request from an Output Channel

Again, just configure an Output Channel to point to your office tool, like Outlook.

Object Connections Attachments

Every form you have in IFS can be made object aware. The setup is form specific, and the objects you can attach will be determined by the versions you are running. Applications 9 has a huge variety of options.

Object Connections Transformations

A very neat feature - and one that was influenced by customers. Set it up in System Setup. You can link a document in one place, but make it visible in many other connections. If you use Document Manager properly, that means everyone always has access to the latest version.

Search Tips

(formerly Query)

Most users want 'Match Case' turned off by default when they search. Since Apps 8 that can be done in System Parameters. There are two levels of search - form and enterprise:

• You can open a form automatically with a specific search.
• When you open a list of values, you can set the system to show a specific search.
• You can use a prompt rather than just opening a form.
• You can share a search with other users.
• Search hints show you the 'bad' column for search - the ones that take a long time to search.
• You can open a chart straight from a saved search.
• You can auto-populate a list of values (LoV) - using saved advanced searches.
• Using prompts can make data entry much easier in search.
• Search using Control K - it will show you every part (say) that starts with what you just control-k-ed on.

Enterprise search was completely redesigned in Applications 9. You can group together search domains now.