The 3 Things EstesGroup Consultants want for Christmas:
Tis the season and along with everyone else out there your Epicor Consultant has a wishlist for Christmas as well. We hope everyone enjoys their holidays with friends and family and has a safe and Happy New Year. Thank you all for a fantastic 2014.
1. A good carry-on
Find me one that I can’t demolish in a year’s travel and can organize a week’s worth in a carry on.
2. Bigger Battery
Flights and airport time take up a lot of time and don’t have a lot of access to power outlets. How are they supposed to watch that movie?
3. Testimonials:
Who doesn’t like it when someone speaks highly about you? This is the biggest satisfaction point to any good consultant and they thrive on receiving high praise. This is their number one goal and the best thing is that means they have to do a bang up job for you to get there. Help them help you!
Now you know what your consultants want for Christmas. Sometimes it’s the little things that make a world of difference when you travel weekly. /epicor-consulting/epicor-ecommerce
No Hurt Feelings: Getting Over Getting Actively Refused in the Epicor System
“When you were called, did you answer or did you not? Perhaps softly and in a whisper?”
― Søren Kierkegaard, Fear and Trembling
Kierkegaard, the nineteenth century existential thinker, wrote at length of the internal struggle between the individual agent and his or her sense of existence. His philosophical work Fear and Trembling outlines the moral anxiety produced by choosing to live according to an absolute faith, in a world that provides no validation or verification. This has been commonly referred to as a leap of faith.
The Epicor System Doesn’t Hate You
With its logical foundations in propositional calculus and its physical manifestation in Silicon, one might not expect such angst to enter the realm of information technology. Nevertheless, anxieties flare more often than one might expect when implementing software such as ERP. For example, when I worked for an Epicor customer, users encountered the following login error with trepidation:
I never expected logging into the Epicor system to require a leap of faith, yet users found the message especially troublesome, and came to me in desperation, pleading that I restore their confidence in the application. The mere thought of being “actively refused” by the application server struck many new users as a surprising, almost personal, affront. “What did I do wrong?” they would anxiously ask me, “Did I make it mad?”
The error is really quite easy to explain and resolve without things getting personal. The system normally raises this error when the application server gets stopped, hung up or is otherwise unresponsive. It’s an error due to inactivity rather than activity. There is no angry ghost in the target machine, more of a sleepy doorman. System administrators normally resolve such a circumstance by simply restarting the AppServer. Once restarted, the AppServer can nowactively respond to login requests.
Moving On From Lost Connections
Have you ever felt actively refused? Do you fear the temporary loss of connection to the information you need? Has your AppServer ever made you tremble? Well, fear no more—the next time you receive this error when logging into the system, remind your system administrator of your existence with an email that includes the error message. And keep the faith.
Learn more Epicor consulting strategies that can improve your business:
Still Using Crystal Reports with Epicor 10? Here’s How to Keep Them Running
Are you still relying on Crystal Reports with Epicor 10? You’re not alone—and the good news is, you don’t have to give them up just yet.
While Epicor has moved toward SSRS (SQL Server Reporting Services) in its more modern platforms, many manufacturers and distributors using Epicor 10.2.700 and earlier still have dozens (or even hundreds) of customized Crystal Reports that are business-critical. If you’re not ready to convert everything to SSRS, this guide will help you keep your existing Crystal Reports running smoothly.
5 Updated Steps to Keep Crystal Reports Working in Epicor 10
1. Set Up an ODBC User and DSN Connection
First, create a dedicated SQL user with read-only access to your Epicor database. Then, configure an ODBC System DSN (Data Source Name) on both the Epicor application server and any client machines that need to run or edit Crystal Reports. This connection enables Crystal to pull live data securely.
2. Re-enable Default Login Behavior for Reports
In later versions of Epicor 10, the “Use Default User and Password” option was quietly disabled in the report print screen. Thankfully, Epicor provides a SQL script to re-enable this option. This is critical—it prevents you from needing to manually enter SQL credentials every time you run a report.
3. Point Reports to the Right Database Tables and Views
Once connectivity is restored, update your existing .rpt files to point to the correct tables in your Epicor 10 database.
For standard fields, link directly to the relevant ERP tables.
For UDFs (User-Defined Fields), use the Epicor-generated views rather than the base tables, as UDFs are not always included in the physical schema.
4. Review and Clean Up Report Formulas
If you’re using a newer version of Crystal Reports (like Crystal 2016 or later), check for any formula errors due to syntax changes or deprecated functions. A quick cleanup here can prevent strange output or broken logic.
5. Update Menu Maintenance to Point to Your Server Path
Lastly, update the Menu Maintenance entries in Epicor to reflect the new server path for your Crystal Reports. This ensures that end users can launch the reports without errors or misdirected links.
Long-Term Strategy: Convert to SSRS (When You’re Ready)
Crystal Reports can still work in Epicor 10, but Epicor is phasing out support in future releases. If you’re planning a migration to Kinetic (Epicor 11), you’ll want to start converting your most important reports to SSRS soon.
Need Help with Crystal Reports or SSRS?
At EstesGroup, we’ve helped hundreds of companies manage and modernize their Epicor reporting strategy. Whether you need a temporary Crystal workaround or want to fully transition to SSRS, we can help you chart the best course forward.
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