Adminsoft Help Library
Contents
New Users and Evaluation
Existing Users
Technical Issues
Introduction
This is a small reference library of important information and FAQs
(frequently asked questions) that should assistance you to install and use the software.
We apologise that it is very limited at present, but we will add to it over time.
Evaluation Resources
For your convenience, we have provided some evaluation resources, that give
you a very basic overview of the software, and an idea of what some of the
screens look like. These are much quicker to download than the software
itself.
(Click here to view evaluation resources)
Assistance with Installation
Installation is normally very straight forward. Instructions are
provided on the "Download" page. In the event of you
encountering difficulties, or if you want additional information before
commencing installation, we have provided some extra material together with some
of the quirks we have discovered with various environments.
(Click here for assistance
with Installation)
Getting Started Resources
There is a "getting started" user sheet, and also an "Administrators Guide" which gives the
philosophies behind the software, and some helpful suggestions to maximize its
effectiveness for you.
(Click here to view Getting Started resources)
Backups and Restoring Data
We have provided a backup facility to make it easy to back up your GECL
data. For more information on this, and restoring data that you have
backed up, click on the following link:
(Click here for more information on Backup and Restore)
Overnight Re-Index
Our software supports a special "command line" call to rebuild all index
files for its data tables. For multi-user sites we recommend that you run
this every night. Single user sites should do it at least weekly (and it
never hurts to do it more frequently). It is very easy to set up Windows
Scheduler to get our software to do this automatically. You can do this on
a workstation that is left running overnight, or on the server itself, if it is
a Microsoft platform. If you have a Linux server, then you will need
to do this on a workstation that is left running overnight (unless you have very
good Windows emulation software on the server itself).
Set up Windows Scheduler to run the following command line (change "F:" to the
appropriate mapped network drive):
Run: F:\Adminsoft\GECL.exe Reindex
Start in: F:\Adminsoft
If you still have the old "\GECL" folder structure, then set up Windows Scheduler to run the following command line (change "F:" to the
appropriate mapped network drive):
Run: F:\GECL\GECL.exe Reindex
Start in: F:\GECL
Issues with Vista
So far we have discovered two issues with Vista:
- Our F1 context sensitive help does not display. You need to
download and install a small program file that Microsoft in their wisdom
decided to leave out of Vista. See
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/917607 and follow through to download
and install the necessary program. Note: Be careful which
version you download: Choose the 64 bit version only if you have 64
bit hardware - otherwise download the "86" version.
- Some installations of Vista cannot run our remote support facility,
others run it very slowly, while others run it perfectly. So far we haven't
found any way of overcoming this for those sites which experience either of
the two problems. (The suggestions
from the supplier of our remote support facility don't seem to help very much.)
Welcome to the wonderful new world of Vista (and of Microsoft's marketing
machine - which has talked many computer manufacturers into no longer
offering Windows XP as an option with their new products).
Disaster Planning
Provided your computer environment is set up appropriately to let key staff
run our software from home, you should be able to maintain continuity
of your accounts function, in the case of a pandemic or other natural disaster -
that does not knock out power and communications. (We wish the solution
for clearing the mail box and banking cheques was as easy.)
Our software runs fine in Terminal Services and Remote DeskTop environments through a VPN connection,
and we have several user sites who do this all the time to provide access from branch offices,
and / or to facilitate working from home.
It also works fine with Remote Assistance or VNC through a VPN.
Our Software runs really slow on one or more workstations
Assuming that you have sufficient RAM on the workstation concerned, usually the culprit
will be your anti-virus software. We have found that
e-Trust and Norton can be particularly bad for this. If this problem
occurs, change the anti-virus settings for the workstation(s) concerned, so that
your anti-virus software doesn't check files with extensions of DBF, FPT, or CDX
(or any files at all in the \GECL folder structure on your server - and
c:\GECLUser folder on the local workstation). It is fairly safe
to do this, as worms/viruses will not attach themselves to non-executable data files,
and are highly unlikely to know about the \GECL and \GECLUser folder structures, and install
themselves into these anyway. However, for safety reasons, we would not encourage you to disable scanning
of all files in the entire \GECL folder structure if you are not encountering any
such performance problems.
Note that we use Eset "Nod32" and "SmartSecurity Suite" here ourselves, and have not encountered any such
problems (or heard of anyone who is using Eset products having such problems). We
cannot sing the praises of Nod32 and SmartSecurity enough. They are both very fast and have a small
footprint (especially compared with something like Norton which is grossly obese
in comparison with the poor performance to match). Eset has some very
clever heuristics which enable it to identify many new viruses even before they
have been included in the signature pattern list. It always wins the
"fly-offs" that are done by independent researchers like "Virus Bulletin": being
the fastest in the scan speed tests, and the best at both identifying new test
viruses and not issuing false positives. So we would encourage you to
seriously consider switching to it, when it is time to next renew your
anti-virus licences.
Low-level system problems (OLE errors etc.)
On rare occasions, some low-level system files do not install correctly.
This typically causes "OLE Errors" when you try to perform operations that
use these low-level files (e.g. sending email and print preview of reports).
These errors may occur on one (or more) workstations, but not on others.
We have provided a separate installation program to help get
past this sort of problem.
(Click here for assistance with low-level installation problems)
Problems with Print Preview
The report may seem to run correctly, but you get hieroglyphics when it is
displayed on the screen. Alternatively, you may get a systems error in
some shape or form, complaining about "OLE". Both problems are
caused by a system file not having been registered correctly, or a previous
entry in the Windows Registry having been lost for some reason. You may
find that reports will work perfectly if you send them directly to the printer,
but fail every time if you try to use Print Preview. For assistance to
overcome either problem, click on the following link:
(Click here for more information on Print Preview problems)
If you need further assistance or have feedback you would like to give us,
please contact our Help-Desk:
E-Mail now to: Support@Adminsoft.com
Phone: (09) 262 2010, Fax: (09) 262 2021 (within New Zealand)
(From overseas +64 9 262 2010 or +64 9 262 2021)
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