SMS Scheduled Housekeeper
Scheduled Housekeeper : An Introduction
The Scheduled Housekeeper is a new standalone package from SMS to maintain and improve the performance of its Sapphire Manufacturing software as well as that of Sage Line 100. This application automatically performs tasks on the system to a user-defined schedule. The Housekeeper has been written in Microsoft .NET to take advantage of the latest available technologies. As the application is service based it can run without leaving users logged in to the machine. The application is installed on a single PC, where the Service is set to run automatically. After a successful beta programme Version 2 of the "Housekeeper" has just been released.
The type of tasks which can be run by the Housekeeper can be split into two categories; System Tasks, and Data Set Specific Tasks. System tasks are non-dataset specific tasks such as catalogue rebuild which affect the whole of the system independent of dataset. Data Set Specific Tasks as the name suggests can be targeted against specific datasets.
This application allows the integration of disparate tasks allowing system administrators to make the most of valuable down time at night. Please see a list of the tasks below. Most of these tasks can be performed manually by a system administrator, however the Housekeeper never forgets and it never goes on holiday. SMS will advise on the schedules to be used in consultation with the client, and then carry out the configuration, to ensure that data integrity is maintained.
1. Rebuild data catalogue
Sage Line 100 maintains a catalogue of all the files that are present within the system. Quite often when upgrades are performed the catalogue is not updated. This becomes a problem when adding options to user's menus, Line 100 will not recognise the Schema File Name and instead prompts for the DOS Name. By rebuilding the catalogue you can ensure that these problems do not occur. It is very important that this event runs successfully as the software is effectively highly unstable with a broken data catalogue (which is why it is a critical event).
2. Reindex All
Each data files in Sage Line 100 and Sapphire Manufacturing has at least one index (apart from direct access data files). These indexes are maintained by various programs within the software. Having index integrity is vital to the system as the indexes are used to find records. This program is used to rebuild an index when an index has become corrupt. In order to rebuild an index all users should be logged out of the related part of the software (otherwise waiting messages can occur). That is why this is a perfect program to be running as a scheduled event when all system users are effectively offline. This option rebuilds all the indexes for the most important files within the system.
3. Cost BOMs
Sapphire Manufacturing has a facility to show information regarding costing of a Bill of Materials. This event runs the program in All BOM mode (as it is to be run over night). Quantity breaks will be assumed to be default. This event will not run by default (until it is changed if desired) as this program can have potentially disastrous consequences for particular business models. Parameters:- Raw Materials Costing Method, Purchase Assemblies Costing Method , Update Standard Costs (Y/N)
4. Clear Active Users
Under certain circumstances users crashing out of Line 100/SMS Sapphire Manufacturing can leave locks on the files that the system uses to maintain the number of users logged into the software. Even if users happen to leave themselves logged into the software, no harm should come to the data by running this event. If any tasks need to be performed, then they can be set up to be run through the Scheduled Housekeeper. Care needs to be taken that this event does not clash with the Exporter as it could potentially cause it to fall over. This event deletes smsnamt*.* and logon.rnd out of the dataset.
