I suggest you buy a copy of the AUDITOR's HANDBOOK or GUIDE to BPCS.
Here is link to some sample pages.
http://www.unbeatenpathintl.com/8menu/source/1.htm
You may be aware that every ERP has its quirks, strengths,
weaknesses. This is a guide to BPCS quirks, strengths, weaknesses, from
perspective of problems an auditor needs to be aware of. A big issue for
me has been that the general business world has some assumptions about
computers and ERP that are not always a good match to BPCS or 400
reality. These false assumptions can lead to data handling errors that
auditors need to get a heads up warning about, and a guide how to check on
that type of possibility's consequences.
While this manual is specifically for auditors, I feel that as an
accountant, you may have a lot in common from perspective of needing to
understand the overall system.
BPCS 2.1 is older than most people now use, but the look and feel of BPCS
evolves very slowly as new features get added, so most documentation for
later versions has a lot of relevance to earlier versions.
Each version of BPCS comes with extensive on-line documentation that
explains the whole system, including functionality and purpose of all the
fields. However, this documentation is extremely fragmented, usually
without standard organization ... you need to have the BPCS Guru at your
facility guide you to the documentation you need to refer to.
Ask that person about
* BPCS naming conventions ... which is the basis for navigating the whole
system
* function keys ... F1 navigation, F4 etc.
* accessing help text on programs without actually running the programs
* getting at list of BPCS files in use at your company, with title of file
function
* getting at layouts of files, with annotation of significance of
individual fields
You may need to get one of the manuals that lists the fields and their
functions.
There are several. They cost several hundred dollars each.
So long as you are on-line with the original BPCS data, as opposed to a
Microsoft copy, there are rich definitions of what each field contains,
thanks to DB/400 external definition architecture, and IBM cross-indexing
tools on the host platform.
For example, I use an IBM tool for software mining ... I can get a list of
all the programs that update a particular file.
IBM and Microsoft use different standards, such that it can be a royal pain
getting IBM data, in a useable form, to Microsoft tools using native
architectures.
There are several 3rd party products to streamline that process.
What we currently do at our facility, is use the rich data base reporting
tools from IBM to construct a report close to what the end user desires,
then we export that to Microsoft Excel or whatever. On the IBM side, the
data as been reconfigured to meet the less flexible and more limited
standards of the Microsoft tools we have.
For example, I have constructed what I call a General Ledger dump.
I use SQL/400 embedded in an RPG program to back track reference numbers in
GL to the original accounting invoices, and other sources, so that the GL
dump shows name of vendor or customer that this $ was due to, then the
whole thing ends up in an Excel spread sheet. We never print it, because
it is too wide to go on any IBM printer.
At the end of each fiscal month, we send our auditors the GL dump on all
Journal activity for the month just ended.
All,
This is a great forum. As an accountant I dontunderstand a lot of what
you guys are saying(too computer smart for me) but Im trying to learn
all I can about this system. It appears to be pretty old, so Im not
certain there is any info available for it any more.
Reading old posts I was able to configure the database for use with
Microsoft Query to enable some custom reporting. I can see the tables
and am successfully seeing data in excel via my queries. The table names
are not very friendly unfortunately. I have located some key tables for
my needs, but Im curious to see if there is an all encompassing list of
tables and their fields so I can determine where best to look to find
certain information. Im mostly interested in the following:
Inventory quantities, part #'s, values
AR & AP open transactions
General Ledger accounts, transactions
Any insight you could provide would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks,
Brian Brosch
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