From the IT Director - Bluecat

I was reading a job posting for 'Senior System Administratoron linkedin from a IT director of Bluecat. Unfortunately (for them) that my skill set doesn't fit for this job, but I personally would love to work in that kinda environment.

Here is the posting at http://www.linkedin.com/jobs?viewJob=&jobId=6156956&goback=%2Enmp_*1_*1_*1_*1_*1_*1_*1_*1_*1_*1&trk=rj_nus

From the IT Director:

This is a message from the most interesting IT Director in the World! That is right, my job is so interesting that astronauts want to quit their jobs to come work with me and I congratulate you for wanting to do the same!

As my future colleague I expect you to be at least as innovative as Martha Stewarts’ cat toys and as interesting as flame broiled ostrich steak with blue Cheese sauce.

For those interested in business cards with their role, people in love with their qualifications and a set way of doing things, this isn’t the place for you. We crave your creativity and we expect you to be unique.

It is hard work with a potential for long hours, however it is an environment that you will own. You will be Bluecat IT. Your creativity and resolve to see problems as opportunities and your willingness to keep the lights on will allow you to engage in projects many dream off with a market leader in its field.

Labels

Label (bar code) printers are usually slow and depending upon your network may be error prone. iVP CMS  majority of the clients uses a software called 'Label View'. Here is the tip. Let's suppose you need to print 4 copies of a label. Instead of sending 4 copies of label from CMS to label printer, you can configure CMS so that you send only one copy of the label with the instruction to printer to print it 4 times.

Pushing demand from 866 to 862 to sales order

ILVS sequential orders are transmitted via 866 document and shipping demand is transmitted via 862 document in EDI. 866 is about packaging racks in sequential order a.k.a blend numbers . Demand should be received through 862. What if you are dealing with a trading partner who is hitting you  with  'over zealous' 866 where you are being asked to package more than the demand you have received through 862?  iVP CMS being the intensive supply chain software has the functionality to push the extra 'demand' from 866 to 862 to sales order. This functionality is not turned on by default. It can be turned on by configuring your trading partner.

Finite scheduling for repetitive with multiple routing (router)

If you are a repetitive environment with multiple routings and are using finite scheduling then you must turn on material constraint as inter dependency of routing on each other in repetitive environment is determined through material constraints.

iPod Touch

My daughter who is a 7th grader was pushing for iPod touch. I and my wife being a stone age generation (remember email?  were resisting. At last caved in and she got her iPod Touch. My wife also liked it and mused about having iPhone for herself. I also liked it. She asked me what did you like about it? To which I responded.

Turn on, Turn off at my own will. What else a married man wants?

Contractual Services a.k.a Outside Service and freight

It is always tricky to setup contractual services in an ERP system. It somehow falls between purchasing and production and a compromise is required to decide whether business requirements will be forwarded to purchasing module or production module of the software. Imagine a scenario where you are shipping materials and expecting finished good back from your vendor and you have to calculate freight. How would you calculate weight of the shipment? Part (finished good)  is not there but usually weight is calculated based on part on the BOL. iVP CMS can be configured to use 'material part' for this scenario by using plant part master flag 'Use Label Quantity as BOL Part Weight if Label Unit Equals to BOL Weight Unit'

Repetitive Scheduling per shift

iVP CMS repetitive scheduler is enhanced to enable whiteboard repetittive scheduler to select a specific shift for scheduling.

iVP CMS MRP Book

I have written a book on MRP for iVP CMS. This book describes configuring MRP, fine tuning,  troubleshooting etc. Unfortunately the book was not published. However I will be posting many tips from my book on this blog.

Let's have a fight.

If two people fight who is gonna win? Wife of-course (and no this is not from personal experience.) If production scheduler fights with accountant about setting production run rates vs cost run rates who is gonna win? Well in case of  iVP CMS ERP both. Accountant can use 'Schedule run standard' for costing and production manager can use 'Production run rate' for scheduling. I know from my experience that some users use very high production run rate to accomplish zero costing but in my opinion this is not a good way of setting up the system. This works just because of rounding, and this is not a documented feature. As a matter of fact I am not sure who knows about it. What if a program change increase a variable length and instead of zero cost you start getting a different cost? Why not use production vs schedule run rate?

Push baby push

Push systems are represented by MRP. Pull systems are represented by KANBAN. 'Going forward by moving backward is how one author described a pull system.'   Also as per author 'Gerald Najarian' 'They are the heart of a synchronized factory.  They permit synchronization by working backward through signals or triggers which cause production events to happen.  The experience of backward motion starts at the finished goods warehouse or shipping area and signals the previous operation - final assembly - when more finished goods are needed.'

In iVP CMS ERP , RAN (Release Authorization) and KANBAN works almost the same way. If you are receiving demands associated with KANBAN then make sure that trading partner master table is configured so that trading partner is enabled to 'Use Pull System.' This will signal iVP CMS that trading partner is using KANBAN and it is not under RAN control. This will allow iVP to accurately control which KANBANs are shipped and which are still outstanding.

Introduction: Hello, My name is Junaid Shamim and this blog is about wonderful ERP software called CMS also known as EPICOR CMS IVP for discrete manufacturing specially for automotive suppliers. I am associated with CMS for more than 15 years and during my 15 years association with this wonderful software I have accumulated enormous wealth of knowledge which I would like to share with the iVP user's community.

This is my personal blog which is not affiliated with EPICOR. All views expressed here are mine only.

This blog will not go without a humor touch.

Production Scheduling

The top most way of scheduling production is manual scheduling also called 'Fixed' or 'Set' requirements. After running MRP and finite critical jobs can be 'fixed' or 'set' so that subsequent run of MRP and finite don't move them around.

ILVS Inline Vehicle Sequencing

Many OEM manufactures GM , Toyota, Ford uses ILVS a.k.a In Line Vehicle Sequencing. One exception is Honda who doesn't use traditional IVLS but they have their own way of handling sequencing. Traditionaly EDI document 866 was used by OEM to communicate to their suppliers. However  many are moved towards  'broadcast' system instead of using traditional EDI. ILVS is all about packaging racks (containers).

Let's suppose a car manufacture will be making a red and then a blue car and you are a supplier of bumper. Using ILVS it can be communicated that when an assembler at OEM opens a container while assembling a red care the bumper at the top of rack should be red and the second bumper should be blue i.e. even a color blind person can assemble color bumpers using the ILVS methodology. 

Sending EDI documents to multiple trading partners

iVP CMS interface with EDI (GXS Trusted Link for ISeries TLi) has a feature called 'distribution list'. Using this feature a carbon copy of an EDI outbound transaction can be sent to multiple trading partner. This feature is not available with GXS Trusted Link for Windows - TLW interface. Sometime it is required to send a BOL (Bill of Lading) to a carrier and to actual trading partner. TLW users can accomplish this for their ASN for up to 2 trading partners by configuring a 204 in the system. 

Production orders created by voiding a production, by default will not be purged by MRP  in CMS . To authorize MRP to purge repetitive requirements generated by voiding a production PDMN23/1, F6=Options, 'Allow to clear repetitive planned schedules that  were created from voided repetitive production' must be enabled.