Friday, August 15, 2008
GrandView was originally developed for RoviSys to manage its projects more effectively. Good project management relies on good communications among team members. GrandView provides a common place where team members can post project status updates, maintain conference call notes and exchange files. There's no longer a need to clutter up your email and worry about how long you need to keep those files.
All of this customer information and communication is stored permanently, providing an unmatched mechanism for searching and storage of critical project parameters. Need to find a project you've done in the past involving Brand X? Just use the status log or project search in the Sidebar to find it. 
Financial information, such as hours, expenses, purchases and invoices, can all be viewed instantly by the project manager. Project task analysis can be used to see how the project is progressing based on estimated hours. Milestones and tasks can also be scheduled and viewed by team members to see how each task is progressing. Project information is seamlessly integrated into the Dashboard for easy access across projects.
GrandView Project Management features have helped RoviSys maintain an edge on our competitors by providing us with a solid framework to more efficiently run our projects, and ... it can do the same for you!
David Heater, GrandView Business Solutions Developer
Monday, July 21, 2008
Back in March, I attended Microsoft's "Heroes Happen {Here}" launch event in Cleveland, Ohio. Among the hype about Visual Studio 2008, ASP.NET AJAX, VSTO, and a slew of other geeky terms, there was very brief mention of a fairly well-known acronym: IE8. Yet the announcement of the upcoming release of Internet Explorer version 8, including the fact that it will be standards-compliant "out-of-the-box", struck me as one of the most important points of the day. How will the release of IE8 impact the way you view GrandView? When will IE8 be available? If it's automatically installed via Windows Update, will GrandView suddenly look wacky for no reason?
Unfortunately, we don't know exactly when IE8 will be officially released. We do know the first beta is currently available, and the second beta is supposedly to be expected in August. Upon asking a presenter at the launch event when IE8 would be released, I received the standard "sometime this year." I wouldn't be surprised if they package it as a Christmas gift.
As for how the release of IE8 will impact your viewing of GrandView, the good news is "not much." In recent years, we've been working hard to make GrandView more standards-compliant. Of course, we don't have 1,000+ people to do it like Microsoft, and we're not all the way there yet -- hence the concern that GrandView could look wacky in a standards-compliant IE8. Fortunately, this concern is alleviated by the IE team's "Don't Break the Web" implementation. Web pages designed to work with accepted W3C and CSS standards will work in IE8, but pages designed to work around previous IE "quirks" will still work, too. In my testing, GrandView looked pretty much the same in IE8 as it does in IE7; but you will have to run through our Web Client Software Requirements document (available from the Help link next to the company logo in GrandView) to make sure your IE8 settings are correct for GrandView.
IE8 boasts greater security, a redesigned Favorites bar, and two interesting new features, Activities and WebSlices. Activites provide quick access to useful web sites or functions. See the example using GrandView Contacts above, where right-clicking highlighted text allows you to instantly view a map of the selected address! WebSlices allow you to subscribe to just a portion of a web page (instead of the whole page as done with RSS) to receive notification when content is updated.
We're excited about the upcoming release of Internet Explorer 8 and will continue to keep you posted on any new developments that affect the way you use GrandView.
Jeromie Walters
GrandView Business Solutions Developer
Friday, July 11, 2008
As a company grows, its employees make vital connections. Protecting and nurturing these connections is important to the success of your company. To ensure your success, GrandView Contact Management helps you and your employees manage, share, and communicate with all of your company’s contacts.
The Contact Management module encourages employees to enter contact information with a simple and intuitive interface. Even better, as your base of contacts and companies grows GrandView Contact Management becomes even more powerful. It remembers company names and site details such as phone numbers and addresses. All of these features transform a normally laborious task that employees avoid into one that is quick and provides tangible benefit to your workers
What good is all that contact data if there’s no way to use it? Luckily GrandView Contact Management gives you practical ways to view and use your stored contacts. The Contacts dataview allows you to easily find contacts to view or edit their information. Need to remember to follow up with that sales lead next week? GrandView’s integrated reminder system will alarm you at whatever date you set. As you and your employees interact with a contact those calls, emails, and meetings can be recorded in a log tied specifically to that contact. The log also automatically records any changes to that contact’s information. This combination of information capture and retrieval will help your company to continually manage the network of connections that are essential to the growth and success of your business.
Jeff Eganhouse
GrandView Business Solutions Developer
Friday, June 06, 2008
The GrandView website is receiving a new domain name! To minimize impact, most pages will be redirected to the new domain. However. the biggest impact will be for GrandView customers that are hosted at RoviSys. Currently, most GrandView customers login from http://www.grandview2000.com but they will soon be redirected to http://www.grandviewbusinesssolutions.com. This redirection could cause script errors and prevent file downloads if you have the old domain in your pop-up blocker exceptions. In order to correct this, you'll want to add *.grandviewbusinesssolutions.com to your pop-up blocker exceptions. For more details on how to do this, see the GrandView Web Client software requirements document. Please use our online support feedback page or select another support option.
GrandView Support Team
Monday, May 12, 2008
Strong Password Requirement
As a measure to enhance GrandView user security, strong passwords will now be required. The following strong password rules will be applied:
- Password must be at least 6 characters long.
- Password must NOT contain username, last name, or first name.
- Password must use at least 3 of the following types of characters:
- Capital letters
- Lower case letters
- Numbers
- Symbols
- Passwords must NOT be the same as one of the last 3 passwords used.
Forgotten Username or Password
With the strong password requirement comes the possibility of forgetting your password. We've provided a automated method to retrieve your username or reset your password. If your login fails or you click on a "Forgot Password?" link, you will be able to enter the appropriate information associated with your GrandView user account (as seen below) to have your username and/or password sent to you. If the system cannot find a match with the information that you provided, you will have to notify your point of contact or GrandView Support to have your login information sent to you.
Changing Your Password and Expiration
You can change your password at any time after a successful login by clicking on the "Options" link (formerly "Tools") and clicking on the "Change Login" button. An account email address (one that you actively use) is also required to allow automated username retrieval and/or password reset to occur. Anytime a login change occurs, a confirmation email will be sent to you.
As an added security measure, passwords will expire after 3 months and GrandView will automatically prompt you for a new password after successful login when this occurs. Your new password cannot be one that was used in your last three passwords.
Getting Support If You Can't Login
Upon your first successful login after the security update, you will be prompted to change your password. An account email address (one that you actively use) is also required to allow automated username retrieval and/or password reset to occur. If you are unable to login, you can try to request a password reset as described above. User account email addresses are initially set to the default email address already stored in GrandView for employee and contact users. If the password reset request does not work, you have to notify your point of contact or GrandView Support to have your login information sent to you. Be prepared to provide user and additional information such as project ID, project manager, etc. to authenticate your user account.
The GrandView Support Team
Monday, April 28, 2008
Whether your company is large or small, capturing the knowledge and expertise of your employees is important for long-term growth. We always say that our employees are our greatest asset at RoviSys. This is true not only because we've invested in their career growth, but also because of the invaluable experience that they have gained working with many different technologies, industries, and people. It's just as important to create a training program to share what you've learned as a company as it is to convey company policies, procedures, and methologies. At RoviSys, we've put together a Continuing Education program to address our training needs. We use the GrandView Training module to capture the information in the form of curriculums and courses which are then offerred to employees to complete.
Like so many other things at RoviSys, the training program has been built using a distributed process in which many employees have contributed. A coordinator is appointed to develop a curriculum and assign teachers who, in turn, develop the courses. The knowledge capturing takes place at the course development stage since materials for the course must be gathered to add to the course. An eletronic test is created that is used to measure a student's understanding of the course information. Students can take a course once it has been completed and administrators can view student course status and results.
Not only has the training program been successful in protecting our greatest assets (employees), it has helped generate new business as we have been able to show our expertise to customers. Ultimately, a training program is a big key to running an efficient organization and the GrandView Training module can help you get there. Look for more details on the GrandView Training module features in an upcoming post.
Chris Engelmann, GrandView Product Manager
Friday, April 11, 2008
File compression is an important tool in any software. It allows minimizing space used in e-mails or on flash drives, bundling related files, speeding communication, and saving on bandwidth. GrandView makes use of file compression for all of these reasons. Below are some of the areas of GrandView where file compressions plays a role:
- Zipped file archives - For minimizing space and for bundling files together, nothing beats a zipped file archive. There are two ways to get your files into one: 1) in Project Files, click on the file download action icon for all files you want added to the archive, then click "Update". All of the files you selected will be added to an archive that will start to download immediately. 2) When viewing files attached to a status log, simply click the "Download All" button.
- Bandwidth-saving - To save bandwidth when downloading or uploading files through the Files Client, all files are first zipped together (behind the scenes) before sending over the network. The files are then uncompressed just before arriving on your computer.
- Communicate faster - The communications protocol used between the Files Client and the GrandView server is compressed using a fast and efficient algorithm to allow speedy communication.
We are investigating the use of other forms of file compression in GrandView. One avenue of investigation is an advanced versioning and compressing file system to complement our current NTFS-backed file system. Another area we're looking into is using our web server's built-in compression to shrink web-pages to speed up communications with your web browser. At Rovisys we know that effective use of file compression is just one of many ways that GrandView can help you get more organized, get more efficient, and get more done!
Bryan DeBois
GrandView Business Solutions Developer
Friday, March 28, 2008
The research on traditional information technology projects is chilling: between 25 and 75 percent of projects are over budget and past deadline. Chronic project mismanagement is particularly a concern when customers perceive all providers in a given area have similar technical capabilities. To compete, you could lower prices. Or you could gain the reputation for more consistently meeting deadlines, budgets and goals—before another company does.
Every project is different
For many service providers, no two projects seem to proceed the same way. These variances, some of which cannot be anticipated, create difficulties you must overcome to reach your goals. Below are listed some of the most common project management challenges.
Cost over-runs
It’s one thing to go over budget because you discover new benefits or savings mid-project. It’s another if the cause is poor project preparation or communications. The worst scenario? When you are unable to track costs until after the money is spent.
Missed deadlines
Deadlines are missed for the same reason projects go over budget. There is an important difference: you can exceed budget to meet a deadline. But when a project is delayed, costs are almost certain to increase. And while people might not understand whether a project achieves objectives, everyone understands deadlines and budgets.
Constant changes in scope
Most projects require frequent adjustments. Problems occur when lack of systems and procedures make it difficult to routinely respond to and accommodate change.
Little or no time and money near project end
The precursor to missing deadline and exceeding budget. The same causes apply: inadequate or missing project preparation, communication systems and methodology.
Unrealistic schedules
Difficulty meeting deadlines is usually the result of poor pre-project planning procedures and communication.
Team unsure of roles, tasks and schedules
When people are confused and messages missed, projects quickly derail. Communication systems with receipt verification can expose misunderstanding and lapses.
Poor internal communication
Effective project communication requires systematic shared access to key information.
Poor customer communication
Projects and relationships suffer when clients feel out of the loop or staff is unable to give timely updates on costs and project status.
Check out the GrandView website to learn how the GrandView project management and team collaboration system can help you address these issues.
Thomas Dormo
GrandView Business Solutions Director
Friday, March 14, 2008
"Time is becoming the new corporate metric", says management consultant Peter Drucker. In an ideal world, you'd completely finish every project on time. When forced to choose, the best bet is usually to get something demonstrably done by deadline.
Today, time is as important as cost and quality. Time to market is critical. Time to respond to a client request is critical. Time to incorporate change is critical. And time to install a finished system is critical.
In addition, work expands to fill the time available for completion. When under a tight schedule, which you should be, keep in mind that clients remember meeting schedule commitment, NOT reduced scope. That said, obviously the reduced scope must meet core functionality. Communication matters here too. Involve the entire team in establishing and maintaining schedules. Keep your milestones to ones that matter. It is much better to have a few you meet than many milestones you don't!
Remember the following:
- Most meetings are unnecessary or mismanaged and result in wasted time
- Effective meetings have an agenda, a time constraint and minutes to document resolutions and actions
- Productivity decreases as the number participants increases
- Scope creep is reduced by the time and money available to do the work
- Rational people will make reasonable scope decisions to meet a critical timeframe. Given more time, team members (like engineers) will always over-design, test excessively and worry.
Thomas Dormo
GrandView Business Solutions Director
Friday, February 29, 2008
With the Projects Dashboard module, users have the ability to open up various GrandView projects into a completely new browser window (the Project Summary Page), then navigate to all functional tabs for each project opened (Files, Status Logs, Financial). This allows for rapid switching between multiple projects while leaving the Actions Dashboard open so new Actions can be seen and dealt with.
The number of projects displayed in the Projects Dashboard module can be modified by clicking the Edit button in the upper left-hand corner of the module. Only projects the user has permissions to view will be displayed in the source list:
Jeromie Walters
GrandView Business Solutions Developer