Monday, November 10, 2008
Everyone has a certain way of doing things. Sometimes the methods we adopt, albeit unintentional, make our lives more difficult. We get into patterns of doing something a given way just because it "needs to get done" or worse, because "that's the way it's always been done before." Even though they're cumbersome burdens, we call these tasks necessary evils and allow the abuse to continue.
One of the very reasons GrandView was developed was to eliminate many "necessary evils" in the early days of RoviSys, such as mountains of spreadsheets used to keep track of sales and project data. Even though we've streamlined our process and simplified our tasks greatly, we realize that our process doesn't exactly work for everyone. Some companies may need additional timesheet information or require additional import tools to get custom data into GrandView; and of course they'll need a new page to be able to view that custom data as well. Others may want quick access to a specific feature, such as Expenses, from every project instead of being limited to just a top-level Expenses tab.
So how do we allow customers to simplify their process without changing it for everyone? Easily - with a new architecture we refer to as GrandView Customizations. Customizations allow us to implement features that are specific to a single customer. We can create a custom import, copy features to multiple locations, add custom data to existing pages, or replace an existing feature with something completely different! We can even add external web pages in case a company decides they need access to a web search engine or another useful Internet tool from within GrandView.
Give us a call today to see how GrandView can be used to simplify YOUR process!
Jeromie Walters
GrandView Business Solutions Developer
Friday, October 24, 2008
Introduced in ASP.NET 2.0 (released Nov. 7, 2005), Master Pages provides a template-based approach to web page design. Master Pages is the next generation to templates.
Templates
Traditional DreamWeaver or FrontPage web templates (.dwt files) provide a framework of HTML that is common to every page using a particular template on a web site; headers, footers or navigation menus. This allows the web author to easily insert new content into placeholder sections (Editable Regions) within the template when designing a new page. The authoring tools detect when a template is changed and prompt the author to modify all pages based on that template. The advantage of using a template-based web site is that changes to the template are propagated to all pages using that template. However, ALL of those changed pages still need released to the live web site. Also, it's easy to inadvertently change an uneditable region on a template-based page which would get overwritten the next time the template is applied.
Master Pages
Similar to using an editable region placeholder in a template, Master Pages (.master files) use a ContentPlaceHolder control. HTML or controls are then placed in this region when authoring a new page:
<asp:Content id="content1" runat="server" contentplaceholderid="content">Testing -- new content goes here</asp:Content>
Unlike with templates, default content can be included in the Master Page within the ContentPlaceHolder control. This can be useful if a default navigation menu is typically used, but may need to change for certain pages. Also unlike templates, the new page based on a Master Page is rendered in the browser at run-time, not during design of the page. So when the Master Page is changed, only the .master file needs released to the live web site.
Stay tuned for Master Pages Part 2 where we'll talk about nesting and image paths...
David Heater, P.E.
GrandView Business Solutions Developer
Friday, October 10, 2008
The Project Management Institute defines a project as "a temporary endeavor undertaken to create a unique product, service, or result" (PMBOK guide, 3rd ed.). Because of the temporal nature of projects, it's important to ensure effective collaboration quickly and consistently through a project. GrandView helps you do that by integrating all of the necessary project-related communications. Some of the highlights include:
- Project Status Logs - This is a project-specific message log where all communications about the project take place. Important decisions are logged and acknowledgement by the team is required. This not only serves as a permanent record of the project's history, but also allows new project team members to get up to speed quickly.
- Project Schedule - A simple scheduling tool for outlining the major milestones of the project. Fully integrated into the GrandView Dashboard.
- Project Files - A secure and unlimited-sized directory of files specific to the project. Files can be shared, commented on, and even attached to Status Logs.
And GrandView doesn't just enable collaboration between employee team members, every customer team member has a unique login and can interact on the project. Try to do that with e-mail!
And we're not done yet. The GrandView Team is always investigating new ways to make project collaboration easy, effective, and efficient. We're consumed with finding new ways to document everything (and we do mean everything) that pertains to a project. What can we say? We live and breath this stuff!
Bryan DeBois, GrandView Business Solutions Senior Developer
Friday, September 26, 2008
The Project Task Analysis feature in GrandView (discussed here in November 2007) allows project managers to enter the start/end dates as well as hours estimates and adjustments of chargeable tasks that employees see in their TimeSheet. As employees enter their time and project managers make necessary adjustments to tasks, an accurate status of a project is portrayed. However, there are project and resource loading views that can allow you to realize the full capability of project task analysis outside of just an individual project. These views summarize the project task hours remaining into a monthly forecast per project (project loading) and per employee (resource loading). The accuracy of the summarized information depends heavily on how fined-grained the tasks are defined, the consistent use of project task analysis across projects, and the frequency that the project task and TimeSheet data (actual hours) is updated. Accurate project and resource loading in GrandView can have many benefits.
The project loading view (see below) shows each project that has hours remaining and is not complete. The hours remaining are forecasted 12 months into the future. Alarming in the form of red text is shown for a project with any overdue or overrun tasks. This information shows project completion status and can easily identify projects that are in trouble. Another benefit from the monthly forecast data is the backlog of the work ahead for the company. 
Similar to the project loading, the resource loading view (see below) shows an employee's hours remaining forecasted out 12 months. All employees are listed to identify those that are under- or over-utilized. This view can also be used as a resource management tool allowing the company to make informed staffing and hiring decisions. 
Chris Engelmann, GrandView Business Solutions Manager
Friday, September 19, 2008
In the previous Project Management Challenges post, we described 8 common challenges contributing to project failure. The following are a couple more potential pitfalls to avoid.
Limited access to project files and information
When work descriptions, schedules and other documents are inconvenient to access or hoarded, project management requirements go up and productivity goes down.
Wasted efforts
There can be many reasons results are not achieved or a team pursues unproductive activities. Real-time project tracking and open communications help maintain progress.
Too many project meetings
Without effective communication systems, teams must resort to a large number of productivity-sapping meetings.
Employee turnover
Miscommunication, uncertain responsibilities and low productivity lead to the defection of valuable team members.
High learning curve for new employees
When key project details are stored in the head of someone no longer on the team or is otherwise difficult to access, new staff takes much longer to be effective.
Lack of accountability
When people are uncertain about their responsibilities or can hide from them, tasks fall through the cracks and work goes undone.
We all know that project failure is expensive. Of course, there's much more to project success than simply making sure the items described here don't happen. But if you're using a system like GrandView that ensures good communication, knowledge sharing, and accountability, it's much more likely they won't happen - freeing you up to focus on your business details that really matter.
Thomas Dormo
GrandView Business Solutions Director
Friday, August 29, 2008
AJAX was a term coined in 2005 to refer to a method of programming web pages that had been in use for many years. It involves a combination of several browser technologies (most notably JavaScript and XmlHttpRequest) to allow asynchronous calls from a web page back to the server. This allows a much more intuitive user interface, as the web page can appear more responsive and the user does not see the entire page "flash" as it is reloaded from the server.
GrandView has taken advantage of AJAX technologies since back when it was referred to as "Remote Scripting." However, developing web pages that can update asynchronously can be challenging and time-consuming. Throughout the years, we have not looked to recreate our entire application as an AJAX application, but instead looked to integrate asynchronous calls at key places in GrandView. Nowadays, we use a suite of AJAX controls from
Telerik to accelerate development, and provide a consistent user experience.
So where is AJAX used in GrandView? You might be surprised to find out where. After all, AJAX is a technology that's designed to be completely invisible when it's working correctly! Here are some examples:
| The Dashboard |
Timesheet |
Project Dropdown |
 |
 |
 |
Of course, technologies like AJAX do not
inherently make a better user experience. It's up to your trusted GrandView developers to use this and all the tools available to us to create the best application we can!
Bryan DeBois
GrandView Business Solutions Senior Developer
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