My company would gladly pay MV to set up our reports in Crystal, but I'm not sure if it can do what I need it to do.  First off, I need fields that aren't available (Purchase Order #'s is the big one).  I also need it to get my optimization data out of Ardis, and consolidate it.  By consolidate I mean if I have 10 sheets of 3/4wmel/PL#1 and ten sheets of 3/4wmel/PL#2, I want a summary that says 20 sheets of 3/4 wmel, 10 of PL#1, and 10 of PL#2.  Currently we need this list so the guys can pull the right material to start the job.  How are you guys handling this? 

Another problem is things like Contact Cement and Finish products.  We've always had these quantities estimated with a formula in excel before and we manually compiled everything above into a list for the shop.  We also used this list to provide costing data.  I'd really like to take advantage of crystal, but not sure if it "fits" well with us right now. 

sure it can do most of what you want, like the PO # could just be any job info field added to you job wizard,and displayed in the report

getting the data out of Ardis is a diffrent question, maybe they can, but you can allways use MV optimizer to fiqure out material quanities, and eport toa report

For the glue there are many areas in the product costing and labor costing that can be edited to allow you to add fromulas to these items

so good luck

Attached is our "old" way of doing this.  This is what I need it to look like.  This is one battle I can't fight to change right now because MV is costing us too much production. 

have you tried material collections- they allow multiple material to be linked via formulas to a single pointer- then can be exported by separate or the group in the reports

check the manual

good luck

I took a look at the Materials Summary report you downloaded. I am fairly new to Microvellum but have been in the casework industry for 15 yrs. I have noticed that Microvellum has tables for hardware and edgebanding but nothing for material. If there was a material table then mv could populate it with the raw materials required for the job. The material could be designated as to if it is purchased or laid up at your location. If you are laying it up then the core & surface materials would all be written to the table seperate. Otherwise mv would write the material a a single record. As for the optimized material, if you are using Ardis. You can have Ardis write a text file with the material requirments. Then mv could use that file to populate the material table. From there Crystal Reports could access the tables for all material requirments. You could even add the lacquer, glue, stain... to the table. This is a pretty generic & brief explanation of my opinion. But, tables can be created for any type of data you need. It is just a matter of Microvellum adding them and adding the code. I come from a SQL database background with Crystal, .NET & Java where I was able to provide all of the data that you are requesting using Crystal. So, I have to ask... Does Microvellum have any plans on changing to SQL in the future?

This dosn't solve your current problem and probably adds even more questions. But I had to add my two cents... I do like what I see with Microvellum so far...

Crystal can do anything you want as long as you give it the correct input in a consistant format.

I have solved this issue by creating a new material naming scheme and then my report will parse the name and find out what is what.

K-PB-33-PL1 VG-PL1 VG

This material contains the following information.

Cut on komo-Particle board core-33mm thick-PL1 VG side1-PL1 VG side2

Every material name follows this scheme and I can use CR to separate out the individual core, side1, and side2 info into different quantities.

I will also say that I have found some things that just cant be helped because of the way MV used 2 different MDB files for Nesting and Optimization info.

For those situations I used VBexpress to write a custom application that pulls the info I need from each MDB file and combines them into a new MDB that is created.

To answer your question, yes, what you want can be done with a naming scheme.  However, you will need someone with moderate CR and database experience to get it done.  I dont see why MV couldn't do it for you, they have some very talented people doing report generation.

Boy, I sure wish I knew what the heck you guys are talking about!  I've emailed Feng@MV, who's their report guy, but no response yet.  I know one thing for sure, whatever we end up doing, I'd like to ensure that it's compatible with Version 6.5  I want to take a look at that as soon as its public. 

CCI_Jeremey, Thanks for sharing. Your approach is the type we were hoping to avoid, but I was expecting might be a required. 

Yes, Crystal Report can do what you need with some helps from you. I am going to list three ways to handle this situcation.

First, you can add the Interior Plam, Core Material, and Exterior Plam as different material in the material file. Then in the actual cut parts, add three parts rather than one part into the cutlist. This involved some work to change the cutlist structure, try to use the spreadsheet editor to get this done.

Second way to get around is handle this at the Crystal Report level. Inside of the Crystal Report, we can create formula to allocate the material for Interior Plam, Core Material, or Exterial Plam. But you must follow certain rules to create your material. For example, material called: PL1/11-16PB/PL2, "/" will consider as the indicator. Use Crystal Report to search for the key string "/", what is before that is the interior material, what is in the middle is the core, what is left is the exterior material. Then we can use the Crystal Report to create any layout you want.

The last option is: give Ardis tech support a call, and let them create a report for you. But they might ask you do the same thing as what I mentioned above.

In terms of the material file for Version 6.5, I don't think there is any change expect for the interface. For your information, the "overdrivepro.mdb" database structure for Version 6.5 is the same as the Version 6.

Hope this helps. Open for feedbacks. Thanks.

Feng,

     Just so I understand correctly, can you make me a report that would "look to" my processed ardis data? If so I will be giving you a call!  Thanks

Gary

One very important thing to keep in mind when using characters for string breaks in names is that some characters are also used when writting code. So, if you have any internal programming going on. You may want to check with your software engineer(s) to make sure that they are checking for these characters in their code. Otherwise, what works great for your report could cause an error in one of your programs. Most programmers remember to check but some new programmers dont catch it. Just an advance warning incase you notice errors in other programs after you start using characters in your material names. (Yes, I do speak from experience, about 13 yrs ago when I first started coding. )

As for Ardis, you can have Ardis export the material results to a text file that contains the material requirments with the use of a macro and a material report. Then you can extract the data from that file. Feng is also correct about contacting Ardis support if you want help creating a report with in Ardis. I have used their services for many years when I find myself bouncing my head off the top of my desk and having a major mind block.  

 Feng, I do have questions about the database structure but I will post it seperate.

Gary,

Could you please forward me a sample PROCESSED job? I will take a close look for you then.

Cory,

Thanks for the feedback. Those are great comments. I will keep my eyes open, post any question that you might have. I will try my best to answer it for you with my "limited" knowledge...

Feng