DBA SOFTWARE – SUPPORT ORIENTATION DOCUMENT Last Revised: June 2012
Introduction
Hello and thank you for your purchase of DBA, we welcome you as a customer. This document was prepared by the DBA Technical Support department, for our customers that are in time zones which do not allow us to perform our usual telephone or Skype-based call for the support orientation or for customers that wish a written copy.
The support orientation consists of three main sections. The first is a discussion of using the Online Support Center to be able to submit and interact with DBA support via tickets, as all support incidents are initiated and managed through our ticket system.
The second is a discussion of topics that bear special focus during the implementation process, which is outlined in our Implementation Planner document. This document is very important, and provides a very efficient, procedural “roadmap” to follow for a successful DBA implementation.
The third section discusses some basic software maintenance information, such as product updating and backup recommendations.
Section 1 – Using the Support Center
Once you have clicked on this link, you will then see a “Support Center Login” link to the right edge of the page. Click that link to proceed to the login page.
If you already have an existing support account, you would enter your login (typically the email address you provided to DBA at time of system purchase) and your password. (In the area illustrated by the red arrow in the previous screenshot)
If you have not changed your password, the default is: pass (all lowercase)
If you have not yet created your support account, or if you need to have the other users from your company request a support account, click on the “Request a New Account” button indicated by the green arrow in the previous screenshot. You will then be able to create your support account.
DBA Support strongly recommends that all users who will be using the software have their own support accounts, so they can have direct ticket access individually, as well as access to the DBA training videos, documentation, and the self-help knowledgebase.
After you have logged into the Online Support Center, you will see the following screen:
This screen is where you will need to come to manage all of your support incidents/tickets with DBA. Any request for support needs to be initiated by a ticket. To do so, simply click the “Submit a Ticket” link, and then follow the on-screen instructions.
Please note, it is very important you include your current DBA build number in the ticket, and be as thorough and specfic as possible in entering your issue. The ticket system does allow you to attach files such as
screenshots of error message, or other supporting documents that can assist us in providing you with a prompt and accurate resolution.
If you look at the top of the screen, you’ll see four tabs. One of these is called “My Support” (See screenshow below with green arrow indicating the tab):
You can see in the previous screenshot your ticket history, along with open tickets and their current status. The status of a ticket indicates what action(s) can be performed against it.
If a ticket is in Resolved status, this means that DBA support has provided a proposed solution for your request. You can, if you do not feel the solution fully answered your question or if you wish to add other information, click on the ticket link and reopen that ticket. That will then notify the DBA Support technician that you have requested further assistance with that issue. You can reopen a resolved ticket within up to 4 calendar days of it being marked Resolved.
If a ticket is in Needs More Info status, it means that the DBA Support technician has requested that you provide additional information to help with resolving the problem.
NOTE: It is very important that you respond by logging into the Online Support Center and updating your ticket with the requested information. Even though you get emails notifying you of actions on your ticket, if you reply to that email only, the DBA Support technician does not get that email reply, and can cause delays in getting that information into the ticket system, which delays the response back from the technician.
If a ticket is in Closed status, this means that the period to reopen the ticket has passed, and now that ticket is permanently closed and will remain in your list of tickets for historical purposes. If a ticket goes into a Closed status, neither you nor DBA Support can reopen that ticket. If there needs to be further interchange on that particular issue, you will need to open a new ticket.
To return to the main Support Center screen, click the “Home” tab at the top.
Another very important section within the Online Support Center is the navigation pane at the left of the screen. From here, you can access the DBA product documentation, as well as our training videos and software
update links.
During the Implementation Phase, you will be referred often to the DBA Operating Guide and Training videos. Please note, the DBA training videos are not available for off-line viewing, you will need to be logged into the Support Center to view them.
Another helpful link in this area is the Self Help Knowledge Base. This represents very common questions and answers that we receive to DBA Support. You may wish to look in this area to see if the question you have has an answer or solution posted.
However, if it does not, or if you prefer to submit a ticket instead, you would do so from the “Submit a Ticket” link.
When you are ready to exit the Online Support Center, simply click the “Sign Out” link as shown below:
You can then exit the DBA website as you wish.
Section 2 - Implementation Topics
In this section, we will discuss the implementation (setup) process of DBA, and highlight two very important topics.
To begin, you should have received in email when you purchased your system a PDF file of a document entitled “Implementation Planner”. If for some reason you do not have a copy of this document, you can obtain it from our website, or via the Online Support Center, or by requesting a copy in a support ticket. This document is a very step-by-step roadmap to a successful implementation of DBA. We recommend that you follow through the Implementation Planner in the order the topics are presented, and review all of the documentation and training materials as you go through your setup.
There are two very important concepts that deserve to be highlighted:
The first is the concept of the formal “Startup Day” procedures. It is critical to the success of your
implementation that you do not enter or create any false transactional data in your system prior to going live after following the Startup Day procedures outlined in the Implementation Planner document.
Failing to do this will introduce improper data into the system that will also affect the startup accounting. It is strongly recommended therefore that you do not do anything in your live company that would create
This does lead to a question though of “How can I get my users to train and practice in the software before we are ready to go live?”
This is the second point to highlight from the Implementation Planner, which is the Rehearsal phase. During this phase, you are directed to install and use our Training Company. The Training Company is a separate installation of the DBA software, that makes a copy of your database at the time it is installed and places that copy in a separate directory. This then allows you to follow our installation guide and video, so that the Training Company installation is available to the network, and your users can log into that Training Company installation for learning, training, and testing the different functions of the software.
Please note, the Training Company is not the same as the “Sample Company.” The Sample Company is more of an example company, used during initial product evaluation, and sometimes, DBA Support may refer you to test something in the Sample Company since it is a dataset that you and DBA will have in common
Another consideration about the Training Company is that as an implementer, you can install and use that in advance of the Rehearsal phase, perhaps for testing things like data imports, or you may wish to create jobs, SO’s, etc. to see if you are satisfied with your settings.
The Training Company can be uninstalled and reinstalled as often as you wish, and each time you do so, it will make a fresh copy of your “production” database. Just ensure that the production database is not open
(meaning DBA is not running) when you do the installation of the training company.
If you have any specific question regarding the use of the Training Company, or how to install it, please contact DBA Support via our support ticket system and we will be happy to assist.
NOTE: One question that arises often during the implementation phase is about the editing of forms to create the customized forms you will use for your business. It is our recommendation that you save that step until just prior to Startup Day, and focus on your base implementation first. You also can use the Sample Company for creating custom forms, as it shares the same forms directory with the “Main” company. Refer to our Forms Customization training video in our Online Support Center for more specific details on forms customization.
Section 3 – General Software Maintenance
In this section we will discuss two main areas: Software updating, and database backup.
As a DBA customer with a valid support subscription, you are entitled to all updates and upgrades of the DBA software at no additional cost. We also strongly recommend that you stay current and updated to our most recent release.
There are two types of software updates that are published. The first is typically referred to as a “service pack” update. It may or may not be generally announced, and you may be notified that the update exists as part of overall interaction via support tickets. For example, we may notice you are on Build 392.40 as listed in your ticket, and we would let you know that a service pack release Build 392.42 is available. You can always check for the latest update/release in our Online Support Center in the Program Updates/What’s New section (it is one of the navigation links to the left in the main support center home page).
We also always include a Training Company version with our public updates, so you can, should you wish, download and install that first so you can preview and test any changes and new features prior to performing the actual update to your production database.
Please remember, anytime you update your database or install the Training Company, you must ensure that no one is actively running the DBA software at the time of the update or install, and that you are logged into your DBA Server with an Administrator-level account.
The final maintenance consideration is database backup. You will want to make sure that you are doing daily backups of the DBA databases. Similar to updates and installs, you should ensure that no one is running the software while performing the backup of these database files.
The most important file is the \DBA Manufacturing\Database\ejdb.fdb file, as this contains all of your setup and transactional data. It is good IT practice to review your backup logs to make sure the file was listed as backed up successfully each day.
You also want to maintain a backup of the \DBA Manufacturing\Database\system.fdb file, as there are some customization settings stored in that file, along with your database registrations.
If you’ve customized your forms, and saved the custom forms with unique file names (as is our
recommendation) then making a backup copy of those forms is also a good idea, though they do not need to be backed up daily, only prior to any edits or changes.
