Technology

Your network server may be a safer place for your free Purchase Order Software

Craig had the Free Version of SpendMap installed on his laptop (including the database), and the voltage regulator went out, so he couldn’t power up his machine.

Luckily, he was able to make an image of the drive, so we were able to get his system up and running on his new PC.

Since laptop and desktop computers are not as reliable as servers, please consider installing SpendMap on a network server by following the “Network Installation Instructions”, in the Getting Started Documentation that came with your free Software.

You’ll sleep better at night with your database resting peacefully on a nice, safe network drive, even if you don’t need multi-user access to the system.

An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

MAPI vs. SMTP e-mail setup in your free PO Software

>>> 07/29/2015 update – The free version of SpendMap now includes a free, built-in e-mail service, which you can use instead of configuring the system to use your own e-mail server or ISP.  This post has details.  The balance of this post, below, still applies if you want to set the system up to use your own e-mail server or ISP.

Since we blogged last month about how to set up the e-mail module in the free version of SpendMap, we realize that the MAPI option might be better than SMTP for many smaller companies (the target market for the Free-Procurement Project).

Our suggestion in last month’s blog post to try the SMTP option first came from our Support Group’s experience with our paying customers, who mostly use the web-based version of SpendMap, and who usually have their own (internal) SMTP servers.  For these customers, SMTP is usually the best option.

But for smaller companies, who are more likely to use a third-party e-mail provider like Gmail, YAHOO mail, MS Live, etc., the SMTP option may not work as some hosted e-mail services don’t allow third-party apps to connect to their outgoing mail servers.

So, if you don’t have your own internal SMTP server, please give the MAPI option a try first, using the two fields at the top of the E-mail Setting Screen.

TIP: Assuming you have MAPI-compliant e-mail software (e.g. Outlook) installed on the PC that you’ll be using for SpendMap, setting the first two fields in E-mail Setting to the MAPI option is all that will be required.  In most cases, you do not need to enter any of the other MAPI-related settings further down the screen.  Any e-mail messages that SpendMap generates will be “handed off” to Outlook and will show in your Out Box until you hit [Send].

All the other instructions in that earlier blog post remain the same (e.g. other setup steps, testing, etc.).

Sorry for the false start, folks.  If you have any trouble, we’re always here to help.

Best regards,
The Free-Procurement Project team
Totally FREE software that automates Purchase Orders and a whole lot more
Powered by SpendMap

E-mail Setup in your Free Purchase Order Software

email purchase order

>>> 07/29/2015 update – The free version of SpendMap now includes a free, built-in e-mail service, which you can use instead of configuring the system to use your own e-mail server or ISP.  This post has details.  The balance of this post, below, still applies if you want to set the system up to use your own e-mail server or ISP.

Most people who use the Free Version of SpendMap want to send Purchase Orders and other documents to their suppliers by e-mail.

You can also enable various e-mail notifications, to let people know about important events, without them having to log into the system (e.g. “You have a new Requisition waiting for your approval” or “Your Requisition was rejected”, and so on).

For SpendMap to send e-mail to your suppliers and staff, you need to enable and set up the e-mail connectivity module, which is included in your free PO software.

Everything you need to know to get e-mail going is in the Online Help system, but I’ve taken the liberty of writing it out in detail here, to save you some time…

E-Mail Server Settings

Before we get started, it helps to understand that SpendMap is no different from any other e-mail client (e.g. Outlook, etc.) when it comes to sending e-mail. Just like Outlook needs to “connect” to your outgoing e-mail server to send messages, so does SpendMap. So you can probably borrow the settings from your standard e-mail software and plug those into the E-Mail Settings Utility in SpendMap, using this menu option…
– PURCHASING > Setup system > e-mail settings

Most people use the SMTP protocol (as opposed to MAPI), so I’ll assume SMTP for now. If you have any questions, or if you prefer to use MAPI and need any tips after reading the Online Help, please log a free support ticket.

>>>CORRECTION<<<  After we posted this article, we realized that the MAPI option might be better than SMTP for many smaller companies (the target market for the Free-Procurement Project).  If you have any trouble using the SMTP option outlined below, you might want to give MAPI a try instead.  Here’s another post with more details.

OK, back to what we were saying…

On the E-mail Settings screen, select “ISP or SMTP server” in the two fields at the top of the screen.

Then, in the block of fields labeled “SMTP” just below that, enter your outgoing mail server’s name or IP address. It will usually look something like “smtp.service-provider.com”. Again, you can probably get that from the Settings area of your e-mail software, or you might have to contact your service provider or IT Department.

Next, enter “587” for the port number, unless your service provider advises you otherwise.

Then enter the user account (or e-mail address) that you use to log into to your e-mail account, and the associated password in the adjacent field.

That’s usually all that is needed for SpendMap to connect to your outgoing mail server.

Other E-Mail Settings

Other than that, you will need to fill in the three fields at the bottom of the screen (Proper User Name, User E-mail Address, and SpendMap User ID). This will improve the formatting of the e-mail messages that your suppliers receive.  Again, the Online Help has details of what those fields are used for.

So those are the only mandatory (i.e. minimum) fields that you have to fill in. You may, however, want to review the other (optional) fields. For example, if you want to add some text to the cover page of the e-mail that goes along with each new Purchase Order to your suppliers, you can use the Boilerplate field in the center of the screen. If so, this blog post may also be of interest.

And it’s also quite popular to enable the setting to “Maintain a log of sent e-mail messages” but, again, all that stuff is optional. And again, the Online Help has all the details.

Test to Confirm Settings

Once the E-mail Settings are configured per above, it’s time to test that SpendMap is in fact able to connect to your outgoing e-mail server. Rather than processing a new PO to do this test, I prefer to just try e-mailing a report, which has less variables than processing a PO, so it’s faster/easier to confirm that it’s working.

So just run any report and select the “e-mail” option when it asks you “Where do you want to send the report?”. Any report will do, but personally I like to use a small report for testing, so maybe try the User Master File report, which you can find here…
– PURCHASING > Reports > Master file reports > Users master file

So, assuming the report shows up in your e-mail client, then that means that SpendMap is able to send e-mail.

Additional Setup for Specific Types of E-Mail

Once you have the e-mail feature working per above, you can enable the various types of e-mail messages in SpendMap.

Sending Documents by E-Mail

If you would like to e-mail Purchase Orders or other documents to your suppliers, please see this section of the Online Help…
– System-Wide Features and Information > Documents and Reports > Sending Documents Electronically

E-Mail Notifications

If you would like SpendMap to send e-mail notifications to your users when certain events occur (e.g. an e-mail to the Approver when someone processes a new Requisition, etc.), please see this section of the Online Help…
– System-Wide Features and Information > System-Wide Features and Utilities > Automatic E-mail Notifications

Barcode and Faxing Modules in Free Purchase Order Software

Due to licensing restrictions related to the third party software that we use in SpendMap for sending faxes and printing barcode labels, which limits the number of copies that we are allowed to distribute, unfortunately we will not be able to include faxing and barcode label printing in the Free Version of SpendMap.

Please note, however, that you can send Purchase Orders and other documents to your suppliers using the E-mail Module instead, and you can still scan your suppliers’ UPC barcodes to simplify your inventory transactions if you wish, and you can print your own barcode labels using third party software (you just can’t print the barcode labels using SpendMap itself).

We were hoping to include the same functionality in our Free Version as we offer in our Paid Version, but unfortunately we just couldn’t get approval to give the faxing and barcode label printing technology away for free with the rest of SpendMap.

Sorry folks, we tried.

Is free Purchase Order software right for you?

Barry in Washington, D.C. commented that we might want to be a bit more forthcoming about the differences between the Free and Paid versions of SpendMap. free vs. paid purchase order software

Sorry about that, Barry.  We didn’t mean to hide anything.

In a nutshell, while they are functionally very similar, the Free Version is a Windows/desktop application that was designed for small businesses and small buying groups in larger organizations, while the Paid Version is a web-based (browser-based) system that is more suitable for midsize and large organizations (since it runs in your web browser with no software to install, it’s easier to deploy to a large number of users).

Technology aside, there are also differences in the way that we sell, implement and support the two products.  For example, the Free Version is all set up for SMBs to do a self-evaluation, while we offer a more “consultative” sales approach for our larger customers who are considering the Paid Version (bigger companies tend to have more complex needs when it comes to their e-procurement systems, which often makes a self-evaluation impractical).

Similarly, the Free Version assumes a do-it-yourself implementation using the various resources that we provide with the free software (e.g. online help, video tutorials, online support system), while our larger, paying customers get to work directly with our Client Services Group and have access to our full line of Professional Services, such as priority phone support, web-based and on-site training, implementation consulting, and custom programming services.

Again, these are just the main differences between the Free and Paid Versions of SpendMap.  For more details, we added a new subsection called “Is this right for you?” to the Getting Started Documentation that comes with the free software.  Just select the menu HELP > CHECK FOR UPDATES, then exit and re-run SpendMap.  The new section is right at the top of the Getting Started Documentation.

Hope this helps.

Keep your Purchase Orders out of your supplier’s Junk Mailbox

Are you sending Purchase Orders to your suppliers using the e-mail feature in the free version of SpendMap?

If your e-mailed POs are getting caught in your suppliers’ Junk Mail filters, you might want to try adding some text to the e-mail cover page.  Without some content in the body of the e-mail, the e-mail will include only an attachment (the attached PO) and one line of text (the default e-mail footer “Get your FREE Purchasing Software at…”, which also includes a hyperlink).  In some cases, a one-line e-mail with a hyperlink and an attachment will be enough to trigger a supplier’s SPAM filter.

So consider adding some text to your e-mail cover page for Purchase Orders, using the field called “Boilerplate for POs/Releases/RFQs”, in the E-mail Settings utility, which you can find here…
– PURCHASING > Setup system > e-mail settings

Here’s some sample cover page text to consider…

—

Dear Supplier,

Please process the following orders/confirmations.

If you have any questions, please contact us before processing this order.

Also please add this e-mail address to your “safe sender” list or address book, to help ensure that you get our Purchase Orders going forward.

Thank you,

ABC Company – Purchasing Department
(other contact info here)
(avoid adding hyperlinks like e-mail addresses or your company’s URL, as additional links can increase an e-mail’s SPAM score)

Windows 8 Support for Free Purchase Order Software

Windows 8The 2013 Release of SpendMap is here, with Windows 8 support and around 20 other new features.

So if you’ve been waiting for Win8 support before downloading your Free Purchase Order Software, the wait is over.  You can download the 2013 Release here.

New Systems Only

This is for new installations only and cannot be used to update your system if you’re already using the Free version of SpendMap (the 2012 release).

For those already using the system, we are working on an update utility to bring your system forward to the 2013 release.  The update utility will retain all your data/history, so you won’t lose any of your work when you upgrade.  Just follow this blog to be notified when the update utility is ready, which we expect will be in the next couple weeks.

More Firewall Friendly

We also made the 2013 release more firewall and proxy server friendly and reduced the frequency that the system checks for updates, so if you had any trouble getting it going before, you might want to give it another try now.

If you need any help, please use our free Support Ticket System.

Thanks.

Windows 8 Support for your Free Purchase Order Software

I’m writing this blog post on my fancy new Windows 8 machine with touch screen.  It’s taking a bit to get used to but I must say, I’m liking the new Windows 8 experience and I suspect it will be a big hit for Microsoft.

We have completed our development work on the 2013 release of SpendMap, which includes Windows 8 support and around 20 other new features, and we have begun our testing phase.

If you are already using last year’s release of our Free Purchase Order System (v11.64), make sure to follow this blog and we’ll let you know when an update is ready.  As with all new SpendMap releases, the update utility is completely automatic and will bring forward all your settings, master files, POs and other transactions, so you won’t lose any of your work.

Happy 2013 everyone!

Installing your free Purchase Order Software on a network for multi-user access

There seems to be some confusion about multi-user access to the free version of SpendMap.

We’ve had quite a few questions about upgrading to the (paid) web-based version of SpendMap in order to have more than one person using the system at the same time, but upgrading is often not necessary.

So to set the record straight, in this post I’ll outline how you can install your free Purchase Order Software on a network server for multi-user access, and I’ll also outline the additional benefits of (optionally) upgrading to the web-based version of SpendMap.

So for the record, “web-based” and “multi-user” are not the same thing.  The free (Windows/desktop) version of SpendMap can be installed on your server, and you can roll it out to as many people as you want.  Each user will run the software on their PC workstation, while accessing the shared database on the network server.  So when someone creates a Requisition or a Purchase Order or whatever, other users will be able to see and work on the order as well (provided you give them the ability to see other people’s orders).

To install your free Purchase Order Software on a network for multi-user access, just follow the instructions in the Getting Started Documentation that came with your free software…

Free Purchase Order Software network installation instructions

So why do I need the web-based version of SpendMap?

You might not!

If you’re working in a small business or a small buying group of a larger organization, you might not need a web-based e-procurement system.  If you don’t mind setting up software on each PC workstation, then our free Purchase Order Software might certainly be enough for you.

But if lots of people need to access your Purchase Order System, then you might consider upgrading to the web-based version, which runs inside your web-browser, so your staff can access it from anywhere, without having to set up software on their PCs.

So for most companies, it comes down to ease of deployment.  While there are some other benefits, in general the more users you have, the more benefit there is to upgrading to the web-based version.  But if you don’t have too many users, then the free version is probably all you’ll need.

And yes, you can start with the free version and upgrade to the web-based version down the road if you like, with no loss of data…everything in your free version will be brought forward automatically, including Master Files, settings, Purchase Orders and other transactions, etc.

E-procurement software vs. Purchase Order Software: what’s old is new again

A dear friend recently gave my 7-year-old daughter an Etch A Sketch.  Yup, 50 years later, in this day of handheld video games, they’re still selling those things.

As I held it in my hand and tried to show her how to draw a flower (with a big line through it…I got stuck in a corner), it occurred to me that our old favorite has much in common with today’s handheld video games; compact, portable, small controls requiring dexterity, eye-hand coordination, progression, reward for time invested, etc.

Of course, it got me thinking about how e-procurement software technology has changed over the years.

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