Manage 2000 Release 8.1 Service Pack 2 - sneak peek

Development of Service Pack 2 for Manage 2000 8.1 has been cutoff.  I have gone through the demo data tidying up while Doug is working through the release control process. We should be in a position to release it well within our announced Jan 2018 time frame.

Here are my top ten favorite new features in this development rich service pack:

1. UniData 8.2 Python Integration
We have UniData 8.2 loaded up on our development machine and are using it daily. Unfortunately our development box is an HPUX machine and the new Python integration is not yet available for HPUX.  But for those running on Windows servers this opens up a whole new world of possibilities.


2. Web DE 5.3 JavaScheduler pass through CallRPC
Rocket put in a special version of the CallRPC method based on the Manage 2000 teams input which by-passes the ADO Recordset parsing and provides a very lean connection between the .Net world and the UniData world. Various measures show through-put improvement from 2X to over 10X.  This doesn't make the processing of the business logic any faster, but just moving data back and forth this much faster creates a very noticeable performance improvement for the end user.


3. UrlAuthorizationModule
"With great power comes great responsibility" PDF publishing and attachments anywhere features of Manage 2000 8.1 provide the power to put your customers in control of viewing their documents. The UrlAuthorizationModule provides the security enabling you to do this responsibly.


4. W(+/-)n Work Date (Shop Calendar) Entry Shortcut
Simple. Global. Useful. What is not to like?


5. ECA support for attachments and calendar events
Welcome enhancements to ECA email notifications. I particularly like the idea of ECAs sending calendar appointments to recipients, who can then simply click on the icon to import reminders into their calendars and have them act as cues for future activity.


6. Associated Sales Items support in ShoppingCart
The existence of Associated Sales Items in the database and the lack of their use in the shopping cart was just begging for development


7. AUTHORIZE.DATA.ACCESS
Anytime hardcoded rules are abstracted to configuration tables it is a good thing for the flexibility, elasticity, and endurance of the product. Plus it puts the Manage 2000 customer organization in the drivers seat defining how the software should behave.


8. REFRESH.SPOOL.DATA Master Agent Service
This makes the web interface to the spooler jobs dependable and truly useful. Dependending on traffic to SPE to trigger refreshes is just too shakey especially in smaller installations.


9. SECURITY.MASS.UPDATE
There are a number of administrator treats in this service pack. Handling security changes faster and easier is certainly a welcome one.


10. PMT.STACK.MASS.UPDATE
Like SECURITY.MASS.UPDATE this just seems like something that ought to be there in this day and age.

Aside from lots of treats for administrators there are over half a dozen new features in Product Data Management alone. So watch for the upcoming official announcement and after you load up this new service pack look through the FEATURE.SUMMARY document.