Author: ccsretail

Disaster Prep and Gate Security.

I had a recent personal experience that reminded me of exactly why it’s important to have a proper disaster preparedness plan in place…

On a recent weekend, the security Gate for the community that I live in was jammed shut.  I had just come back from running errands, to find multiple lines of cars waiting to get in and out of the only access road the community has.  There were a number of people milling around trying to figure out what to do, while talking on their cell phones, and getting ever more agitated.

The Gate motor appeared to be in a seized condition. This situation prevented anyone from doing a manually assisted opening.  The manual over-ride switch was in a locked housing.  No one there had the key.  There were several home owner association members that had keys, however, one was on vacation, another could not be contacted, and the remainder had just left a few hours earlier on a long distance Motorcycle ride.

On looking at the way the gate chain was attached to the physical gate, the easiest  solution was to simply disconnect the drive chain from the end of the Gate. I figured that all I needed was a sturdy wrench, and deep socket, and socket wrench.  Many decades ago, I learned the value of always carrying a full set of mechanics hand tools in my vehicle at all times.  Since I had all of the tools that were needed in my vehicle, it less than 30 seconds to undo the nut holding the chain,  pull the chain out of the way without damaging it, and then shove the gate open.

After getting a number of thank yous, and bewildered comments on how the solution could have been that simple, I smiled slightly, while cleaning the chain grease from hands,  Turning towards the one lone board member present (but sans keys), I said, "It looks like everyone was lucky that I happened by when I did, otherwise you’d still be waiting around." , then adding, "As a suggestion, maybe there should be a schedule, so that there is always  at least one board member with keys around at all times…"   Obviously, no one had really given this much thought.  If there had been a real emergency, the local Sheriff, Fire, and
Emergency responders current policy is to ram the gate (thereby destroying it), in order to get in.

So with this event fresh in your mind, do you have your computer systems  disaster plan in place?  Winter and its challenges with power and snowed-in conditions is not far off.

5 Critical questions to consider while you are putting one together are:

• Do you have the technical people on staff, or on retainer, who can deal with any emergency? This would include phone numbers, email addresses of all technical people that would need to be involved in helping with the recovery.  Consider backup contacts, after-hours contacts, weekend contacts and escalation points to the "super-tech" as part of your plan.

• Do you have Logins and Password for the servers/workstations and other communication hardware, such as routers?  These can be kept online on a backup sever and secured with a product like Keepass.

•  Is there verified backup media, and do the necessary people have access to it?   This can be Disk, USB Drive, DVD, Tape, or Remote Online server, for example. 

•  Is there physical pre-staged backup hardware available in the event of complete hardware failure?  An online Backup Server, online Redundant Peripherals, and Components is desirable for your Critical Servers.  Higher-end servers like HP have these options for automatic or semi-automatic cut-overs.  Communication Systems for the LAN, Internet, and Voice should be considered as well.

• Do you have a written plan on how to deal with likely scenarios?   What the Users. Technical Personnel, Desktops, Servers, Communications Systems are to do. 

If you need assistance with developing your disaster recovery, please contact the CCS Retail Systems Support Department.

CP SQL 8.4.0 – Order Management

Radiant plans to release a this new feature in a CP SQL 8.4.0 service pack.

This feature is set to include comprehensive Order Management functionality that allows merchants to process multiple orders simultaneously instead of one at a time using a single, centralized interface. Order Management will provide an efficient, task-oriented work-flow that is designed to streamline order processing for structured, high-volume operations, such as mail-order, telephone-order, and eCommerce merchants.

The Order Management window will includes separate tabs for each stage that an order typically goes through (i.e., Entered, Picked, Pick Verified, Invoiced, and Released), as well as a tab for order lines that have been back-ordered. These tabs display orders that include lines in the corresponding stage, filtered
by location, customer, date, and other user-definable criteria.

Because Order Management allows you to work with orders at the line level, individual orders can appear on multiple tabs, making it easy to see which lines on each order have been back-ordered, entered, picked, verified, invoiced, and released. For convenience, the All Orders tab lists all orders that match your filter criteria and indicates which stage(s) each of those orders is in.

Each tab on the Order Management window allows you to select multiple orders and perform one of the following tasks:

• Fill back-order lines

• Print picking tickets

• Verify picked quantities

• Generate invoices

• Release invoiced lines

Completing a task moves the selected orders into the next stage of the process. For example, the "Entered" tab allows you to print picking tickets for selected orders, moving them to the Picked stage, while the Invoiced tab allows you to move order lines to release tickets, marking them as Released.

The Order Management window also allows you to view detailed information for each order including billing and shipping addresses, deposits, notes, and so forth and to add, edit, or delete order lines, as necessary.

Overall, this feature should allow for a faster and more accurate order fulfillment process.

If you have any questions surrounding this new enhancement, please contact the CCS Retail Systems Support Department.

Microsoft issues largest ever security fix on Tuesday, October 12th, 2010.

This series of updates includes the Windows operating system, Internet Explorer browser for flaws that could let hackers take control of a PC.  The new patches fix a number of vulnerabilities including one that allowed the  Stuxnet virus (mentioned in one of my earlier blogs) that attacked an Iranian nuclear power plant and other industrial control systems around the world.

Microsoft has indicated that four of the new patches were of the highest priority and should be deployed immediately for ALL Windows PC’s and servers in order to protect users from potential criminal attacks.

Also repaired were other less serious security weaknesses in Windows, along with security problems in The Microsoft Office Suite of products for PC’s and Servers. There were a total of 16 security patches to address 49 problems in Microsoft’s products.  Some or all of these may apply depending on your operating systems version, and installed components.

CCS recommends that these service packs be installed at the earliest possible opportunity.  Applying these updates will require that users be off the system, and will require that the PC’s and servers be restarted to complete the installation.

As always, if you have questions or concerns, please contact the CCS Retail Systems Support Department.