A very nice and detailed post on Jivetesh Singh’s Dynamics GP Blog “About Dynamics, Development and Life” aboutFRx, Forecaster and itsreplacement By Management reporter.
Her has covered most of the questions asked by developers, consultants and existing clients with useful links from blogosphere and partner source.
Microsoft® FRx® has a feature named FRx® WebPort. It’s is a separately licensed feature of that allows authorized users to output both Microsoft FRx reports and non-Microsoft FRx items to a Web repository.
Microsoft FRx reports are most commonly published to FRx WebPort from FRx® Report Designer. Microsoft FRx reports in the following output formats can be published from FRx Report Designer to the FRx WebPort repository:
FRx® DrillDown ViewerTM (Enhanced XML)
XML
HTML (Via Excel 2000)
ASCII
Microsoft® Excel
Lotus 1-2-3
OLAP cubes
Step 1- Install FRx Web Port: - Run FRx Installation Wizard from FRx CD - Select “Install FRx Web Port”
- Choose Setup Language as “English”
- Accept User License Agreement
- Select FRx Web Port Components.
- Choose Destination Folder, this folder will be shared after the installation and will hold all the published report of FRx Web Port.
- Enter the UNC share name for the FRx Web Port Folder.
- Enter Virtual Director Name For FRx @ IIS Default Web site.
- click on administration link. - Enter the registration info here and press update button.
Step 3- Publishing FRx reports to FRx Web Port: - Open FRx Report Designer, select any report. - Click On Output tab , then select web publishing tab. - Mark “Publish to Web” check box.
- Select “Web Location”, it will be the location of FRx Web port folder and the repository file. Like C:\FRxWebPort\Data\repository.xml
- Select Folder Name, by default “Repository” folder will appear. This is used to organize you reports on web port. You can setup your own desired folder to group you reports on Web Port using FRx Web Administrator ( Start >> Program >> FRx WebPort >> Web Administrator ) - Enter “Report Name”, this name will appear to the user on FRx Web Port.
- Generate the report. Step 4- View Published Report on FRx Web Port: - Open Internet browser, and type the following address http:///FRXWEBPORT like http://waqas/FRXWEBPORT
- On the main page published reports will appear.
- Click on the report, it will open in a new window.
Step 5- Publishing Non FRx reports to FRx Web Port: - Login to FRx Web Administrator
- Input Blank password to login for the first time, once you login to Web Administrator, you can sync web admin with FRx Report Designer user & passwords.
- Click on “New Report Link”
- Enter “Report Name” & select the Non FRx Report Location.
FRx provides an extend functionality to your financial reporting with linking Microsoft Excel or Lotus 1-2-3 files for reporting. Using linking option in FRx You can import data from one of these programs and combine the same with your data from general ledger. For example, you can import budget figures from a worksheet and then create a report that compares actual figures from the general ledger to the budget figures in worksheet. The other example would be linking the unit sold information from the excel to FRx and doing some analysis for unit sold with Gross profit.
Method of Linking External Worksheet
1-Combined Worksheet &
2-Separate worksheet link.
1-Combined Worksheet:
Using the combined method data can be referred in FRx using simple cell references in the same link column as your general ledger account codes. It is also the easiest method of linking External worksheet. By its Name itself, using this method means some rows in a given column of your report contain general ledger information while other rows in that same column contain worksheet data. Combined method is preferred when there is a requirement of importing limited data (such as headcount, units sold). Step 1 – Link The Row With External Worksheet:
- Open row format In FRx Report Designer
- Select Open Link menu or click the Link Form icon in the toolbar to display the Links dialog box.
- In the Link Type box, change General Ledger to GL + Worksheet.
- Accept the FRx Report Designer default value in the Link Name box, or if you would like to use your own link naming system, type a new name.
- In the Worksheet File Name box, click the arrow.
- In the Worksheet File dialog box, type or select the worksheet to use and click Open.
Note:
If you type a file without a full path, FRx Report Designer uses the path defined for the default IO_Data directory in the Company Information(FRx >> Company >> Information >> Import & Export Path) dialog box. The file name appears by default in the Link to GL + Worksheet header description.
- In the Optional Description box, you can type a description of the link for the reference.
- Click Save.
- Click Close.
Step 2 – Reference a Worksheet Cells in FRx Row Linking:
Here is the sample excel sheet which was linked in above step.
- In the row format, Type the following code in the link to General Ledger + WKS column ( H)
@WKS ( B=B5)
@WKS = A predefined code of FRx which instruct the row to look into External worksheet for data.
B= Column Layout Reference.
B5= Cell reference of External worksheet.
- Save the row and column layout.
- Create a report catalog with the newly created row & column layout.
Step 3 – Generate the Report:
- Here is the resultant report by GL & External worksheet linking.
2-Separate Worksheet Method:
You can use a separate worksheet link method to access multiple rows and columns of worksheet data and associate one or more external worksheets with one or more reporting units in the reporting tree. You create a special column in the row format that links to the worksheet cell addresses, and then add the worksheet file names to the reporting tree.
Note:
Linking to spreadsheets that have identical layouts reduces the number of link columns required in the row format and reduces maintenance time.
Step 1– Link the row with external Worksheet or many external sheets.
- Open row format
- Select Open Link menu or click the Link Form icon in the toolbar to display the Links dialog box.
- In the Link Type window, Click New Button and then change link type to Worksheet.
- Worksheet path will be disabled, it will be defined in Reporting Tree and details will be referred in column layout in next steps.
- Click Save.
- Click Close.
Step 2 – Reference a Worksheet Cells in FRx Row Linking:
- Here is the sample excel sheet which we will be linking
- Type the following in external worksheet link column ( i), which is worksheet column
B5 ( B5= Cell reference of External worksheet)
Step 3 – Setup Column Layout For Worksheet linking
- Open exiting or setup a new column layout.
- Add a new column with Type “WKS”, apart from WKS column you can also add additional Column for any calculation such as Variance calculation with Actual Vs Budget.
Step 4 – Setup Reporting Tree
- Open reporting Tree setup window to setup a new Reporting Tree.
- Select the company code, Type the unit code & Description.
- Click on Tree Menu and select tree form( FRx >> Reporting Tree >> Tree >> View Form )
Select the followings.
Row Format Name = Row format which we have setup in step 1 above.
GL Row Link = Name Of GL Link column in the row format to pull GL values.
Wks Link = Worksheet Link Column name from The row format
Wks File Name = Location of External worksheet
Note:
If you type a file without a full path, FRx Report Designer uses the path defined for the default IO_Data directory in the Company Information(FRx >> Company >> Information >> Import & Export Path) dialog box. The file name appears by default in the Link to GL + Worksheet header description.
- Save the reporting tree. Step 5 – Generate the Report:
- Setup a new report catalog with the Row, Column layout and reporting tree we have created above.
- Mark the check box, under Building Block Row format “Use Row Format and worksheet links information From Reporting Tree”
- Generate the report, Here is the resultant report by GL & External worksheet linking.
This was recently reported by one of customer as he was facing the following error while he starts FRx.
Apparently form the screen shot it seems an issue with SQL database access, but it is not. This error prompts when user runs the FRx rather logging to the FRX.
The error prompts when user does not have access to FRx 6.7 application folder.
To give access locate the FRx application folder most probably it will be “C:\Program Files\FRx Software”
-Right click on FRx 6.7 folder and select properties.
-Then Select security Tab.
-Then Select that particular user or group of users , and make sure they have read & write access to this folder.
