Ask Slashdot: Best Open Source CRM/ERP System For a Small Business? 163
An anonymous reader writes "One of my coworkers recently left the company, and I had to take over most of his responsibilities, including the maintenance and development of a homegrown CRM/ERP system. The system has evolved over more than a decade under the hands of at least four different developers and is based on Microsoft Access. Since I have been assigned this additional role, a day rarely passes without a user yelling for help because some part of the software is failing in strange and unpredictable ways, or some of the entered data has to be corrected manually in some obscure table in one of several database files. Without any exaggeration, some of the Visual Basic source code would be sufficient for several stories on The Daily WTF, and could make a grown man cry. Instead of spending further hours on optimizing this software i would rather like to start from scratch with some existing open-source CRM/ERP system that can be adapted to my companies needs. So far I have looked at and tested several CRM systems, including SugarCRM, vtiger, Feng Office (formerly known as opengoo), Zurmo and Fat Free CRM. Feng Office and Fat Free CRM look really nice and easy to use; the other ones could take a bit less bloat but are fine nevertheless. What software would you choose?"
Insightly (Score:1)
Just went through this nonsense. Switch to Insightly. It's easy and it works better than the open source alternatives, plus you don't have to host it.
Re:Insightly (Score:4, Interesting)
"Just went through this nonsense. Switch to Insightly. It's easy and it works better than the open source alternatives, plus you don't have to host it."
Insightly is CRM. It doesn't do ERP.
But that brings up a good point: CRM and ERP are fundamentally different tasks. I doubt OP will find many packages that do both well. My suggestion would be to look for them separately.
Re:Insightly (Score:5, Insightful)
But that brings up a good point: CRM and ERP are fundamentally different tasks.
Yes, but the poster probably doesn't really know what he wants, and has probably never managed any sort of big project before. I have been working in the software industry for 30 years, and I can assure you that a "new guy" confronted with a complex system always recommends throwing everything away and starting over. But that is almost never the correct answer. Real world implementations don't look like the textbook examples that college students are used to, but doesn't make them "wrong". The existing implementation looks complex because it codifies hundreds of special business rules, such as discounts for the boss's friends, special commission arrangements with a particular salesperson, etc. You can't just throw out those rules, so you end up maintaining the old system simultaneously with trying to implement the new system. But your resources are split between these two tasks, so requests for fixes get backlogged, while the new implementation drags on for years. Meanwhile the "new guy" has left the company in frustration, and when the new ERP/CRM/WTF system is finally ready, it is a complete mess, and a fresh new guy recommends throwing it out and starting over. I have been around this loop many, many times.
CRM and ERP (Score:2)
can anybody give some specific examples of what CRM and ERP are used for in a big company? I know what the acronym stands for, but I don't know what they mean in real life.
Re:CRM and ERP (Score:4, Informative)
ERP is used for tracking all internal transactions and workflow within a company. For instance, you type in information about what you're buying to make widgets into a Purchase Orders form, and this allows you to print a report version of the purchase order that you can email over to your vendor. Then, when the stuff shows up at the doc, you enter in the quantity of all the stuff that showed up, and your inventory goes up by that amount. When the invoices arrive, you can check to make sure you're not paying for anything that didn't show up.
Every time you enter a transaction, it appears in your financial ledger as a pair of transactions - a debit and a credit. This way, the accountants constantly know where you're making money and where there might be cost savings.
The idea is that by journaling all work in a structured data kind of way, it cuts down on lots of work required to reformat and communicate that information and generally speeds up the pace of business.
CRM is a smaller piece of this where you're entering details about conversations with customers and track the status of sales proposals. It's often disconnected from the general ledger and financial statements.
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If your systems are any good your ERP and CRM will be linked, often with a content management system thrown in as well. For instance you want to be able to look up your customers orders, invoices, etc when you're talking to them so those will get pulled from the content management system and you might want to be able to pull their current balance so you'll need to be able to talk to your ERP system. If all these systems are islands it's a LOT harder on the customer rep. The fact that most of these systems a
Re:CRM and ERP (Score:5, Informative)
The answer is "it depends on the nature of the business".
Generally speaking, CRM covers front office business processes, while ERP covers back office business processes. However, these kinds of software are often vertically integrated (i.e. targeted at specific kinds of organisations/industries), and so at times the terms are used interchangeably.
CRM is primarily focused on the sales & marketing processes. ERP is commonly is primarily focused on getting the things you need to sell ready to sell (e.g. purchasing, manufacturing, hiring/developing employees/contractors) and managing the ordering/billing/delivery aspects of the sale. Both typically overlap in capabilities around sales.
CRM and ERP typically have different perspectives. CRM is typically customer-oriented, intended to create and build/maintain relationship with customers through managing the interaction with the customer, both directly and through sales/service partners. ERP is typically product-oriented, intended to make sure the organisation and its suppliers work together efficiently and effectively (from the point of view of being ready to meet market demand).
As a result, while large organisations typically have both, smaller organisations will have a variant of one or the other as their primary system. Smaller organisations where systemising the prepation and delivery of product is the focus will use an ERP (e.g. manufacturing), while smaller organisations where the relationship is the focus (e.g. close collaboration with the customer is required to get the sale and/or deliver the right product so the customer will become a repeat customer) will use a CRM (e.g. professional services).
Getting back to vertical integration, if a particular CRM is targeted at the professional services industry, it may include personnel/project management even though that's normally an ERP function; conversely, if an ERP is targeted at FMCG distributors, it may include sales partner program management so you can manage you distribution channels even through that's a CRM function.
Hope that helps.
Re:Insightly (Score:5, Interesting)
The existing implementation looks complex because it codifies hundreds of special business rules, such as discounts for the boss's friends, special commission arrangements with a particular salesperson, etc. You can't just throw out those rules, so you end up maintaining the old system simultaneously with trying to implement the new system.
The issue isn't that setting up a new system is wrong; the issue is that there is no documentation or specification for the existing setup, therefore it's not actually possible to do anything with it. Generally, nobody in the business that is supposed to be responsible for or understand the business requirements are prepared to spend any time formulating them. What's left is for the implementers to determine business rules as best they can, due to apathy from management. Which turns into scapegoating when the system doesn't function according to the spec that existing in people's heads, but never anywhere the implementers could see it.
I've been around that loop many times, too.
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The existing implementation looks complex because it codifies hundreds of special business rules, such as discounts for the boss's friends, special commission arrangements with a particular salesperson, etc. You can't just throw out those rules, so you end up maintaining the old system simultaneously with trying to implement the new system. But your resources are split between these two tasks, so requests for fixes get backlogged, while the new implementation drags on for years.
I've seen both sides of this argument. I have seen companies try to replace a system and be unable to replicate the functionality that they need in a new system. On the other hand I've seen companies decide after trying to replicate poorly documented business rules in new software that they need to take a long hard look at all the rules and jettison most of the software customization that is unique to the business. Some of it is there for reasons that no longer apply. Some customization is no longer used. S
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They all suck for specifics. _All_ of them. If it's not written specifically for your business, you're not going to be very happy. If you want something that's not perfect pretty much by definition, you might as well consider something from Apache [apache.org].
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Fine for me in FF.
The cert MD5 fingerprint is: 85:A3:B9:6E:6D:98:CB:FA:6B:E8:DB:3F:0F:88:F3:BC (typed by hand because FF won't let me copy/paste, blah)
SHA1: bc 5f 40 92 fd 6a 49 aa f8 b8 35 0d ed 27 5e a6 64 c1 7a 1b (woo, chrome lets you copy paste)
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AFTER taking half of forever to compile, OFBiz took about 5 minutes just to start! I could have rebooted my Mac 3 times or more in the same amount of time.
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Don't complain to me. I *told* you you wouldn't be happy.
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I wasn't complaining. Just making the observation.
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See, /. gets bought out by Dice, and suddenly someone looking for advice gets hammered by some idiot salesman from "Unsightly". Oh and it work better than all the open source alternatives, not just brand A or brand B, but all of them altogether!
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Just went through this nonsense. Switch to Insightly. It's easy and it works better than the open source alternatives, plus you don't have to host it.
You are recommending an American hosted solution for someone to trust his business secrets to? You haven't been paying attention lately.
Pay for what you get (Score:2)
That includes network admins.
SAP (Score:1, Funny)
Obviously.
(Yes, this should be modded flame-bait.)
Re:SAP (Score:5, Funny)
That's just mean.
Sure he's a poor unlucky sap but you don't have to yell it.
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The anonymous reader is looking for something free. SAP is short for "Send Another Payment" which is a literal translation of the original German, "Scheiß Aufs Privatleben."
Sort of.
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The anonymous reader is looking for something free. SAP is short for "Send Another Payment"
SAP is decidedly not "free", BUT zero licensing cost is not free either.
Sometimes the most expensive option you can pick will be the free one!
The important thing to remember is software license cost is not your only cost.
Time and energy have to be invested in deploying whichever solution you pick and making it work; in other words, shoehorning the software into the role, customizing as necessary, and forcin
Why, Opentaps, of course! (Score:5, Informative)
It's what we use. Very powerful and flexible and it covers most ERP areas. It also gives you easy path to running in the cloud if you want to do that, though we're running it on our own machines.
Out of the box solution is going to have pushback (Score:5, Insightful)
Getting the information from your old system to an out of the box solution is going to be a huge hassle, and you will probably end up losing a lot of data in the process. You should look into having a developer improve or streamline the current system instead of trying to push a one size fits all solution down everyone's throat.
Granted, every organization and every situation is different. I would stay away from anything that you can't host in house, because you'll be blamed when the company goes belly-up and loses all of your information.
Re:Out of the box solution is going to have pushba (Score:5, Informative)
Getting the information from your old system to an out of the box solution is going to be a huge hassle, and you will probably end up losing a lot of data in the process. You should look into having a developer improve or streamline the current system instead of trying to push a one size fits all solution down everyone's throat.
I agree with this, except for a blaring situation: the existing solution is a hodgepodge of VB and Access code. I'm dealing with something very similar at work...
One of our clients recently acquired someone else. Among them was a custom Access "application". It *must* be launched from a standalone executable, which *must* be run as administrator, and as best we can tell, requires a metric ton of DNS redirects because it pulls data from all over the network using server names instead of FQDNs or IP addresses, has a wheelbarrow full of security warnings due to extensive use of macros, fails in any version of Access except 2003...and cost the company over a quarter million dollars ten years ago. The amount of duct tape and string that this thing is being held together by is ridiculous, and it NEEDS to be moved into some sort of legit server/browser situation, since it literally will not run without reordering one's entire system around it. Now yes, we could (and are) tracing out those servers so we can add DNS entries to allow for domain traversal, but it still won't run on anything except Access 2003 without extensive rewriting, and the consulting firm that made it is no longer in business so we can't just "call the vendor".
Between the two options of "add more duct tape" and "deal with all kinds of pain and agony to make it somewhat standards compliant and run in a browser using some MS-SQL and HTML/PHP/ASP.NET*", it makes more sense to invest our time in a manner that will make it continue to run long after Access 2003 fails to install anymore.
*Yes, I know, the Microsoft database/web platform situation isn't exactly "standards compliant", but remember that we're coming from a Microsoft Access database, so getting data into tables is significantly easier than MariaDB or Postgres...and even if we end up in a similar situation where we can't upgrade the database beyond, for example, Server 2008/SQL Server 2008/IIS 7.0, at least that's server-side, can live in a virtual machine (and thus the hardware can be upgraded in time), and it's an internally facing setup anyway so security doesn't need to be as crucial a focus as if it were being pounded from the outside. If we're still there in 2018, that's fine - end user desktops can be changed whenever and it won't be nearly as big of a problem.
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Erm, why would you ever(!?) prefer hard coded IP addresses over domain names?
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I have to agree with this. I tried (and tried and tried) to move my company's ailing VB-based CRM system to a OOTB solution, but none of the platforms I tried (Sugar, VTiger, and a few others) really did what we needed. Either too much or too little complexity and customisation with each.
In the end I gave up and spent a week designing, and then another two weeks implementing, the first version of a custom-built solution using Zend Framework (yes sorry, feel free to snarl at my framework/language choice, but
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"Getting the information from your old system to an out of the box solution is going to be a huge hassle, and you will probably end up losing a lot of data in the process."
It is absolutely possible for someone that has a clue how to work with databases to get the information from on to the other without losing anything. Unles the origional system was written in VB6 and is using some wierd ass system you cant run SQL queries or stored proceeders on.
Get the data out as a dump, and a little perl or python an
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Having seen a few custom Access jobs in my time, I can tell you first-hand that, more often than not, you're lucky if the data is normalized, much less organized in any sane, sensible way. I've seen tables where there are "Serial Number 1", "Serial Number 2", and "Serial Nu
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Even if the Schema doesnt match, you drop the rest in the "NOTES" field that they all have, this is Databases 101 stuff.
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Sorry, but you've NEVER actually done a CRM/ERP migration have you?
Yeah. You're right. You can drop field data that doesn't schema-match into the notes fields.
However, a lot of that stuff isn't going to make sense to future users because there's no longer any context for it.
In which case, you may as well be dumping in random characters.
Also, not every setup supports raw copy/dumps in a forward-compatible manner.
Sure, the data may appear on the server. But in some cases, it won't sync because it wasn't br
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Just switched to a process driven system intended to funnel requests through their workflow.
It works for what it was designed to do. But once data goes in, it stays there. What was that thing I did for that user? Don't know, can't find it. That guy who left, he wrote something that solved a problem, was there any specific error checking that made it work? No idea.
Historical data was not a selling point, and was not considered by the people who bought it, and now I'm stuck with it.
The worst case is trac
Since when is ERP out of box? (Score:3)
ERP software is not an out of box application. It is a development platform for creating line of business apps. It should be treated like a web app framework. It provides a user interface and workflow engine along with a set of modules that you can implement on top to provide accounting, inventory control, and other business functions. But it has to be programmed, and you also may have to modify your business procedures to better work within the confines of the framework as well.
Perhaps that is why do many
OpenERP? (Score:3)
It's been a long time since I took a look at it, but it's been around quite a while. I don't see it in your list, so it's probably worth you at least checking it out.
Re: OpenERP? (Score:1)
I have a similar situation. I use dbconvert to put what useful data from
access to postgres. export spreadsheets from Recon/quickbooks. Read data into OpenERP massaging on the way. I have had to modify OpenERP to suit our specific needs. I would recommend using version 7.0. The doco is better and the API is also much improved. There is a steep learning curve but that goes to all ERP systems.
OpenERP handles both CRM and ERP, which falls within your requirements. But don"t be naive and think that porti
Tryton is a better choice (Score:4, Informative)
OpenERP has issues that you might not want to deal with. Some technical like using floats where decimals should be for example, and some political, similar to what SQL Ledger went through (OpenERP is commercially backed and some fundamental needs as well as developer/integrator participation requires $$$). The real pain point is that it has no supported upgrade path between major releases, and the people who run the project actively interfere with community efforts to provide upgrade tools that are open. Upgrading seems to be seen as a primary part of their business model.
Tryton is a fork of OpenERP community edition managed by a nonprofit group of developer-users. It's code base has diverged a fair bit by now and is much more solid, and I've been able to upgrade between releases without the hassle as testing and migration abilities are considered important core priorities.
Might be worth considering...
Sugar CRM (Score:3)
It's a little flaky, but no more than systems you pay a lot of money for..
Of course, it really depends on how well it meets your requirements..
Get serious about your selection process (Score:5, Insightful)
You write "CRM/ERP" like the two are related in some way, but apart from both using a database they do extremely different things.
A true ERP system is orders of magnitudes larger and more complex than any CRM system, and while you can find examples of ERP systems with embedded CRM modules the reverse is not true. No CRM vendor - free or otherwise - has produced an ERP system.
Don't mix the two. It is like comparing a train with a motorcycle. They both have wheels and transport people, but beyond that ...
Before you proceed any further I strongly suggest you read up on the meaning of those two TLAs. And you need to analyze your needs - not just pull a new IT system out if your (or slashdots) a**.
Here is what you should be doing.
1.) Understand what these systems do. Wikipedia and the various vendors own descriptions are a good place to start.
2.) Make a list of your business needs. Do you need Marketing functionality in your CRM? Or Sales Forecasting? How about ERP - do you need product life cycles agent? Shop floor time registration? Production management? And what about support? Hosting?
3.) Make a list of your technical requirements. Like if you need toolbars that plug into MS Office, integrations with other systems, and your options for management reporting tools.
4.) Collect information about the system vendors and products you think mach your needs.
5.) Make a gap-fit analysis between the vendors you have identified, and your list if business requirements.
6.) You end up with a winner.
This will take a few days; but at least you'll be doing things right. Your company will be stuck with your choice of system for yet another decade so you need to be professional and serious about all this.
- Jesper
Re:Get serious about your selection process (Score:4, Insightful)
While it's true that there is a large market for CRM systems that do not require ERP, there is a significant market of ERP users that require CRM support from their ERP.
However, I do agree that the odds of finding a single solution that is good at both is unlikely. The author would be better off looking for seperate systems that support easy customization and extension so they can be tied together. While this will require some work, the odds of success are much greater.
One thing I would recommend: make sure the systems use a real database like PostgreSQL, DB/2 UDB, or Oracle. Those four support "SELECT...FOR UPDATE" syntax properly, which makes it possible to implement embracing locks between two seperate databases for a dual-system solution. MySQL with appropriate extensions and table configuration will work as well, but the odds are that either or both of the systems selected won't be coded to use those extensions, making it a very risky proposition. Sybase ASE and Microsoft SQL server do not support "SELECT...FOR UPDATE" syntax properly, so you can't implement embracing locks with those databases, despite their performance and popularity -- they cut corners and require a completely different (and more difficult) style of coding to achieve the same effect.
Ideally you want databases in the back end that can support two-phase XA commits rather than coding embracing locks, but that limits your database options even further, and comes with it's own set of technical challenges.
Of course if you can get away with generating a "report" from one system that is "imported" by the other, batch-style rather than having deep integration between the two, your job will be much easier. Don't let the wish lists of your users obstruct the focus on meeting the core needs of the business. Just because someone wants to hit a function key and be taken to the appropriate screen in the CRM system from the ERP doesn't mean that they have to have that functionality to do their job.
Remember, the most important thing to do is to get management buy-in on the risk and expense of the data and functionality migration. If you don't have buy-in from management and the ability to say no to unrealistic or unnecessary user demands, you're dead before you started.
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Typo: "those three" databases, not those four.
The selection of a database is key to success when dealing with systems integration. Don't let the rah-rah fanbois and sales reps tell you otherwise.
Re: Get serious about your selection process (Score:2)
If it is a proper system then integration is done through an application layer and not directly on the storage layer.
Hacking two systems together using the storage area is a method from the 70s which you really should abandon if at all possible.
Few scenarios may still warrant that approach. But they are few. Very few. And probably not present in a small company.
- Jesper
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BEGIN TRANSACTION;
SET TRANSACTION ISOLATION LEVEL REPEATABLE READ;
COMMIT TRANSACTION;
Alternatively you can use the WITH( REPEATABLEREAD) table hint when you select (but you still have to use transactions).
There are also implicit transactions and a lot of other ways to control concurrency...
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Repeatable read is not the same as SELECT...FOR UPDATE.
Select for update lets you pin the data, analyze it, and then update it consistently with the values you read. While delta id's can let you detect update collisions with SQL Server and Sybase ASE, you have to write very platform specific code that updates the record, does it's analysis, and if no update is actually required, either rolls back the transaction or updates the delta id back to it's initial value.
What really sucks is that both SQL Serv
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i.e. With SQL Server and Sybase you have to do something like:
UPDATE mytable SET deltaid = last-known-value-of-delta-id + 1;
// do analysis and calculations // To undo the lock without changes, or
// Repeat for any other records you need to update
SELECT * FROM mytable;
UPDATE mytable SET deltaid = last-known-value-of-delta-id
UPDATE mytable SET foo = updated-value;
COMMIT;
This is an absolute HACK of a way to code around the lack of SELECT...FOR UPDATE which lets you far more concisely do:
SELECT *
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I'll have to look into that. I've never heard of an UPDLOCK clause.
Figures Microsquishy would have some incompatabible syntax for doing the same thing as the standards. :(
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Came here to say essentially the same thing - GET REQUIREMENTS. No matter which road you end up choosing, the requirements will make choices much clearer, and their objective nature will give you a buffer against the business folks who agreed to them, but want the flaming logo on Wednesdays.
I did this a few years ago for a decent-sized telecom, that wanted to get rid of dozens of home-built systems in favor of telecom-specific ERP type software (usually called OSS for this industry). The RFP was a bust (n
ERP for "small business"?! (Score:2)
I just have to point out a bit of a seeming discrepancy here. From the wiki article on ERP:
> However, information tools like ERP are expensive, and not a practical method for medium or small business owners.
Re: ERP for "small business"?! (Score:2)
I might head over to Wikipedia to correct that error.
It is really not the size of the company that matters, but the complexity if it's business processes.
A well-implemented ERP can do miracles for a production company with as little as 30 employees, as long as the production is sufficiently complex to warrant the kind of investment (both economically and time) that an ERP systems requires.
Hell, I've helped implement ERP for an 11-man business; though I will admit they were a very special and specific case.
-
Go with with the pros use (Score:2, Funny)
Go with MS-SQL Express. It is free and it has been very, very good to me. Access? Only for beginners. You have been at it 10 years now so you can move up to big boy software: MS-SQL Express. Did I mention it was free? It is free so enjoy. If you want to continue to use VB you may but I recommend also moving up to big boy software, MS .NET, and c sharp. You will need to hunker down and learn to rid yourself of your VB ways, but you need to learn new skills if you want to play with the big boys.
To c
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Clueless fellow who doesn't even understand what he's replying to.
The OP did not write it. He inherited it. VB was not his choice.
This isn't "How do I go rewrite this crap" but "I'm all for tossing every vestige of this out the door; does anyone have a replacement?"
And while we're at it:
SQL Express?
Go with Postgres or something else that scales in terms of systems rather than wallets.
Mod parent up; +1 funny (Score:2)
Mod parent up; +1 funny.
It can't be anything other than a morbid kind of twisted and dark humor.
It has to be. Please. ... ... please ... /J
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I thought it was satire.
OpenERP (Score:2)
Salesforce.com (Score:2)
...or some other SAAS solution. Really, there is almost no reason to do this on-prem anymore. If you are idealogically open source, then sure, you are legitimate exception. Just be sure the "you" in that case is "your organization", not "you personally".
Obvious choice (Score:2)
Re: Obvious choice (Score:2)
Masochist.
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I was always a fan of CRM114...
Masochist.
Yes, I think he's some kind of deviated prevert. I think General Ripper found out about his preversion, and he's organizing some kind of mutiny of preverts.
Depends on your resources and your requirements. (Score:1)
Will an off the shelf system meet the needs of your business?
You obviously already have a database that was built in house. It probably did what it was first meant to do well but scope creep over the years has totally destroyed the original vision (been there, done that).
Given that, could you feasibly do a re-write? Migrate to a better back end, to a better language. Can you break the current system into bite sized parts and convert them little by little?
Sugar, SalesForce etc etc etc are great IF they su
xTuple (Score:2)
xTuple is a possibility, as are a number of midrange packages depending on your industry (e.g. Visual Manufacturing for machine shops / small make-to-stock operations). But you really need to get a handle on your requirements and budget first. Budget includes not only dollars but willingness of director-level managers to second key players onto the implementation team for as long as it takes. If you can't get that, well, time to get the resume to the headhunters.
If you tell us what your line of business
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I'd say +1 on xTuple, but you've got far more insight than I.
I was about to suggest that myself; my brother demonstrated it recently at a smallish manufacturing company he works for. IIRC, they ended up going for the commercial version.
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X2Engine or OpenObjects (Score:1)
SugarCRM is very mature, and has a built-in "Developer Studio" where you can create new modules, add new fields, and so on. The only downside is when you need to do complicated stuff, then you need to hire a PHP developer to write custom actions for you. Another missing feature in the Community Edition is a proper Workflow Engine.
X2Engine comes with a workflow engine which is an awesome feature when you need status that function based on a certain logical business process.
And of course for me the ultimate s
SFDC, Workday, done. (Score:4, Interesting)
Forget maintaining / rolling your own. Doesn't make ANY sense, especially when this thing got dropped in your lap.
Salesforce.com for CRM.
Workday for ERP.
Sleep at night. Priceless.
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Replying to myself, but just to prove the theory .... even huge companies are going this route.
http://www.citeworld.com/social/21940/salesforce-chatter-communities-hp [citeworld.com]
http://allthingsd.com/20130319/seven-questions-for-the-man-shaking-up-hps-operations-john-hinshaw/ [allthingsd.com]
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I've implemented on premise solutions for ERP and CRM. While SAAS is the flavor of the month at the moment there are some real issues with it. Let's start with Workday. You cannot customize it in any way....outside of simple mods like changing field labels. You cannot create your own custom pages, records, fields, or code. Period.
In 15 years of implementing ERP systems I have never been to a client that didn't have a need to customize something to fit the way they do business. Not one...in 15 years. For a s
The obviously stupid question. (Score:2)
Let me ask it here -- just what is an ERP supposed to do?
-- hendrik
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An ERP system allows you to run your business. It's generally a suite of applications or modules that cover production, ordering, inventory management, accounting...all the things that make the business run. The system can be something relatively simple and generic that can apply to almost any company in a basic way, or it can be extremely complex and highly customized, specific to only a single company.
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Thanks. That's the first straightforward explanation I've seen. Most explanations I've seen consist of acronym soup.
There are presumably well-known, generic applications in the prepackaged ERP systems, and they have enough hooks that it's possible to add code that changes their sources of data, their results, and enables you to write completely new applications that use their output and provide their input.
-- hendrik
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Once upon a time, all organisations of any significant size had an in-house 'Computer Department', with systems analysts, and programmers, and computer rooms, and operations teams ... which provided bespoke custom-developed applications suites to perform all the business functions that organisation depended upon. These custom applications worked more or less well.
Then, along came the Big Bad articles in CEO magazine, which convinced the CEO to liberate herself from the need to employ all those IT weirdos
A successfuk ERP conversion (Score:3)
There was a paper presented at a Lisp/Scheme - related conference a few years ago about how someone managed to wrestle an ERP system (whatever that was) into submission.
It started out as hundreds of thousands of lines in C or C++ (I forget which).
They decided they wanted to add a scripting language to it.
They picked Gambit/C, an implementation of Scheme that can be compiled to C, and can also be interpreted.
Gradually, when they had trouble with particular parts of their huge system, they discovered it was often easier to rewrite them in the scripting language than to fix the C code. Gradually, over a few years, hundreds of thousands of lines of C code were replaced by about 30,000 lines of Gambit. And it ran faster in the scripting language (which could be compiled, after all) than it had formerly run in C. And it had more features.
If you can accomplish a major rewrite an improvement incrementally, you can probably achieve continuity of operation that would be difficult any other way.
Now I don't know how Gambit would link with Microsoft's BASIC. But there's probably a way, and perhaps you should look into it.
You might want to communicate with Marc Feely, the Gambit/C author about the possibilities.
The Gambit/C mailing list is at https://webmail.iro.umontreal.ca/mailman/listinfo/gambit-list [umontreal.ca]
Yes, there's a server misconfiguration that may prompt your browser to give scary messages, but that's the URL.
The main page of the Gambit wiki is at http://dynamo.iro.umontreal.ca/wiki/index.php/Main_Page [umontreal.ca]
-- hendrik
Re:A successfuk ERP conversion (Score:4, Informative)
Actually you are mixing 2 stories.
JazzScheme backend was redone in Gambit/C and Cairo about 5 years ago, that was the "hundreds of thousands of lines of C code were replaced by about 30,000 lines of Gambit." The project owner is Guillaume Cartier, but Marc Feeley and some of his students were involved.
The ERP project build using JazzScheme flopped some time ago for the usual reasons.
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Thanks for the update. I stend corrected. Maybe the typo in the subject "successfuk" for "successful" wasn't all that wrong.
-- hendrik
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Yeah, the typo was perfect.
We've been using OpenERP 7 (Score:1)
As a small company we've been using OpenERP 7 for quite a while and it works for most of the tasks. We've been rolling out features very carefully and slowly, 'cause OpenERP is a big beast.
ADempiere (Score:2)
Support is available, as well.
Pronto.net (Score:2)
pronto.net [pronto.net]. Not Open Source although you can get a developers license that allows you to compile 4GL programs. If the business is worth running, then it's worth paying for mature software and support. Very rich suite of applications, including CRM, inventory, warehouse, project costing, POS, payroll, ARAP, plant maintenance, hire, assets, RFI, etc
Openbravo (Score:2)
Filemaker (Score:1)
Laugh all you want, but Filemaker has come a long way. Vendors who bid to replace ours walk away in shame.
Google Filemaker ERP CRM
The poster is looking for a magic bullet (Score:2)
An therefore is asking the wrong questions. The first questions should be:
1) What does the current system do?
2) What should the current system do?
3) What is the value in what it does?
If what the current system does has no or little value, then throwing it away without a thought is not a bad idea. If there is value in it then what is it that gives the job it does value? What is there that the system cannot do that should be done? Also, one should ask what are the potential negative consequences from migratin
Just ask System of a Down (Score:2)
There generally isn't a "best alternative" (Score:2)
When trying to replace an in-house system for something as business-critical as ERP and CRM (basically, everything your business does, and everyone you talk to), even when that system is based on as simple a solution as MS Access, any potential solution is going to require significant customization from its out-of-the-box state to (1) work, and (2) work the way your business wants it to work - remember, that the current business workflow both depends on the way the application works and also defines the way
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Open Source CRM + Custom-made code in Gambas (Score:1)
Re: Who is to blame? (Score:1)
Yeah, probably yelling at the other guy. Now it's OP's problem. :/
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Uh yes they should worry, if they want autonomy as a business. While the current system sucks, replacing it with some remote company that doesn't give any more fucks than it has to to keep the contract is not the answer either. The 'cloud' is a not a magic fix-all no matter what the idiotic hype says.
Re: (Score:2)
Its definitely not free, but it seems to work as well as any other ERP I have ever come across. The cloud means the support is outsourced but availability and functionality are fine. Frankly I am surprised by how well it works, I am very suspicious of IT bullshit - having worked on both sides of the fence.
Re:Obvious (Score:5, Insightful)
I take it you've never worked with end users.
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I agree. That's why you do research. You need to bring to the table the best possible options. Users know what their job is, but they don't know how to tell a good system apart from a bad one. You don't pick for them, but you need to narrow it down to prevent the paradox of choice problem.
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I want a pony, I want a sports car, I want ice cream, I WANT EVERYTHING AND NOTHING AT THE SAME TIME!!!
And then next week all of their decisions change yet again.
Never EVER ask the users.
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Take time to look and see what they are doing. It's a silly secret technique used only bu ninjas and shadow operatives. It's called research.
Re: (Score:2)
Oh do tell us what makes something that looks like it came from 1998 "shit". I presume you have some problem with anything from before your birth. Most business software looks like "shit" of course and with good reason - its not used to play games.
Re: Now you know... (Score:2)
Actually it is a decent tool nowadays.
You can use it as the presentation layer for a SQL server (including non-MSSQL servers).
I used to hate it as well, but if you just use it without storing data locally it's not half bad. Not anyone anyway.
Re: Dont waste your time (Score:2)
Because SF is extremely expensive once your requirements leave the nice little cheap basic package they push on you - and you always end up with a gazillion added costs?
Marketing and BS is the only way they ever became a successful business. Their product isn't so bad; just extremely overpriced for what it does. Really. In a big way. /J
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OpenERP does. Probably doesn't have the right rules for your state/province/territory but only took me less then a week of work to take nothing to a working system and the company has been using it for around 9 months with anything more then tweaks.