As a temporary workaround for the Internet Explorer 9 memory hogging problem described earlier, PC-Topp Terminal pages will automatically refresh every 60 minutes, causing a momentary flicker, and potentially displaying the start page of the terminal (and not the page that was last being viewed). We do however watch out for ongoing user interaction and delay the refresh until we are have not seen any user interaction with the page for a reasonable time.

This workaround now makes it possible to use Internet Explorer 9 with PC-Topp's terminal pages without suffering the effects of long term memory loss inside Internet Explorer 9.

However, any other problems Internet Explorer 9 still has will not disappear with this trick, so users may still experience browser failures and similar effects in PC-Topp under IE9, the same effects Internet Explorer 9 users experience in popular Internet services like Google's www.gmail.com.

Internet Explorer 9

When working with PC-Topp.NET in Internet Explorer 9 you may face difficulties like unexpectedly high memory usage or browser crashes.

These are Internet Explorer 9 specific problems; in Internet Explorer 8 PC-Topp.NET is stable and runs with the usual reliabilty.

Microsoft has admitted the memory hogging problem in Internet Explorer 9 (see http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2572253/en-us); concerning the browser crashes a Microsoft statement is still pending.

Our developers are currently trying to find a workaround. However, in the meantime resp. as long as there is no official Microsoft fix we recommend using PC-Topp.NET with Internet Explorer 8. We will inform you via this blog as soon as there is a solution available.

 

Internet Explorer Add-Ons

No matter which version of Internet Explorer you are using, Internet Explorer add-ons can cause performance and stability problems in PC-Topp.NET.

Therefore, we advise you to disable all Internet Explorer add-ons like search engine toolbars, social networking tools etc., except those you absolutely need.

You can find instructions on how to disable add-ons here:
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows-vista/Internet-Explorer-add-ons-frequently-asked-questions

We are currently reorganizing our customer response management to further improve our customer support in terms of reaction time and solution quality. In order to streamline our handling of customer inquiries we have introduced a new central e-mail address for support requests. As of now, please exclusively use this e-mail address if you need our support.

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Nouvelle adresse de support de PC-Topp

Afin d’améliorer notre support concernant le temps de réaction et la qualité des solutions nous avons réorganisé le système de réponses de nos clients.  Nous avons introduit une adresse e-mail centrale spécialement conçue pour les demandes de support : Désormais, veuillez utiliser uniquement cette adresse si vous avez besoin  de notre support.

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Neue Mailadresse für den PC-Topp-Support

Wir reorganisieren derzeit unser Kundenreaktionsmanagement, um unseren Kundensupport im Hinblick auf Antwortgeschwindigkeit und Qualität der angebotenen Lösungen zu verbessern. Zur Optimierung der Bearbeitung von Kundenanfragen haben wir eine neue zentrale E-Mail-Adresse für Support-Anfragen eingerichtet. Bitte wenden Sie sich ab sofort ausschließlich an diese Adresse, wenn Sie per E-Mail Support anfordern möchten.

support@pctopp.com

Alternatively you can give us a call on / Ou bien vous pouvez nous appeler au / Oder rufen Sie uns an unter +49 (911) 994000

In March 2010 Microsoft will release a Windows update including a browser choice screen that asks you to select your preferred web browser. (Microsoft does so to comply with the settlement with the EU in autumn 2009.) When that Windows update is run on your computer this is what you will see. (Click to enlarge.)

Screen 1	Screen 2

PC-Topp.NET is designed exclusively for Internet Explorer (version 7 or higher) and is not supported under any other browser.

Selecting a standard browser other than Internet Explorer will start PC-Topp.NET in an unsupported browser. This will lead to serious malfunction of PC-Topp.NET!

Therefore we strongly recommend not to select a browser in the browser choice screen but to inform your system administrator!

It might even be advisable for him to disable the browser choice screen altogether.

How to Block the Browser Choice Screen (Microsoft Education Partner Network)

The PC-Topp.NET backup functionality now better ensures that in case of data loss there is a current backup available.

• If a backup has failed a warning message is displayed throughout the system.
• The system checks for the last successful backup and, if necessary, prompts the user to run backup more often.

When running an automatic backup PC-Topp now creates a backup of the last existing archive folder.

The new Statistics Terminal is much like the Planning Terminal but doesn't allow planning. It targets technical personnel charged with system maintenance tasks like parameter changes or correction of the statistics who need access to most functions but are not supposed to have access to planning.

The PC-Topp.NET menu bar now offers drop-down sub-menus for all menu items that allow faster navigation to all major functionalities.

There is a new red alert box in the My PC-Topp section of the main menu page. It warns you if there is something badly wrong with the system itself, or certain planning situations have occurred that require your attention.

Of course, that notification is only visible on the PC-Topp start page, and so you don't miss an alert while working on a different page, we have added a Red Alert icon on all other pages (top right, near the Print Preview icon). It flashes for 15 seconds after a problem was first found, and then remains on screen, but less prominently, until the problem condition is resolved. A click on the icon takes you to the home page where the problem can be seen in detail.

The system alerts you to difficulties of the following kind:

• An order has arrived in the order data transfer that can't be produced in time.
• The production statistics need to be archived because they contain records that are older than 6 months (6 months are the default setting and can be changed to a different value.)
• Some station is blocking backup.
• The Program Memory has to be cleared up because someone forgot to delete the produced programs promptly.
• A problem occurred during the transfer of Paper Stock data:
  • The host system has sent a paper code that is unknown to PC-Topp.
  • The stock for a particular paper and roll size appears more than once in the file.
  • The stock date is either incorrect, in the future, or too far in the past.
  • Incorrect numeric values appeared for roll size or stock.

(The number of problems reported like this will grow in the future.)

Clicking on the customer name, a machine code or any of the other links in an order takes you to a page showing orders e.g. by customer or by machine. However, it used to be hard to find the order you clicked on on that page - it could be hidden from view, or it could be necessary to page forward or backward to get it on the screen at all.

PC-Topp.NET now offers new functionality to make navigating between different order views much easier: When you click on a link in an order, the page that appears will always show the order you clicked on, usually near the top of the page, and the order will be marked by a small black arrow on the left so you can spot it as soon as the page opens.

Not only does this new feature make your work with PC-Topp.NET more comfortable but it also lets you navigate back and forth from one order view to the next and back again rapidly and with ease. No more loss of orientation while browsing the different order views, no more tedious searching for the original order in a new context.

This works in any page, whether it shows a list of orders or just the summary of one order.

But where are the drawings?

In more and more plants, drawings are available for the article, the print specification or the forme, and a click on, for example, the Stereo Number brought up that drawing. Now, that same link takes you to a page showing all orders using that stereo.

The drawing is now accessed by clicking the little icon to the left of that link, usually a tiny PDF icon. If a drawing is available, then the icon is active (=red) and clicking on it will bring up the desired drawing. When it is inactive (greyed out), then no drawing is available.

In the classical PC-Topp screens, it is very easy to locate an order with the Find Order function which can be accessed at any time by pressing the question mark key.

This function is now available in many PC-Topp.NET pages, and it works even better than before.

"Find Order" on the PC-Topp.NET Order Pages

There is a new box in the PC-Topp.NET toolbox called "Order Number" where you can input an order number and then press "Enter". PC-Topp.NET will mark the desired order with a small black arrow, provided it is in the batch of orders currently displayed on the page.

If the order is not on the current page (i.e. the machine or the customer etc. that is on the screen), then PC-Topp will display the Order Summary to let you know where to find the order. From there, you can easily display the current order in the context of orders by article number, board grade, stereo, forme, or conversion machine by clicking the respective links in the Order Summary.

When you start entering an order number in the Find Order box you will notice a handy help feature: PC-Topp displays the orders matching the entry in real time, so you can very quickly select the right order.

Moreover, pressing "?" like in the classical programs now works in PC-Topp.NET, too. Doing so makes the last used order number appear in the Order Number box, so that this order can be accessed by just pressing "Enter". If you start typing instead, the old number is erased and a new search begins.

"Find Order" on the PC-Topp.NET Menu Pages

On the PC-Topp.NET start page and all menu pages in general the link "Find Orders" in the Order System box opens the Find Order tool in a small independent box. Enter an order number or pick one from the pop-up order selection and the Order Summary for this order appears. Here, too, you can also call up Find Order by pressing "?".

The Find Order box floats freely on the page and you can move it around by Drag&Drop. If you want Find Order to be permanently in view click the little arrow symbol in the top right corner to make it dock to the "My PC-Topp" section. (Of course you can make it undock again with another click on the arrow.) In case you want the feature to get out of sight again after using it leave it floating freely on the page.

How to Make Best Use of "Find Order"

The new feature helps you deal with some frequent tasks fast and hassle free, e.g.

• inding all parts of an order
  If an order has several parts (same order number, different part number), the list of matching orders that appears when you enter an order number in the Find Order box will show you that the order has multiple parts, and let you select.
• Finding parts of orders that have been split
  If an order has been split, PC-Topp likewise shows all parts of that order, making you aware that there are several runs of it, and forcing you to choose.
• Moving an order to a specific machine
  If you want to reschedule a specific order you don't have to make the detour over Access by Order Number any more to locate it. Just let Find Order spot it for you, press Enter in the order summary, then change the machine routing.
• Quickly displaying an order at any machine, customer etc.
  The links in the Order Summary have been modified to take you straight to the selected order in any PC-Topp.NET order screen. In combination with Find Order this allows you to directly spot an order at any machine, article no. etc. and rapidly navigate between them.

Microsoft has today ended its support for the Windows NT operating system.

We must also announce that PC-Topp.NET is not supported any more under Windows NT. That is so because many of Microsoft's system components that PC-Topp needs to function don't work under that legacy operating system. PC-Topp.NET clients are supported exclusively under Windows XP Professional and under Windows 2000. Support under future versions of Windows will be announced as soon as any adaptations that may be required have been implemented.

If your system still runs under Windows NT, then you should strongly consider upgrading to new hardware and an up-to-date operating system. New hardware will most likely be necessary as it is likely that your PC is many years old, and cannot show the complex PC-Topp.NET web pages with adequate speed.

The Incidents page has a new tool that helps you print out those incidents that you need on paper. It is started via the Toolbox link "Print Wizard" and offers you the following options for filtering the incidents to be printed:

• You can select incidents on either a single machine, several machines, or all machines.
• You can choose between all incidents, open incidents and closed incidents.
• You can print only those incidents (filtered by the above criteria) that occurred within a certain period of time.
• Moreover you can choose whether the incidents should be printed one after the other or just one per page.

If you click the link "Print Incidents" a new window showing the print view of the selected incidents opens along with the Windows printing dialog. Just proceed as with any ordinary document to get a printout of the desired incidents.

The new PC-Topp.NET Incidents Page shows an overview of the open (= unresolved) incidents at any of the machines or at any other facility in your plant where there is a regular need for maintenance or service intervention (e.g. the coffee dispenser or the copy machine).

If an incident occurs at a machine (or a service unit) the operator creates a new incident describing what happened and what is wrong. On the Incidents page the technician or service team member in charge can then make a note to this incident about the state of the issue, i.e. what has been done, what remains to be dealt with etc. When the problem is solved the incident is closed by the persons involved.

Each incident belongs to a pre-defined topic and a category. Before you start using the Incidents page you have to create appropriate topics and categories to properly organize your incidents. The topics relate to the machine part involved, the categories describe what kind of problem occurred. Following you find some typical examples:

Topics: Pre-Feeder Slotter Creaser Palletization Cafeteria ...

Categories: Electricity Mechanical General External Service Suppliers ...

If used regularly the Incidents page not only supplies a pool of information on current problems to all staff members concerned but over time also creates a searchable knowledge base on incidents for future reference.

The new page can be viewed on http://demo.pctopp.com.

Changing from one machine, customer etc. to another has become faster and more intuitive:

In the past, when you did not exactly know the name or the number you wanted you had to use a search dialog to look it up. This has been replaced by an easy-to-handle dropdown list.

It pops up as soon as you enter the first letter in the search box, offering you a list of all matching items. The more characters you enter the shorter the list gets, making it easy to spot what you are looking for.

If you don't know even the first character or if you want to view the complete list of all items just leave the search box empty and click "Find". All available items are immediately displayed for you to scroll through.

By navigating through the list either by mouse or via the up / down keys, you can select the desired item which is instantly displayed on the screen.

PC-Topp now allows targeted messages!

So far, messages could only be broadcast to all PC-Topp users. Now, you can send a message to one or several other users, or for example to a conversion machine.

On PC-Topp's Post a Message page, just select a recipient in the list of all PC-Topp users, type your message, and click send - the message appears instantly on the other user's PC-Topp screen.

To send a message to several users, press Shift while you click on further user names, the message will be sent to all users that you highlight that way. If you still want to send a broadcast message, select "all users" as recipient.

New Reply Function Allows Easy Conversations

When a message appears, clicking "Reply" opens a message form with the right recipient already selected, just type your reply and send your message.

System Messages Inform All Users of Incidents on the PC-Topp System

As before, the PC-Topp System itself will generate messages when it finds incidents that threaten the stability of the system. For example, when a user just turns off his PC without first exiting from PC-Topp or otherwise "kills" a PC-Topp program, a message is sent to everybody to make it easy to locate the culprit.

Don't Forget to Delete Messages

PC-Topp will show messages until you reply to them or delete them, so please click "Delete" after reading a message if it is of no further interest to you. This ensures that you will immediately notice when a new message appears on your screen.

• "Auto" (default setting) keeps the displayed data up to date all the time: Automatic updates are triggered whenever a change in the data occurs (e. g. Conversion Machine Scheduling and Orders by Customer) or when the data has been recalculated (e. g. TGV Machine Load and Corrugator Scheduling).
  The "Auto" button is greyed out as long as the display is set to "Auto". "Auto" is the option to choose whenever up-to-dateness is essential, e. g. for planning.
• "Keep for [x] min" offers a way to prevent the display flicker caused by the automatic updates: A user who can do without seeing the most recent data changes can define update intervals with this command. The display is not updated until the preset period of time is over even if the data is modified or recalculated in the meantime. The interval length can be entered
  - in minutes (Default setting; the value can be entered as a whole or decimal number.)
  - in seconds (The character "s" has to be entered behind the value, e. g. "90s".)
• "Update now" allows manual updates whenever the user wants to immediately view recent changes in the data even if he has defined an update interval. The "Update Now" button turns red and starts flashing if a modification is detected within the preset interval.
  But on pages like e. g. the TGV Machine Load, the button only gives the signal to update if the data displayed has been recalculated. This means that in order to have the most recent changes displayed here one has to trigger a recalculation by pressing the "Update now" button even if it is in its normal state.

The PC-Topp.NET Toolbox can hold all the machines in a plant now. The number of machine links in the Conversion Machine toolbox used to be limited to eight. But because most PC-Topp users have more than eight machines this restriction has been removed:

If all of the eight default links are occupied the single button at the foot of the list permits adding as many further links as necessary now.

Of course this feature works as well on all other PC-Topp.NET pages containing this type of toolbox which allows the user to set personal links and arrange them in the preferred sequence.

All PC-Topp DOS modules have been compiled in a new way that has left them visually unchanged, but has made them real Windows programs: The mouse can be used to control them, and it is okay to close them using the X in the upper right corner.

As a result, it will almost never happen anymore that Backup or Reorganisation cannot proceed because a DOS program was terminated incorrectly (the dreaded grey message doesn't appear anymore).

Old time users can continue as though nothing has changed (except that some programs are now slightly faster). But for beginners, the ability to use the mouse removes another obstacle to learning PC-Topp.

The paperless plant has long been a dream - PC-Topp 2000 now makes it come true.

When an order is shown on a PC-Topp 2000 Intranet page, a simple click on a hyperlink can open a spec sheet complete with drawings, a graphic of the printing dies, or the die-cut form.

The graphics can be in the popular Adobe Acrobat pdf format, or an ArtiosCAD file that opens directly in the ArtiosCAD Viewer in fact, any Windows document or application can be linked to any field in the PC-Topp order screen. On any PC in the corporate network users can now have access to order documentation and CAD drawings.