PO Commander is a powerful tool to document J.D. Edwards® OneWorld/EnterpriseOne® Batch and Interactive Program's Processing Options in a convenient and easily readable PDF, XLS or CSV formats:
Original version (all versions up to and including 2.3) was using a direct DB connection and so it did not need a Fat Client, supported B732 - E811 and any version of Windows®, but had limitations with IBM DB2 database connectivity.
The new PO Commander II uses Fat Client API's and supports XE - E812. The main advantage of using JDE API's is the database-independence and easier configuration of the tool - POC-II is entirely self-configurable and will work with any DB supported by JDE. Operating system support has also changed: it now supports Windows® 2000 and up only, Windows® 95/98/NT suppport has been dropped. This new version is shipped by air mail on a dedicated USB flash disk - the tool will operate only when this disk is physically inserted into the client computer.
Neither Adobe® Distiller® nor Microsoft® Excel® need to be installed. PO's are reported by Language (the same Version can have multiple sets of PO descriptions in multiple Languages, displayed in OW accordingly to the current user's Language Preferences).
XLS format is highly visual, conveniently packing a lot more data per page than PDF, plus it can also be very useful to compare PO's between different Versions in the same Environment or even between different Environments or Installations (some VBA scripting skills would definitely help with this):
CSV format, on the other hand, allows import into any database (i.e.: MS Access), so that different reports can be easily compared using simple SQL.
PO Commander not only reports PO values, it also analyses the data as it processes it and highlights any versions that have PO values corrupt (see the ZJDE0002 Version in red on the screenshot above) - a very frequent problem in upgraded or updated systems, because this data is simply copied across by the Upgrade process (or stays unaffected by Updates) without fixing any mismatched entries. This normally manifests itself with "PO Change" (or "Processing Option templates changed in versions.") warnings on the spec merge reports.
For example, in a brand-new, pristine ERP8 system, after the application of Update 1, there would be about 600 Versions with corrupt Processing Options!!! Nothing can easily identify them all, except PO Commander. If somebody accidentally runs one of them, without re-viewing the values, the consequences are unpredictable. For example, this sample report was taken from a fresh E811 installation and shows Processing Options for standard Versions of P4310 APPL. You can see, that most of the Versions have corrupt or missing values. The available Trial Version reports a small subset of the available Versions, but even those are likely to be corrupt in your system - you can see it for yourself, once you have downloaded and used it.
Running versions with corrupt PO's may lead to myriads of unpredictable problems. Using PO Commander periodically, to check your system for PO corruption is highly recommended. Once such corrupted PO is opened in JDE, reviewed and OK'ed, the values are fixed. The trick is to find them before they bite you in the back. A Version with corrupt PO's can be executed, if a user runs it without a prompt and most Interactive Programs do not, by default, prompt for Processing Options when run from a menu.
Having collected a few PO Commander reports over time, makes it easy to answer a number of likely questions:
See the sample output:
English sample PDF
P4210 sample XLS
Limited Trial Version is available upon request.
A Data Selection counterpart is available here.
A software solution to lookup the actual old Processing Options, used by the submitted jobs on the Server(s), is available here.
Many reference sites are available.
Cross-Upgrades from competing products are also available - please, inquire via e-mail, stating the legacy product's name and the number of Licenses you wish to cross-Upgrade.