How to get BSI Display Logs

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BSI Support has asked for a BSI Display Log.  Use this method to configure your system to create the logs.

Open msgmnt and enter your Product Line and enter Category ‘PRTFX’.

Look in the Number column to see if the Number 400 appears.  If there is not a message 400, you will need to add it.

You can either Tab or Down Arrow to get to a position to enter the 400 line.

Use the F8 key to Insert a line.

Type 400 in the Number column.

Type Y in the Xlate column.

Within the Message portion, type in the fix for the message

After pressing Enter twice, the 400 message will appear in the appropriate order and has been added to the listing.

Now go to PR80, create a payment and Calculate

After the PR80 has been successfully calculated, click on Options > Display Log File

 

The Display Log will appears in a new text editor.  Save the file as ‘BSIDisplayLog’ and send the file to BSI.

 

Troubleshooting “WARNING: SUBSTITUTION TABLE ENTRY NOT FOUND”

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A common ED501 message is “WARNING: SUBSTITUTION TABLE ENTRY NOT FOUND”.  This substitution table is maintained in screen ED40.1, and if the key values passed to ED501 are missing, you will receive this error.  Simply update your ED40.1 and recover the job.

If this message causes your job to go into recovery, that is because you have not set up notifications for EDI.  Here is a simple solution to troubleshoot this message: If you set up notifications, then this message will cause an email to be sent about the warning, but the job will continue to process the remaining files.  Notifications are configured on ED00.1, as well as the configuration file located in the EDI directory.

Steps to Purge Benefits Data

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Every time an employee makes a benefits change, a new record is stored in the benefits table.  Additionally, a new record is stored in the employee’s deduction master table for each deduction related to that benefit.  If these records are allowed to accumulate unchecked, this can slow down payroll processing and even cause errors.  The larger the benefits and deductions table become, the slower payroll batch jobs will run.  These batch jobs, such as PR140, loop through each record in these benefits and deductions tables so that the correct deductions are applied.  Some of these batch jobs have a limit of the number of records allowed, so if an employee has deductions that exceed that limit, the job will error out.  Also, traversing through these records can greatly slow down processing.

To help alleviate these issues, we recommend running the BN430 benefits purge program periodically.  When you are processing payroll, if you see an error similar to “26 20591 PRDED-DED-TABLE must be increased; Cur size 0500”, chances are you have an employee with too many benefits changes, and need to run the BN430.  But, before you receive this error, you should make the benefits purge part of a normal maintenance process.  Ideally, payroll users would make this part of the payroll process each pay period, and choose a “Purge Through Date” corresponding to your company’s record retention period.

Date is before (or after) closing control date

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Problem:

User is getting the error “Date is after/before closing control date” when trying to release PO’s.

 

Solution:

This message indicates that the transaction post date on the record you are working with falls outside of the date range allowed by the System Control Closing Control Valid Entry Dates (GL01).  You will need to review this record to obtain the Valid Entry Dates and then correct the transaction post Date on the record to fall inside this range.

The GL01 Valid Entry Dates can be changed, but this record is used to ensure that transactions are created for a certain period, or range of periods only. You should work with your accounting staff if you feel the dates are incorrect.

 

Setting General User Options in Lawson Portal

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This guide explains how to modify settings for Lawson Portal options, affecting how applications display on your computer.

  1. Open the Navigation Menu and from the General group, select User Options.

  2. From the General tab, make the following selections:
    Option Meaning
    Locale The language that Lawson Portal uses. Default is U.S. English.
    Note: After changing the Locale, you must refresh the page for the change to take effect.
    Note: This option is not available to privileged online-only users.
    Data Area A defined storage place within a Lawson product line.
    A product line can have one or more data areas, allowing you to separate access to different sets of data within the product line. If you have more than one and are unsure which to select, consult your system administrator.
    Note: After changing the Data Area, you must refresh the page for the change to take effect.
    Value Separator Defines the character used to separate values in CSV files. The options are comma, tab, or semicolon.
    Default Report Type Select the default report format for Lawson system reports. Options include Text, PDF, and LSR.
    Note: For correct rendering of all data, only the LSR output format is enabled on the Arabic platform.
    See: Enabling Infor Lawson Smart Reports (Optional) in Lawson Administration: Jobs and Reports.
    Default Printer The default printer for Lawson system reports. Available printer names and locations are created by your system administrator. The selected printer name will be shown on the right of the drop-down list.
    Note: This option is not available to privileged online-only users.
    Tab Recovery Controls how tabs from your previous session are recovered: Ask (default): Lawson will prompt you to recover or start fresh when the system loads. Always: Automatically recover tabs from the last session. Never: Always start fresh without recovering tabs. Note: Tab Recovery saves the last session per browser, but data from the session is not saved.
    Show Product Line in Page Header Displays the current product line after the tab title. This option is disabled by default.
    Auto Select Required Fields Automatically prompts available data when processing a record.
    Display Field Help Shows help for a field when it is in focus. Useful for new users unfamiliar with the applications.
    Allow Logging to Console Logs browser console information related to Lawson Portal requests, including context messages and workstation state.
    Use Data Entry Field Advance Automatically moves the cursor to the next field without needing to click or press Tab.
    Note: Form customizations can affect the behavior. For example, if fields have been reordered in Design Studio, Lawson follows the original order when moving to the next field.
    Lawson Portal advances the cursor based on field type: Text and non-decimal numeric fields: Cursor advances when the maximum number of characters is reached.  Signed fields: For decimal signed fields, the cursor moves when the maximum number of decimal places is entered.
    Advance on 6-Digit Date Entry Indicates that a date entry is complete after typing six digits (e.g., “093024” for 09/30/2024). This option is only available if Use Data Entry Field Advance is enabled.
    Enable Accessibility Behaviors Enables various usability features designed for assistive technologies.
    Use Client Machine Time Zone When enabled, Lawson Portal uses the time zone of the client machine when submitting jobs and displaying timestamps in Print Manager and Job Schedule.
    Frequent and Recent Forms Enables the use of frequent and recent forms on the Lawson Portal homepage and navigation menu.
    Click Clear data to reset the data.
    Default Token View Selects the default view for applications: Form View: Full field layout, requiring a key field search for data display. Ideal for frequent data entry. List View: Displays application records in a list. You can apply filters, create custom views, and select records for inquiry. List Mode: A wizard-based mode that guides you through required fields to locate and display records.
    List View Configure settings for List View: Number of Records: Maximum number of records displayed in List View. Maximum List View Edits: Maximum records that can be edited in a single transaction.
    Note: This option is not available to users without edit permissions. You can also exclude forms from List View by entering form tokens, separated by a semicolon.
    List Mode Sets the maximum number of records displayed in List Mode.
    Highlight Key and Required Fields Highlights required or key fields with a color swatch, matching the user’s accent color.
    Shrink Forms to Fit on Screen Shrinks forms to fit the screen without scrolling. Supported on Chrome, Firefox, Safari, and Microsoft Edge browsers.
  3. After making your selections, click OK to save your changes.

 

Lawson Security Administrator Stuck on Authenticating after two-factor sign-in

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When running Lawson Security Administrator (LSA), you may get stuck on the authentication screen even after going through the two-factor sign-in. Here is how to resolve this issue.

 

Run LSA as Admin and login

Ping ID Authenticates

 

Script Error pops up, clicking yes, no or closing leads to same result:

Doesn’t connect after:

LSA Logging gave me these results 9/20 when last tested (logs not updating now):

LSA Version 10.0.3.01065

 

Installing LSA Version 10.0.3.01069 Resolves this issue. And that’s it!

IPD Debugger Feature

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IPD  enables you to debug your processes. To activate the Debug view, go to the Infor Process Designer menu bar and select Window > Show View > Other

From there select Infor Process > Debug and click on OK.

The Debugger feature set includes:

  • Breakpoint management- can be enabled for any activity node within a process, and causes a running process to pause at the point before the specified activity node. When the process pauses, process variables can be examined and/or modified. Process execution can be resumed at the breakpoint, or at any other activity node if desired.

To set this up, right mouse click on the node to debug and select Debug

The Run to this activity breakpoint is temporary and only valid for the current execution of the process. A “run to” breakpoint can be useful when you want to pause at a specific activity node during the current execution, but you do not want it to stay in effect for any subsequent executions. All temporary breakpoints are cleared before a process starts execution.

This feature is available only when running the process locally.

  • Process execution controls

The run process control starts the execution of a process and is available if the process is currently not running or paused. The Run Mode option gives you the option to run the process either locally or on the server. The flow can be run on the server from the designer and provide you with the status and log information.

Specify Input data can be used to pass data to a process. The data will be added to the workunit once the workunit has been created. You can select from these options when specifying the input data:

  • No input data: Select this option if you do not want to pass any specific data to the process.
  • Use data from Workunit: You must specify the workunit number. The process will fetch the input data from that workunit and use the same data in the current process. If the workunit or input data does not exist, then the input data will be null.
  • Use connector: You can select between two options. The first one is Specify input data where you can specify the data that you want to pass to the process. The second is Input data file where the data will be read from the given file and be used in the process.
  • Runtime variable examination and modification

This feature is available only when running the process locally (that is, Run Mode is set to Local).

Once a running process is paused at an activity node, the current value of variables in the process can be examined and modified if needed.

The Debug view shows a list of currently running processes. The variables accessible to the activity node at the pause point is shown, organized by variable category and activity node. Selecting a variable shows its current value, and a new value can be specified.

5 Patching Tips in Lawson v10

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These 5 tips could make applying patches that much less stressful and are also good practice in general.

 

Tip 1: Check existing patch logs to see if a patch has already been applied previously and current versioning. This is good to check after a patch has been applied as well.

These logs can be found and generated here in LID:

perl %GENDIR%\bin\patches_installed_report <productline>

perl %GENDIR%\bin\source_versions_report <productline>

 

Tip 2: Restart the LSF server (or services) to ensure no processes are being held up and when it boots up, turn off Websphere LSF Appserver service before applying a patch to ensure users cannot log on, especially if patch needs to be applied during or close to work hours.

 

Tip 3: Run dbdef command to make sure there is a connection to the database before patching

 

Tip 4: When activating or staging multiple patches, run this command to speed up the post compile process:

qcontrol -jlocal,4  – This will set the servers cores to 4 when processing form compiles. Set it back to 2 when done. You can also check the status of the compiled jobs with command: qstatus | head -5

 

Tip 5: If a Plus dictionary is created after patching, its typically good practice to compile the entire product line with the command: cobcmp (be aware this can take up to 20-30 minutes to complete, tip 4 helps with this). This ensures that all programs are functioning correctly before passed to testers.

 

Bonus Tip: Verify security is on before sent to the testers!  Hope these were helpful.

 

If you found this article helpful, Nogalis provides managed services and expert technical resources to assist with Lawson patching and system maintenance. If applying patches feels overwhelming or time-consuming, our team can simplify the process by managing everything from version checks to database connectivity and post-compile optimizations. Let us help ensure your patches are applied efficiently and your system is running smoothly. Contact us to learn more about how we can support your Lawson environment.