I've started at a new company that uses Baan.

The documentation here at the company is very sparse, and I'm trying to figure out several things.

1. What version of Baan am I running?

We use Windows NT and a program called Smarterm Essential by Persoft, version 7.0b. When I login to Baan, it says at the top:

TRITON General Menu

and then it lists what I believe are the modules and their versions.....

Common 3.1
Finance 3.1
Project 3.1
Manufacturing 3.1
Distribution 3.1
Organizer 1.3
Enterprise 1.3
Transportation 3.1
Service 3.1
Tools 6.1
Exchange 6.1

I'm trying to figure out what version of Baan I have to ask more detailed questions like....

2. Does anyone here have experience using the Easy SQL feature in the tools menu? If you could point me to some documentation or walk me through making a simple query, I'd really appreciate it. I've been able to generate a new query and assign some tables and fields to it, but I can seem to get it to print out, it keeps saying there's no data in the selection set. This leads me to...

3. Is there an easy way to get a print out of somekind showing the database structure and table relationships? Even if I got the query to print, I fear I would have a tough time telling which table or field is what.

4. I've been using Access and VBA 6.0 for quite sometime now, and have started moving into VB 6.0 enterprise and SQL server. I'm wondering if anyone could either point me to a thread or documentation or advice on if it is possible / how I could query Baan directly from SQL server or Access. I've noticed some of the threads here that people are using VB, I'm hoping that my version of Baan will allow this.

Thanks much for your time, I'm sure I'll be on here a bit more, now that I need to deal with this.....

Thanks again...

-Don

Your Baan version seems to be Triton 3.1 (from the 3.1 appended to all the modules) Verify this by looking at the package VRC's with the session ttadv1151m000. Via the menu, access this with:

-> Tools6.1
----> Application Customization
-------> Packages and Modules
----------> Display Package VRC's (on the first screen of the parallel menu's)

Follow the derivitive path. Most of them will have as a base a 3.1 release. That's the confirmation you need. If it says something like B40, you're on BaanIV, which has been upgraded (sloppily) from Triton 3.1

Table definitions can be printed with ttadv4420m000. But I would advise against printing it. There's something like 1800 tables in Triton 3.1!

Don -
1. You are indeed on Triton 3.1. You can check the exact specifics when you log in. Assuming you type the ba6.1, type ba6.1 -V, which will display your version, porting set, etc.

2. EasySQL. Sorry, I don't know of a standard doc, maybe someone else has one to post. My company offers workshops in EasySQL if you need. Here's a basic walk through, though I admit it's from Baan IV, I don't have Triton available just now.

a. Maintain Query Data - Insert a new Query.
b. Choose 'Maintain Query by EasySQL' option..if avail.
c. Choose Insert, and put in a table to query on. I chose tiitm001 - the Item Master.
d. From there, choose the 'Table fields' option, and define which fields you want to retrieve, just choose a couple to start with, so it fits on any generated report.
e. Exit back to the Maintain Query Data Session, and choose 'Generate Report'. If you have too many fields, it should tell you, otherwise you should see it compile a report.
f. Choose Run Query option.

For me, that was it, and I got everything I needed for 1 table. Once you get that, write back if you need help with anything more complex, or if something does not work as described - this is from Baan IV, but I don't think it has changed too much.

3. I don't know of a doc for that either. One helpful hint, if you want data from a session, the main table name is usually in the session name. You take the session name minus the 2nd numeric digit, minus the 'm000' on the end (or s000). So, for the session Maintain Sales Orders (tdsls4101m000), the main table is tdsls401. Hope that helps, or hope someone has a better doc. You can find out more about each table in Maintain Table Definitions.

4. I think most of the tools for VB to access the Baan DB are for Baan IV or higher - like OLE or OpenWorld. May be wrong, so anyone speak up. As you posted elsewhere, there are other options, probably get better answers on that thread. Also I know CorVue has tbase viewing capabilities.

NvanBeest,

Thanks for the reply!

I followed the paths you posted and found out it's 3.1c.

What I'm basically trying to get ahold of is the EasySQL portion in the tools set.

I'm trying to get an inventory count of our finished goods as of 6/30 of this year.

I'm pretty good with SQL, but I don't know the table structure.

I was experimenting with EasySQL, but I can't get any reports to print, it keeps returning "no data".

If you have a link to some tutorial on it, I'm all ears.

My other thought was to just try to link to Baan using Microsoft Access, but that's proved to be a bit of a problem in itself. I'm currently looking into Croko reporter, but haven't heard anything as of yet.

lbencic,

Thanks much!

It seems I tried that before, but I guess I didn't cause it worked!!

It did take a bit for it to return control to me (the cursor back to the command field) for such a simple query (just a range of 25 purchase orders, the items and the quantities.

Any trick then to finding out about joins, or does Baan already have the relationships and uses them automatically in the queries?

I would guess there's no way to determine the relationships, or is there?

Thanks a bunch you guys.

Oh, and from your post, it seem to infer that reports are just a layout for the queries? If that's true, what happens if I don't assign a report layout to a query? Just a default is used?

Thanks again!

-Don

Well, I'm glad you got it going.

If you now choose the 'Text Manager' option you should now see how EasySQL generated your query. You can optimize this in Text Manger, the EasySQL just generated it.

It doesn't run very fast, because it's not compiled before startup (like a program script would be). The query itself is probably not too bad, but if you notice it is not using indexes, you can change that in the Text Manger.

Not sure what you mean about finding out the joins - maybe viewing the text of the query will help you there.

The report is actually a separate component - it is just easy to generate based on what fields you picked. I believe you have to either generate a report, or make one and attach it, if you are outputting to a report (there are other options, but I have not used). If you choose generate again, it will just overwrite what you have attached (so don't do that if you modified anything!).