The most common eConnect error: The source was not found, but some or all event logs could not be searched

By Steve Endow

This is one of the most common eConnect errors that I continue to see with Dynamics GP customers.  It occurs when a new server is setup with eConnect, or when an integration is migrated to a new server where eConnect was just installed.

It is very simple to fix, but requires Local Admin rights on the machine running eConnect.


eConnect error:

Exception: The source was not found, but some or all event logs could not be searched.  To create the source, you need permission to read all event logs to make sure that the new source name is unique.  Inaccessible logs: Security.

eConnect Performance: Using GetNextDocNumbers vs taGetNext stored procedures

By Steve Endow

This one is definitely an obscure topic that nobody is asking about.

But hey, I was curious.

I was researching whether the eConnect GetNextGLJournalEntryNumber could handle a heavy load, and whether it would throw any errors when issuing lots of JE numbers.

Interestingly, I was unable to break it.  I was able to get one SQL exception error when running my test while also trying to get a new JE number in the GP Journal Entry window, but I was unable to reproduce that error.

This image shows 3 instances of my load test application simultaneously retrieving a total of 3,000 JE numbers over about 45 seconds.

3,000 JE Numbers

 public string GetNextJENumbereConn()  
 {  
   GetNextDocNumbers getNext = new GetNextDocNumbers();  
   
   try  
   {  
     string nextJE = getNext.GetNextGLJournalEntryNumber(IncrementDecrement.Increment, ConnectionStringWindows());  
     return nextJE;  
   }  
   catch (Exception ex)  
   {  
     throw ex;  
   }  
 }  

Testing just 1 instance of my load tester, I saw that it took about 16 seconds to generate 1,000 JE numbers using the eConnect method.

So, naturally, I wondered what the performance would be if I called the stored procedure directly.

How long does it take to import Dynamics GP GL JEs with Analytical Accounting?

By Steve Endow

I recently did some tests to see how long it takes to import GL Journal Entries with large numbers of line items.

Those test results were fairly consistent, and showed that eConnect does a pretty good job of importing JEs with a large number of lines.  Only 8 seconds to import a JE with 2,000 lines seems pretty good to me, as I suspect most customers don't import JEs that large.

For anyone who is familiar with Dynamics GP integrations, the next obvious question is how eConnect handles imports of GL JEs when there is Analytical Accounting data involved.

From experience, I know that GL JEs with AA do not import terribly quickly or efficiently.

Here are the results of importing a single JE with varying line counts.  Every line in the JE has one AA code assigned.

100 lines:  3-8 seconds
200 lines:  3-9 seconds
500 lines:  9-17 seconds
1,000 lines:  21-47 seconds 
2,000 lines:  174-222 seconds


There are two obvious differences when you add Analytical Accounting codes to your GL JE import.

First, they take much, much longer.  A standard JE with 500 lines takes 2 seconds, but when you add AA, that same JE takes 9-17 seconds.

A standard JE with 2,000 lines takes 8 seconds, but when you add AA, that same JE takes 174-222 seconds.

HUUUUUGE decrease in import performance.

The second issue is the incredible variance in import times for the single JEs with AA data.  When importing the standard JEs, the import times were completely consistent.  Over 10 runs, I might have seen a 1 second variance, if any.

In this test with AA data, I imported the same JE at least 10 times for each line count, and you can see how different the times are.  The durations seem almost random.  The import times did not gradually increase or decrease--they would just increase on one run, and then decrease on the next.

The times varied from 89% to 200%, which is pretty wild.  I don't know how a stored procedure could have so much variance in performance from one run to the next.  If it wasn't such a nightmare to trace the activity from the eConnect procedures, I'd look into it.

So there you have it.  If you have to import transactions with Analytical Accounting data, you have been warned.  It seems that the eConnect procs for AA do not perform well.

Steve Endow is a Microsoft MVP in Los Angeles.  He is the owner of Precipio Services, which provides Dynamics GP integrations, customizations, and automation solutions.

You can also find him on Twitter and YouTube

http://www.precipioservices.com

.NET code to create a Dynamics GP batch with eConnect

By Steve Endow

I just posted a story about how I discovered that sometimes I need to explicitly create Dynamics GP batches using eConnect in order to control the batch posting date.

Here's the code that I used.

First, I check to see if the batch exists.

 public static bool BatchExists(string database, int series, string batchSource, string batchID)   
 {  
   try  
   {  
     string commandText = "SELECT COUNT(*) AS RecordCount FROM dbo.SY00500 WHERE SERIES = @SERIES AND BCHSOURC = @BCHSOURC AND BACHNUMB = @BACHNUMB"; // AND GLPOSTDT = @GLPOSTDT";  
     SqlParameter[] sqlParameters = new SqlParameter[3];  
     sqlParameters[0] = new SqlParameter("@SERIES", System.Data.SqlDbType.Int);  
     sqlParameters[0].Value = series;  
     sqlParameters[1] = new SqlParameter("@BCHSOURC", System.Data.SqlDbType.VarChar, 15);  
     sqlParameters[1].Value = batchSource.Trim();  
     sqlParameters[2] = new SqlParameter("@BACHNUMB", System.Data.SqlDbType.VarChar, 15);  
     sqlParameters[2].Value = batchID.Trim();  
     string result = DataAccess.ExecuteScalar(database, CommandType.Text, commandText, sqlParameters);  
     int recordCount = Convert.ToInt32(result);  
     if (recordCount > 0)  
     {  
       return true;  
     }  
     else  
     {  
       return false;  
     }  
   }  
   catch (Exception ex)  
   {  
     Log.Write("An unexpected error occurred in DataAccess.BatchExists: " + ex.Message, true);  
     return false;  
   }  
 }  

If the batch does exist, I make sure to update the posting date.

Sometimes you have to explicitly create Dynamics GP Batches with eConnect

By Steve Endow

You just can't know everything.

Maybe I never took the time to look at this one field when using that particular Dynamics GP batch posting setting, and never knew about this quirk.

Maybe I did know about this quirk at some point over the last 12 or 13 years working with eConnect, but forgot about it.

Either way, I didn't know about it when I needed to know about it.

Last week I had a call with a customer to try and troubleshoot a weird posting date issue.  They import a bunch of AP Invoices every Monday morning into dozens of batches, review the batch that Monday or Tuesday, and then post the batch.  Simple, right?

But when they were reconciling the GL for their month end close, they were seeing AP Invoice transactions post to prior weeks and prior fiscal periods.  An invoice imported on November 5 posted to October 30.  Another invoice imported on November 5 posted to November 1.

It was weird.

We looked at their GP posting settings for Payables Transaction Entry, and it looked pretty normal.

Typical Batch Posting Date

The customer is using the Posting Date from the Batch.  Okay, so that rules out an issue with the invoices posting based on the Transaction posting date.

But, that doesn't explain why invoices imported at the same time on Monday morning would post to different dates.