Switching PDLs in Smart Office (LSO)

Name	Points
Greg Moeller	4184
David Williams	3349
JonA	3288
Kat V	2984
Woozy	1973
Jimmy Chiu	1883
Kwane McNeal	1437
Ragu Raghavan	1348
Roger French	1311
mark.cook	1244

Ward Mitchell

Veteran Member

Posts: 81

10/24/2011 4:59 PM

Friends, been a while since Ive been out here. Hope you all are well!

We are trying to go live with LSO very soon and I have a question that I think I have answered but need to be sure.

I do not think you change change product lines in LSO like you can via the portal per se, but if you can in LSO, can you change PDLs on the fly?

I found the following (below the +++++) via the Lawson Web Services Installation guide on myLawson that leads me to believe you have to have a separate server instance for each PDL which means each server would need to be licensed if I am not mistaken. Let me know if I am on track in my thinking gurus as we want to know what functionality we can provide via the portal and LSO as we will parallel for a while. Thanks in advance for your help gurus!

+++++

Feature

Lawson recommends installing one Lawson Smart Office server per back-end

Description

Lawson recommends that you install one Lawson Smart Office server for each back-end environment you use. A back-end environment is defined as a group of applications accessed through the Lawson Smart Office client.

Each Lawson Smart Office server has a set of configuration data which applies to all environments associated with that server. Therefore, as a best practice, Lawson does not recommend configuring multiple back-end environments with a single Lawson Smart Office server instance unless the environments have identical configuration requirements.

For example:

• If you have three environments for production, test, and development, you will install three instances of the Lawson Smart Office server.

• If you have production, test, and development environments, but test and development can have identical Lawson Smart Office configurations, you could install one Lawson Smart Office server for your production environment, and a second for the test and development environments.

Impact

Customers should assess configuration needs before installing Lawson Smart Office.

Related Documents

"Topology Considerations" in the Lawson Smart Office Installation Guide (that is attached folks)

Ward Mitchell

Veteran Member

Posts: 81

10/24/2011 5:00 PM

FYI - We have 5 PDLs in our DEVelopment (2 are for QA) and 2 PDLs on our PRODuction.

Roger French

Veteran Member

Posts: 545

10/24/2011 7:24 PM

In the Settings on the upper right hand, under S3 Transactions, for that environment, it will allow you to change the PRODUCTLINE to the productlines you have installed on that environment, including GEN and LOGAN... weird if you ask me and I don't think this is a good feature to have (yes you can lock this feature down too though.)

Ward Mitchell

Veteran Member

Posts: 81

10/25/2011 1:50 PM

Roger, thansks for the response. I forgot to mention that I knew about this but when I change my PDL, on the Profile tab in that same section, shouldnt my profile / role file be changes to something that points to my newly selected PDL? The concept of roles in LSO I get but do not see how that and switching the PDL work in tandem. I feel like just because I point to a new PDL my role in pointed at another PDL which negates the switch in the firts place IMHO. Am I wrong here?

Ward Mitchell

Veteran Member

Posts: 81

10/25/2011 1:50 PM

Roger, thansks for the response. I forgot to mention that I knew about this but when I change my PDL, on the Profile tab in that same section, shouldnt my profile / role file be changes to something that points to my newly selected PDL? The concept of roles in LSO I get but do not see how that and switching the PDL work in tandem. I feel like just because I point to a new PDL my role in pointed at another PDL which negates the switch in the firts place IMHO. Am I wrong here?

Roger French

Veteran Member

Posts: 545

10/25/2011 3:00 PM

(I didn't design the thing, so.....)

No you are not wrong. I think the design of the productline switching is a little wonky.

For 'regular' users, you can lock down the productline switching so they can't switch productlines.

Ward Mitchell

Veteran Member

Posts: 81

10/25/2011 4:54 PM

Roger, I got on with Lawson via CASE and they said they can switch PDLs via the Data Area dropdown on Settings>S3 Transactions>Advanced AS LONG AS the user is not part of a role (but will default to be in default.xml). Well this will mess the users access up to the Lawson Portal based on our setup. So we have a Catch 22 in effect there without much that we can do.

So because our setup is different than most and because we have 5 PDL on our DEV and 2 on our PROD, we will have to figure out who needs to be in roles and who does not. When I asked Lawson what was their idea behind the design, they had no comment.

Personally I think the setup by Lawson of this area is going to make it more condusive to migrating to LSO from the Portal, just my opinion though if there are other users out there like us.

Nonetheless, you can switch PDLs, convoluted if you have multiple companies but possible and easy if you run one company.

Roger French

Veteran Member

Posts: 545

10/25/2011 7:04 PM

Well, I have 'locked it out' by modifying the code behind the scenes. Not the preferred or 'the way' to do it, but it did the job.

Ok so, ... my opinion here ...

I think Lawson does a poor job with Smart Office. Yeah it's nice and pretty once you get it up and running.

But...,
They do not sufficiently document or explain how Settings are tied in with the 'role' files, among other things.

Or, how LS Security is tied in with Smart Office. Or how you can really screw up your LSO if you accidentily choose the wrong settings within the Settings editor. (No, do not try and innocently clicking on the applications listed in the applications area within the Settings tab). Or .... (the list goes on...).

Oh and yeah. If you have noticed, they are again offering 'free' Smart Office for the next few weeks. What they don't mention to tell you is that, um, they want you to use LPS to do the installation, or find someone else that had been through the madness of trying to figure it all out. Oh and yeah, the licensing/maintenance fees are another thing.

But, I think LSO opens up a whole big a__ can of WORMS ... what with Portal interface, LBI, Processflow inbasket, and how to support it all.

It's like that old Susan Powter commercial from the '90's.. 'Stop the Insanity'!

Phew, that felt good.

Ward Mitchell

Veteran Member

Posts: 81

10/25/2011 7:45 PM

Wow! I hope you do feel better

LOL! I hear and feel your pain though.

I hear you. I think if they can integrate LSO in so that previous products still work instead of taking the "new is the one to use" approach that it would be a good compliment to their suite of tools - which needs a major UI upgrade - but thats another topic for another time

You said you scripted some LSO stuff huh? I am trying to deploy a screen script and it does not seem to deploy properly. The code compiles 100% but the customization never runs? Any ideas on deployment on scripts? (I just hijacked my own thread, haha)