Monday, June 9, 2014

BlueBox2.0 document pagination templates

BlueBox2.0 includes pagination templates that display long documents in a paginated format.

It is now possible to specify the number of lines on the first page differently from the number of lines on the subsequent pages by simply splitting the line-count with a pipe | and specify page 1's count first followed by the count for page 2 onwards after that.

For example:

<!--:set:global|force_custom_templates_in_system_mode=1:-->
<!--paginate_document_lines=10|15-->
<!--paginate_document_runon_template=bb_sales_quotes-print_runon-->
<!--:class:bb_sales_quotes_items:viewlist_print|sales_quoteISbb_sales_quotesID=(#_id#) and _id>=(#pdl_start_row#) and _id<=(#pdl_end_row#):-->

Monday, June 2, 2014

Neater Table to CSV Exports in BlueBox2

Update:

BlueBox includes a javascript library and PHP function which automatically exports tabular data to CSV export by simply adding ".table2csv_export('table_id')." into the string above your <table id=table_id> tag.

This feature has existed for a few years, but has been updated now to improve trimming of the contents. The numbers and text snippets in each cell are now trimmed to perform more reliably in Excel.

Friday, May 2, 2014

Print to PDF quickly with BlueBox

For BlueBox PHP coders and HTML5 developers here is a handy shortcut to printing any page to pdf with a few characters: (url broken up for legibility)

<a href=
/?class=some_class
&method=some_method
&global[noincludes]=print
&global[send2pdf]=1>Print to PDF</a>

Easy as that :-)


Thursday, April 24, 2014

Creating bespoke ajax lookups in BlueBox

BlueBox includes a default ajax-lookup feature for lists of information. This provides a neat facility for any link-table lookups and works by simply naming your fields with a capital ID in the field name ie userISbb_usersID.

Sometimes you want to use your own ajax lookups and there is a quick bbsetting that allows you to override the standard lookup, called bbsetting_ajax_lookup_jsfunction.

If you enter your javascript replacement function name into this setting for the required module, it will use that function rather than the standard one, ie my_lookup_function

A hidden div is automatically created with an id 'div_{field_name}' whenever a field for that module is created, so you can hook your ajax lookup into that div and the text input field is automatically given the id 'viewer_{field_name}' - with these 2 id's you have the ingredients to build an ajax lookup.

Your javascript lookup would work this way:

function my_lookup_function(){
  \$('div_global[fields][userISbb_usersID]').style.display='block';
  ajax2div('div_global[fields][userISbb_usersID]','/?class=my_class&method=my_method&global[noincludes]=rawtext&global[srch_txt]='+$('viewer_global[fields][userISbb_usersID]').value);
}

In your my_class->my_method you would then search the module using $global[srch_txt] and return the results.

Thursday, April 17, 2014

BlueBox and Mailchimp

BlueBox now integrates with MailChimp the popular bulk emailing platform.

To access/activate the integration follow these steps:

Go to Integration > MailChimp



Then edit the settings to insert your MailChimp API key:

To generate an API key in MailChimp go to Account Settings > Extras > API Keys

Then click on 'Create a key' and copy the key when it is generated.


Once you have the key inserted into BlueBox you can proceed to upload lists of BlueBox users to your matching MailChimp lists. You can send users from a Campaign of User Group as follows:


After you have used MailChimp to send to your new list you can access campaign stats from MailChimp by clicking on 'View Your Campaign Settings':





Wednesday, March 26, 2014

New Features for BlueBox Forms (Financial Document Lines)

Recently added to BlueBox2.0 financial document lines are 3 long-awaited features:
  • Editing Lines where the Items have Sizes/Colours
    Previously newly added items with sizes/colours were sent to the end of the list of items. Now, if the current line has been 'cleared' of it's item the first click/select of a new item will fill the current row.. any subsequent clicks will auto-populate at the end of the form.


  • Draggable Line Ordering:

    For new lines added to any form there is now the ability to drag the line into any position amongst the other newly added lines. The catch here is that this ONLY applies to newly added lines... any lines that are part of a previous posting and are being edited cannot be moved and cannot have any new items mixed among them.

  • Ajax Loading for Extra Details:

    For very large forms the extra fields in the [+] extra items area has slowed up the page load considerably. To get around this we now only load the extra fields as required via Ajax when the [+] is clicked.

Wednesday, March 19, 2014

General ledger Postings for Sales and Procurement Documents

BlueBox2.0 uses document maps to dictate GL movements from the document layer. This means that you can specify which entries get posted whenever specific documents are created, and using advanced condition statements you can be very precise about these postings.

Once your document maps are set up your system will populate the GL automatically providing you with a live Trial Balance, Balance Sheet and Income Statement.

The GL allocations for a stock-based business that uses GRN's to receive stock and Despatch Notes to ship stock have a specific layout that is worth noting:
  • GRN
    • DR Stock GL Account
      Note: for non-stock items being received be sure to set the 'GRN asset acct' to a special asset account (ie something like Non-stock Assets Received)
    • CR GRN Suspense Account
      Note: this Liabilities account should not be changed via item-data settings
  • Creditors Invoice
    • DR GRN Suspense GL Account
      Note: This 'expense' account must not be changed via item-data settings if the item was GRN'd in originally. For CR Invoices that are captured directly without a previous GRN this expense account can be set to anything.
    • CR Accounts Payable
    • DR Input Tax Account
  • Despatch
    • DR Cost of Sales
      Note: The 'DSP expense account' can be overridden at item-data level as required
    • CR Stock
      Note: be sure to set the 'DSP asset account' on non-stock items to the same asset account used in the GRN above
  • Debtors Invoice
    • CR Sales Revenue
      Note: this income Account can be overridden at item-data level as required
    • DR Accounts Receivable
    • CR Output Tax Account