We are currently using an On-Prem installation of Epicor ERP 10.2.400.22 utilizing the Modern UI Client. We will be migrating to a new instance of Kinetic ERP 2023.2.4 in the near future and I am told that the staff will be utilizing the Web Client, in lieu of the local client.
The team that decided that we are going to use the Web UI does not use the system on a daily basis, which means they are not fully aware of what is all done to our existing system.
I know that there are things that Kinetic does not support that E10 does, but I am told that the Web UI removes even more features. So, what I am wondering is this: How much functionality/customization abilities is going to be gone when we make this transition? Does the Web UI basically limit us to âstockâ Kinetic with just a few abilities such as BAQs and BPMs? Or is it a bit more open than I am thinking?
The entire user experience is massively different. The Configurator platform and underpinnings (as well as Enhanced Quality Inspection Plans) is massively different. The way you perform screen enhancements is massively different.
Any screen customizations will need to be completely rewritten, as well as Configurators and Inspection Plans. In each of these cases, the mindset of the application has also changed in that any logic that needs to happen should be done server-side instead of client-side (since there will be no Smart Client necessary for web users).
Is this loss?
There has been a pretty rocky road to get to where Kinetic is now, but as a consultant that implements new customers for a living, I feel comfortable having them go straight into Kinetic and not even bother with the Classic. However, for those of us whoâve used âClassicâ since forever, it has been an exhausting challenge.
Iâm (finally) beyond the âgritting my teethâ phase and am getting more and more comfortable with it.
Youâll need to have your power users kick the tires in a test environment. When I try things, everything seems like thereâs feature-parity vs on-prem client Classic UI. And then Iâll suggest a power user in a department try it for a week, and they come back with a list of issues that impede efficiency! Every version gets better, at least.
The current gripe for the Kinetic UI for our production control department is that part filters in Kinetic v2023.2 load part numbers into âbubblesâ. These donât have the right click open with context menu thatâs available in the Classic UI (which loads the partnums as rows in a grid).
Is it a deal breaker? No, but I have no reason yet to move them onto a new UI that slows them down (I did schedule recurring MRP in the Kinetic UI to take advantage of the new active part filters though).
That being said, everyone loves that the browser Kinetic is significantly faster feeling than the classic UI in the client.
Lost functionality? There should not be any. We have attempted to replicate everything that was in core functionality in the smart client and pushed it to a browser. If you find something in the smart client that you cannot do in the browser, we need it reported. I just had something come in last week in a fairly obscure process that we needed to match for parity.
Gained Functionality? There is quite a bit to be gained by moving to a browser.
Speed⌠the browser if much faster at launching and retrieving data. In one demonstration I gave 2 Insights ago, I showed how from Login to data retrieval of a PO took 45 seconds in the smart client, and in the browser took less than 10 seconds to log in, launch PO Entry, and retrieve a PO.
Run from Anywhere: Hey, it runs from a browser⌠so as long as you can get to Google Chrome, Microsoft edge, or other Chromium based Browser, you can run Kinetic. It will also run from smaller screens as well (Although, donât try to enter a Quote or engineering workbench from your iPhone as it is very hard to enter that many fields (but you CAN DO IT).
Note that BPMs and BAQs all should work just as before (with the regular exceptions that happen when we change schema⌠but schema changes were not done for most apps.
CHANGED functionality This is where there has been some friction.
companies who had no changes, no customizations, no personalization typically only had a âtrainingâ issue to get their users to start using the new UI.
Companies who have lots of customizations WILL need to adjust those. BUT in MOST cases, the customization can be recreated in the new UI⌠AFTER ALL, Epicor created the NEW UI using APP STUDIO, which is the same tool you have to create your customizations.
The one âbigâ thing that is different in how customizations are created includes a challenge⌠IF you created business logic in the UI, you will need to push that business logic down to the Epicor Function or BPM layer instead of directly in the UI⌠One really bad example was a customer who had built in all their COMMISSIONS Calculation logic into the Sales Order Entry UI. This had to all be moved to the server in a Function, and then called by the UI (via App Studio)⌠but the point is, there was no loss in functionality⌠just a change in the way the programmer had to approach it.
In Kinetic 2023.2, we released a feature called âBrowser Firstâ which allows your users to log into Kinetic using the browser⌠when the menu option that your user chooses is a smart client app (because you still have not migrated the app to Kinetic), then the smart client version will automatically load and be run for the user. This allows the user to have the best user experience from all the browser apps while you are transitioning the balance of your apps from the smart client.
Watch out for the web client Menu Maintenance. Using it to make updates to some menus will break them in ways that the classic client Menu Maintenance canât fix, by deleting values that BAQ canât read. I ended up having to do some light hacking in REST to get a couple of our menus back in action a couple of weeks ago.
A little insight to this migration: It is coming sooner than one would like. We are opening a new facility and migrating part of our staff from one of our existing facilities over to the new one. The new facility will be on Kinetic using the Web Client while the existing facility will remain on Epicor 10.2.400.22 for a little while longer. How much longer is an unknown variable at this time. It could be a few weeks, or a year or more.
That is good to know. So while the immediate loss of functionality will be present, but it is nobodyâs fault other than our own. I am good with that tid-bit of information.
Knowing that any client-side logic needs to be moved server-side is the scary part. We have a lot of customizations that fall into that category that will need to be recreated (including commissions calculations taking place on the client).
The powers-that-be firmly believe that we can be live with the Kinetic Web option (SaaS, hosted by Epicor) within the next couple of monthsâŚto me, that screams âDumpster Fireâ.
Lost functionality: multiple filters on the same column in a grid.
Our finance team is very frustrated with the lack of this functionality that they use every day in E10 to clear out noise from dashboards.
We have 30 some odd plants now, with another one opening soon. The new plant will be taking over some of the load of one of our existing plants. The new plant will be on the clean installation of Kinetic. It is my understand that we are going to import some of the data (Customers, and Part Numbers, for example) into the new environment via DMT. Other data, such as Open Orders, will be manually entered into the new environment. Our data could be considered quite âdirtyâ, so this provides us a good way to clean some of it up.
Once that is done (if it ever is) we will begin migrating our other sites over to the new Kinetic environment in the same way. DMT-ing some of the data, manually entering the rest. Those other sites will be done one at a time to prevent the headaches of everyone across the company having to learn the new system at the same time.
Luckily each of our facilities operates as its own entity in our existing Epicor environment. They do not share Part Numbers or anything, so âshutting downâ one of the plants in Epicor 10 should not affect the rest of our facilities.
Again, this is all âin theoryâ, and the plans may very well change during the next meeting.
@timshuwy - The more I think about this comment, the more I wonder if we are thinking the same thing. Can you elaborate on that? What exactly, Business Logic wise, is not allowed/possible in the UI as it is with the Classic ERP interface?
Are you referring to calling anything requiring BOConnect and related things?
in the old UI, you could write C# code to do extra calculations, then add records to tables, and all sorts of things that would be considered âbusiness logicâ⌠but all the business logic should be done on the server side. the UI should be reserved for User Interface only, but no actual things like calculating commissions, sales tax, etc should be done here.
so, we allow you to call Epicor Functions from the UI, which does all the work and returns the answers. App Studio does have some flowcharting of calling functions, but you cannot write C# code directly inside App Studio.
FOR EXAMPLE⌠you can create things that are done within the UI that drives events. These events then do things such as call a business object or a UD Epicor Function⌠but there is not code in the same way as you had in the client.
Here is the âCredit card authorizationâ⌠Note that you can now see more than you could before (this was hidden in our old smart client)
I see. Well, sounds like a ton of work whichever path you go down.
Not sure if it helps at all, but one thing to consider is that you can still use classic forms in the latest Kinetic version. That statement should be true for a couple more years.
Thatâs what a lot of us here are doing â keep up with the upgrades while still using Classic, then switch to the Browser when the time is right.
One additional note⌠I have heard it said that âwe have 1000s of customizationsâ⌠but when you actually examine what companies have, they have:
added several dozen (or hundred) user defined fields to tables (not a UI issue)
On several dozen screens (Order Entry, Part, Customer, PO, Job, etc) they exposed some (or all) those fields to the UI (This DOES make changes to the UI, but is not necessarily hard with App Studio)⌠In many cases, putting a UD Field onto a screen is fairly simple as long as it has no built in logic.
on several critical screens (Order Entry, Job Entry, PO Entry) they created business logic inside the screens. THESE are the âhardestâ depending on how this was done.
BUT NOTE: There are 1000s screens that could be customized inside the 100âs of applications within the system⌠and MOST are never touched (Example⌠âTerms codeâ is rarely touched⌠(ABC Code Maintenance is one exception since so many of you use that as an experiment⌠but most of the time, it is not a ârealâ customization".
SO, when you actually count customizations, you need to count how many applications on menus where you also added extra logic. I think you will find that in most cases, there are less than 2 handfulls, with another 10-20 apps where you added a UD Field or two.
If you are upgrading from a previous version, these UD fields will automatically be CREATED in the database. You wonât have to do that again.
HOWEVER⌠every single one of these fields you WILL have to put onto the new Kinetic UI screen. It is manifestly NOT hard, but certainly time consuming. It is also a GREAT way to get familiar with Application Studio!
Install the Smart Client and run using Classic screens
Install the Smart Client and run using Classic and/or Kinetic screens
DONâT install the Smart Client and run using Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge, or Apple Safari. Just the browser.
I have a client right now that uses only Mac hardware, so they only have option 3 available to them. There are some tools (BPMs, Functions, some advanced BAQ functionality, probably others too) they cannot use (as yet, all is coming someday), but for their business this is sufficient.
Can confirm I havenât seen any variances between various Chrome flavors and Firefox (fwiw the menu mtc bug I mentioned earlier was verified in three different browsers).
Be cautious about investing in non-Windows architecture. The dependence on Edge (the agent not the browser) may or may not eliminate compatibility on non-Windows devices in the future.
The sad news for M-x eww fans is that javascript is required.
