PeopleSoft Release 26.5-System Availability and Enhancement Details
Due to HR Release 26.5, PeopleSoft will be unavailable on Thursday, July 15, between 7:00pm and 10:00pm.
This release includes the following enhancements:
Absence Management Updates
Absence Request Entry Greater than 13 Months in the Past
A modification will be made to allow the Absence Management Product Team to enter absence events which are greater than 13 months in the past.
Previously, if an absence needed to be historically entered but was greater than 13 months in the past, a balance adjustment would be processed. For vacation requests, however, an additional step would need to be taken to pay out the vacation in order to be reimbursed by the Central Vacation Fund.
Now, for special circumstances where vacation needs to be entered prior to 13 months in the past, the product team may enter these in order for the absences to flow through the payroll process and be reimbursed automatically.
Please contact the help desk at 617-496-2001, or via email at uis_helpdesk@harvard.edu to request such entry.
Payroll Updates:
Visa Expiration Report Enhancements
Harvard Reports>Payroll Related>Visa Expiration Report
Returns individuals for whom all visa types have already expired or are expiring with date values less than or equal to the report run date + 180 days.
- The report will now EXCLUDE employees whose the primary job paygroup is NPD, MEP, and MST as none of these need to have valid work authorization
- The report is currently returning the short description for visa type (e.g. Exchg Vstr, Student) instead of the actual permit type (e.g. F-1, J-1). It will now return actual permit type
- Employees with a permit type of LPR, PAA, CPR, ASL, ACP, ALP, RFG will be excluded from the report
Please send any questions concerning the report to the help desk at 617-496-2001, or via email at uis_helpdesk@harvard.edu
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JRE Plug-In Update for Users of Oracle Forms-Based Applications
As was reported in the October 2009 issue of e-News, users of Oracle forms based applications such as the General Ledger began using the JRE Plug-In instead of the J-Initiator browser plug-in. In the March 2010 e-News, it was reported that Oracle indicated users were experiencing problems with the latest iteration of the JRE Plug-In, Version 1.6.18 and higher. Users were told that if using this version of the plug-in and are having problems with Oracle, the version would need to be uninstalled and reinstalled with an older version of the JRE Plug-In.
Oracle provides new versions of the JRE with enhancements for security and functionality for installation on the desktop on a regular basis. To ensure that a new version is compatible with Oracle Financials, The Office of Administrative Systems and its business partners in FAD Systems Solutions have developed a process to test and validate new versions of the JRE for use with Oracle Financials within 60 days of their release. Current supported version information can be found at: http://www.able.harvard.edu/other/DesktopStandards.pdf.
New Compatible JRE Plug-In Now Available
IMPORTANT: Users should not attempt to install this version of the JRE Plug-In on their own; please contact your local IT department for assistance.
Recently Oracle released a special version of the JRE, 1.6.0_20. Version of the Oracle JRE, 1.6.0_20-b05 has been tested and its compatibility with Oracle Financials has been verified. It is strongly recommended that this new version be installed on the desktops in your area as soon as possible. This special version can be found at: http://www.helpdesk.harvard.edu/icb/icb.do?keyword=k32422&pageid=icb.page345480.
Please note that this special release of the Oracle JRE is not yet available through the JRE desktop update program that some individuals have on their machines. Installing that version of the JRE will lead to known incompatibilities with Oracle Financials.
The JRE Troubleshooting Guide has been updated with this information.
If you have any questions concerning this information, please contact the UIS Helpdesk at 617-496-2001, or via email at uis_helpdesk@harvard.edu.
The Oracle forms-based applications are:
- Applications Administration
- Sponsored Budget Tool
- CAPS
- Cash Management (CMRA)
- CSMA
- General Ledger
- Payables
- Receivables
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July 2010 CREW Financial, Sponsored, CAPS, and Student Release Items
| Category | Module | Report, View or Object | Description | Release | Actual or *Target Release Date |
| Capital Asset Management | REPORT | CPBDLND205: CAPS Building and Land Report & CPASCHG213: CAPS Asset Status Change Report | Currently, the LOV is not complete. It needs to include "Primary Use" LOV value "ROB - (Research Office Building / Lab)". | CREW RPT 6.7 | *7/16/2010 |
| Sponsored | REPORT | GMINVAC093: Sponsored Invalid Code Combinations | Current Month Parameter requires change in domain function used to enable current open GL period to be selected so that ICC's may be corrected prior to month end closing. | CREW RPT 6.7 | *7/16/2010 |
| Student | REPORT | STSRORA227: Student Analysis Report modifications | Modifications are to report output display and groupings, and greater search functionality with a report period and comparison period. | CREW RPT 6.7 | *7/16/2010 |
If you have any questions or concerns regarding these changes, please contact the UIS Help Desk at 496-2001 or via email.
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HUBS Updates
On Friday, July 23rd monthly report updates are being deployed to HUBS. No outage is required for this activity.
The monthly report updates are as follows:
- July Reports Release: Several HUBS reports are being updated on Friday, July 23rd to correct minor issues that had been identified. The details of these report updates can be found in the release notes, located on the home page of the HUBS iSite.
- SmartView Analytics Office Hours: The next office hours for the SmartView tool are Thursday, July 22nd from 9:00-10:30am in the B2 Suite at 8 Story Street. Please stop by this location to receive assistance and have your SmartView questions answered.
- PLNG0021 and PLNG0030 Application Outages: Starting at noon on Wednesday, July 14th and extending until 8:00am on Thursday, July 15th the PLNG0021 and PLNG0030 applications will be unavailable. CINA reports can still be executed from PLNG0030 at this time but employee reports should not be run. This outage only applies to these two applications and none of the other HUBS applications are impacted during this time.
If you have any questions or concerns this report release, please contact the UIS Help Desk at 496-2001 or via email.
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Upcoming Releases
FY2010 FINDINI Release Schedule
A software release to the Oracle Financial Applications, known as a "FINDINI release", is done every two to four months. Each upgrade introduces needed bug fixes, enhancements, and technical upgrades into Harvard's financial systems. Generally, releases are performed on weekends to assure maximum availability during the business week. Most outages occur from 6 pm Friday evening-6 am Monday morning.
The next FINDINI release, 3.2.12, is scheduled for the weekend of October 23-24, 2010. Further details will be available in an upcoming e-News.
The Oracle Financial Applications are:
CREW FIN Releases
The Common Reporting Environment for the Warehouse (CREW) is a reporting system that draws data from a variety of sources, which are updated on a nightly basis. Users can submit report requests for immediate processing or schedule reports to automatically run on a recurring basis. Types of CREW reports include financial, budget, receivables, HR management, benefits, costing, payroll, pension, security, grants management, and sponsored reports.
The next CREW FIN release, 3.2.12, is scheduled for October 22-25, 2010. Details will be available in an upcoming e-News.
HR (PeopleSoft) and CREW HR Release 27
The next PeopleSoft Release (HR 26.5) is scheduled for July 16, 2010. Please see article 1 for details.
The CREW HR 27.0 Release is scheduled for September 11-13, 2010.
CREW Reports
In addition to the CREW Financial and CREW HR releases which correspond with the FINDINI and HR releases listed above, changes and enhancements to new and existing CREW reports are also released monthly.
- The CREW RPT 6.7 Report Release is scheduled for July 16, 2010. See article 3 for details.
Sponsored Systems Releases
Sponsored Systems include the Grants Management Application Suite (GMAS), Harvard's first enterprise-wide grants management system. The application is web-based and serves to connect those involved in and responsible for sponsored research administration, and the Harvard Institutional Research Board Reporting Tool (HIRBERT), a web-based tool designed to assist Institutional Review Boards (IRBs) share best practices and standardize data while allowing flexibility in considering the needs of individual studies at Harvard.
The next GMAS release is targeted for Fall 2010. Stayed tuned for details. As usual, please see the Release Notes for details about releases to date.
The next HIRBERT release is targeted for Fall 2010. Stayed tuned for details. As usual, please see the Release Notes for details about releases to date.
HUBS Releases
The Harvard University Budgeting Sytems (HUBS) is a set of web-based Oracle Hyperion Planning applications used for budget data entry, estimates, annotations, reporting, and submission associated with the annual budget and planning cycles.
HUBS Release 1.0.9 is scheduled for November 2010.
The HUBS Monthly Artifact Release is scheduled for July 23, 2010. Please see article 4 for details.
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About the e-News
The Center for Workplace Development publishes this electronic newsletter for users of Harvard University's financial, HR, and reporting systems, policies, and procedures. The e-News is generally published on or around the 15th of each month.
It contains:
- updates on projects underway to build or improve University administrative systems;
- information about new University policies, procedures, and forms;
- reminders about upcoming deadlines and cut-over dates;
- tips and tricks for working more easily or productively.
We welcome questions and suggestions for improvement from readers. If your questions are of general interest, we will answer them in future issues.
Please send comments, questions, or suggestions for improvement by email to us at: admin_systems_enews@harvard.edu.
For information about subscribing or unsubscribing to the eNews notifications, visit our who gets the eNews page.
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