Don't Forget the Fiscal Year End Deadlines!
Be sure to check out the e-News Fiscal Year-End issue for all of the dates you need to end your year on a sound financial footing! Don't forget there's a handy, printable calendar of due dates also available!
Tag; Fiscal Year End
HR Release 29: PeopleSoft, CREW System Outage Information
Due to the HR Release 29.0, PeopleSoft, ASPIRE transmissions to PeopleSoft and CREW HR will be unavailable during the weekend of May 20-23. Specific outage information is provided below:
PeopleSoft and ASPIRE transmissions to PeopleSoft will be unavailable starting on Friday, May 20th at 5:00pm until Monday, May 23rd at 8:00am.
The CREW Human Resource Reporting Application, as well as ad hoc reporting and exporting from DWHRPRD, IMSUTS & DWHRHST will be unavailable beginning at 8:00pm on Friday, May 20th (the usual down time in the evening) through approximately 3:00pm on Monday, May 23rd in order to install the CREW HR 29.0 software release which corresponds to the PeopleSoft HR 29.0 release. The nightly HR data load from PeopleSoft into the Data Warehouse will be cancelled for Friday, May 20th.
If you have any questions or concerns, please contact the UIS Helpdesk at 496-2001 or via email.
Tag; PeopleSoft, CREW
Important System Outage Information for June 2011
Users of administrative applications should be aware of at least two important system outages that will occur in June:
All-System Outage
All systems, including email and websites such as HARVie, will be unavailable to users on at various schedules on Friday, June 10. Most systems are expected to be available on Saturday, June 11, also at varying times. The list below detail outage information for most of the major administrative applications; users should expect additional communications from owners of additional applications (such as email) as the June 10 date approaches.
Please note the following information for each application:
PeopleSoft
PeopleSoft will be coming down at 2 pm on Friday June 10th. The Time Reporting deadline and Absence Approval deadline for the week of June 5 - June 11 will be pushed up to Friday, June 10th at 2pm. PeopleSoft will be tentatively available as of 9 am on Saturday, June 11.
Oracle applications
Oracle applications will be coming down at 9 pm on Friday June 10th. This will allow time for system feeds into the General Ledger. Oracle will be tentatively available as of 9 am on Saturday, June 11.
CREW
CREW Reporting will be coming down at 6:30 pm on Friday June 10th. CREW will be tentatively available as of 6 pm on Saturday, June 11. Users who log into CREW on June 11 will see data as of Thursday, June 9th. A special data load will take place on Sunday, June 12th, and users will be able to see up-to-date CREW information on Monday morning, June 13th.
HUBS
All features of HUBS, including SmartView, will be unavailable beginning at 6 pm on Friday, June 10th. All normal nightly processing activities originally planned for Friday night will be rescheduled to the night of Sunday, June 12th. On Sunday night the following activities will occur:
GMAS
GMAS will be unavailable starting at 8pm on Friday June 10th, and will remain unavailable until Sunday, June 12th. Financial data in GMAS will remain as of the close of business June 9th from June 10th through June 12th. Financial data will be updated as normal for the start of business on Monday, June 13th.
HARVie, ABLE, Financial Applications websites
HARVie, ABLE and other public websites such as the Office of the Controller (Accounts Payable, Accounts Receivable, Cash Management, etc.), Financial Systems Solutions, the Office of Sponsored Programs, etc. will be unavailable starting at 9 pm on Friday June 10th. The websites will be tentatively available as of 9 am on Saturday, June 11.
For more information concerning the all-systems outage, please contact the UIS Help Desk at 617-496-2001, or via email.
FINDINI 3.2.14 Release
Due to FINDINI Release 3.2.14, Oracle Financials will be unavailable starting on Friday, June 17th at 6:00pm until Monday, June 20th at 6:00am.
The Oracle Financial Applications are:
The CREW Reporting and Ad Hoc environments will be unavailable as follows during the CREW FIN 3.2.14 software release:
If you have any questions or concerns regarding the outage, please contact the UIS Help Desk at 496-2001 or via email.
Tag; All System Outage
Now Available: New HCOM Job Aids!
As the rollout of the Harvard Crimson Online Marketplace (HCOM) application continues, The Center for Workplace Development (CWD) has produced a number of 1-6 page "quick reference" job aids to assist users with the most frequently used functions in the system. All of the materials can be found on Eureka, CWD's learning management system.
The following Quick References are available:
| Quick Reference Title | HCOM Job Aids Folder Location |
| HCOM Login & Setting Preferences Quick Reference | Main HCOM Folder; can also be found in Approver Folder and Setting Preferences Folder |
| Approver Quick Reference | Approver Folder |
| Executive/PI Approve Quick Reference | Approver Folder |
| Vacation Rules & Sharing Worklists Quick Reference | Approver Folder |
| HCOM Punchout Quick Reference | Punchout Request Folder |
| HCOM Catalog Search Quick Reference | Catalog Request Folder |
| HCOM Standing Order Quick Reference | Main HCOM Folder; can also be found in Non-Catalog Folder |
| HCOM Checkout Quick Reference | Main HCOM Folder |
| HCOM-After Final Approval Quick Reference | Main HCOM Folder |
| Non-Catalog Request Quick Reference | Non-Catalog Folder |
| Payment Request Quick Reference | Payment Request Folder |
To access the Quick References, follow these instructions:

Tip: If you work primarily with financial applications, you can change the opening page in Eureka to open up to Financials instead of PeopleSoft. To change your preferences, click on the My Profile link at the top of the Eureka homepage. Under Default Applications, select Financials from the drop-down list, and then click Save Profile. The opening page will change to Financials the next time you log into Eureka.
More Quick References, online simulations and additional materials will be added on Eureka on a regular basis, so users should be sure to check Eureka often for new offerings. Questions concerning the HCOM training program should be directed to Patricia Hatch or Ilena Williams.
Tag; HCOM
Update to Desktop Standards-Internet Explorer Version 8 now Recommended Browser
As reported in the April e-News, current Desktop Standards for University-wide administrative applications have been updated and contain the minimum and recommended hardware, software, and operating systems for use with University Financial Applications, the Harvard University Budgeting System (HUBS), PeopleSoft Human Resource Applications, CREW, GMAS, CAADS and Student Financial Systems.
Interenet Explorer is the supported browser for financial applications and the administrative applications mentioned above. The recommended version of Internet Explorer is now version 8.0.
Financial Systems Solutions (FSS) convened a cross-application testing group to test Windows 7 and Internet Explorer 8 with the applications. The group has prepared a document containing details for recommended browser settings in all of the above applications: Using Internet Explorer 8 and Windows 7 with Administrative Applications. It is strongly advised that all users and IT departments review this document when installing Windows 7 machines (Internet 8 comes bundled with Windows 7) and/or prior to installing and using Internet Explorer 8 with earlier versions of Windows operating systems with the applications named in the document.
If you have any questions concerning the updated desktop standards and/or the approved use of Internet Explorer 8, please contact the UIS Help Desk at 617-496-2001, or send an email.
Tag; Desktop Standards
New Harvard Risk Management iSite Available
The Risk Management & Audit Services Office is pleased to announce that a new iSite has been created to support the Harvard community in its efforts to implement an effective enterprise risk management program.
The Harvard University Risk Management iSite is structured to support and facilitate committee work, risk assessment activities, the sharing of learnings and provide tools and templates. In addition, articles will be posted to keep users up to date on what is new in risk management.
Features of the iSite include:
The iSite will become the focal point for Risk Management activities, so please be sure to visit often and check out the upcoming Calendar of Events. Please send any questions or suggestions for the site to Amanda McDonnell, Manager of Strategic Planning.
Tag; Risk Management
May 2011 CREW Financial, Sponsored, CAPS, and Student Release Items
| Category | Module | Report, View or Object | Description | Release | Actual or *Target Release Date |
| General Ledger | REPORT | GLFGUUB179: Funds, Gifts, Unrest Unexpd Bals | To facilitate Year End reporting and reconcilliation processes, add to report the ability to target funds in deficit and identify the "Fund Purpose" of each fund. Please note, because two new parameters were added to the report, any existing scheduled reports will need to be modified so that they will not error out upon execution (see steps noted further below). |
CREW RPT 7.5 | 5/20/2011 |
| Student | REPORT | STSRAGY225: 1/2/3 year Aged Student Receivables Report | In order to compare months, the business needs period functionality added to this report. Currently, users must run report on last day of period and can not run reports for previous periods. Point in Time (PIT) views will allow period functionality. |
CREW RPT 7.5 | 5/20/2011 |
| Student | REPORT | STSRAGM226: 30-60-90 day Aging Student Receivables Report | In order to compare months, the business needs period functionality added to this report. Currently, users must run report on last day of period and can not run reports for previous periods. Point in Time (PIT) views will allow period functionality. |
CREW RPT 7.5 | 5/20/2011 |
Recreating/Resubmitting the Funds, Gifts, Unrest Unexd Bals (GLFGUUB179) Scheduled Reports
As noted above, the modified GLFGUUB179 report, being released the evening of May 20th, will allow users the ability to target funds in deficit by checking the "Funds in Deficit Only" checkbox (located next to the Fund parameter). Also, users can now choose whether they want to "Suppress Zero Rows" or not.
Existing scheduled reports will need to be modified as a result of adding these two new parameters.
Follow the quick steps below to update any future scheduled (or schedule later) GLFGUUB179 reports:
To recreate scheduled requests, from the CREW HOME page:

If you have any questions or concerns regarding these changes, please contact the UIS Help Desk at 496-2001 or via email.
Tag; CREW
Upcoming Releases
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, 3.2.14, is tentatively scheduled for the weekend of June 17-20, 2011. 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, 3.2.14, is tenatively scheduled for for the weekend of June 17-20, 2011. Details will be available in an upcoming e-News.
HR (PeopleSoft) and CREW HR Release 29
The next PeopleSoft Release (HR 29) is scheduled for May 20-23, 2011. For more information, see artcle 2.
The CREW HR 29.0 Release is scheduled for May 20-23, 2011. For more information, see artcle 2.
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 the 3rd weekend of each month.
| Release Number | Dates | Notes |
| 7.5 | 5/20/11 | |
| 7.6 | 6/17/11 | |
| 7.7 | 7/15/11 | |
| 7.8 | 8/19/11 | |
| 7.9 | 9/16/11 | |
| 7.10 | 10/14/11 | |
| 7.11 | 11/18/11 | |
| 7.12 | 12/16/11 |
Sponsored Systems Releases
The GMAS release (1_28) was deployed on Saturday, March 12, 2011. As always see the Release Notes about releases to date.
The HIRBERT release was deployed on Saturday, March 19, 2011. 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.
The next major HUBS release, Release 1.0.10, is tenatively scheduled for June 2011. Details will be available in an upcoming e-News.
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:
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.