ActionWare PC Applications
ActionWare is an IBM iSeries based Contact and Activity
Management product. It provides all functions needed to create and maintain a
view of prospects and customers, from first contact, through the sales cycle,
and subsequent customer support and follow-up.
Although ActionWare is primarily a host based product, it includes
3 optional PC applications that can be installed on each user's PC. These
are known by the acronyms GUI, MSWI and PCL.
GUI is a Graphical User Interface that presents ActionWare
in a graphical Window instead of in the standard 5250 host (green) screen. This
interface was developed using a product from Jacada (www.jacada.com
), and is separately licensable.
MSWI is Microsoft Word Interface. This is a
product that allows the user to create and edit single or multiple Microsoft
Word documents with pre-filled data from the iSeries ActionWare database,
and to store the documents in the customer folder on the iSeries.
PCL is PC Command Link. This application is a pre-requisite
for MSWI, it provides a communications channel that enables commands
and data to be sent from the iSeries to the user's PC.
These PC products are distributed on the ActionWare installation
CD along with the host product. After doing a standard install or Upgrade
of ActionWare on the iSeries, the installation folders for these PC products
are located under the top level folder AW4. From the iSeries you
can use command WRKFLR to verify this. A second level folder is named
PCAPPS. Under that folder are the 3 installation folders named GUI,
MSWI and PCL. From the PC side, you can use Windows Explorer to navigate
down the folder path starting with network Drive I: which will normally be
mapped to folder AW4 on the iSeries.
The IBM product iSeries Access
is a pre-requisite for the PCL and MSWI products, and must be configured
and installed on each PC. There is no
similar pre-requisite for GUI.
Microsoft Word on the PC is a pre-requisite for MSWI and
PCL. All versions of Word from 2000 through 2007 are supported.
The ActionWare PC products are compatible with these
versions of the Windows Operating System: Windows 2000 Professional, Windows
XP Professional, Home and MCE editions, and Vista Business and Ultimate editions. Note
that other Vista editions are not supported because IBM does not support
the iSeries Access product on other editions, as documented on this
IBM page:
http://www-03.ibm.com/servers/eserver/iseries/access/supportedos.html
.
The current version of ActionWare is 6.30.
The GUI product is backward compatible with versions
6.30, 6.20, and 6.01.
The MSWI and PCL products are backward compatible
with versions of ActionWare all the way back to version 6.00 Level 002. This
is all supported versions.
The most current versions of the ActionWare PC products can
be (and should be) downloaded via the web from this page:
http://www.actionware.com/DCustSrvc/Downloads/.
The downloaded files must be unzipped (where applicable) and
stored in the locations described above. This means you will need to
overwrite the files already there. It does not matter if the files in
these 3 folders originate from the ActionWare distribution CD, or from
a web download (recommended). In either case you will have
the following number of files in the distribution folders. (The
upper casing is for emphasis only, it is not required.)
I:\AW4\PCAPPS\GUI - 17 files - setup.exe is the installation file
I:\AW4\PCAPPS\MSWI - 6 files - setup.exe is the installation file
I:\AW4\PCAPPS\PCL - 1 file - a self-installing file
There is no requirement that the installation of the PC
products be performed from these network folders. So long as all
the files for an application are in the same folder, the installation
will work. You could, for example, copy the files to a temporary folder
on a PC. Our support desk has had some reports that one or
more PC applications will not install from a network drive. This is
probably due to network configuration or a Windows permissions setting. The
easy workaround is to copy the entire PCAPPS structure from the network
drive to a temporary drive on the PC's C:\ drive.
Installing GUI
Remember you will not be able to use the GUI application
without purchasing a license. Contact ActionWare for details.
If installing on Vista, read the Additional Considerations before proceeding.
Navigate to the folder containing the GUI installation
files, the default folder is I:\AW4\PCAPPS\GUI. Double click on
SETUP.EXE. Follow the instructions on the screen. Enter the user
name and company when prompted. Select the TCP/IP connection option. Select
the appropriate date format. Select to not enable Just In Time feature. Select
Finish. When finished, go to Start --> All Programs, locate the
application and copy a shortcut to the desktop.
The first time you run GUI, you will be prompted for the
host name or IP address of your iSeries computer.
Additional considerations for installing
GUI on Vista
It is assumed you will be installing this application using
an Administrator profile. In any case, it is recommended that instead
of double-clicking on INSTALL.EXE that you right-click on it and select "Run
as Administrator".
You will receive additional warnings at the beginning of
the install process such as "The publisher could not be verified. Are you
sure you want to run this software?" You need to reply Run. You
will also see "An unidentified program wants to access your computer." You
need to reply Allow.
Installing PCL
Ideally PCL should be installed
before MSWI.
If installing on Vista, read the Additional Considerations before proceeding.
Navigate to the folder containing
the PCL self-installing file, the default folder is I:\AW4\PCAPPS\PCL. Double
click on this file to begin the installation. Follow the instructions
on the screen. When finished, go to Start > All Programs, locate
the application and copy a shortcut to the desktop.
Additional considerations for installing PCL
on Vista
It is assumed you will be installing this application using
an Administrator profile. In any case, it is recommended that instead
of double-clicking on the self installing program that you right-click
on it and select "Run as Administrator".
You will receive additional warnings at the beginning of
the install process such as "The publisher could not be verified. Are you
sure you want to run this software?" You need to reply Run. You
will also see "An unidentified program wants to access your computer." You
need to reply Allow.
When the installation is complete,
Use Windows Explorer to navigate to folder AW400\AWPCL on the C: drive. Locate
program AW4PCFX.EXE. Right click on it and select Properties. Click
on the Compatibility tab. Check the last checkbox on the page to "Run
this program as an administrator".
Installing MSWI
If installing on Vista, read the
Additional Considerations before proceeding.
Navigate to the folder containing
the MSWI installation files, the default folder is I:\AW4\PCAPPS\MSWI. Double
click on SETUP.EXE to begin the installation. Follow the instructions
on the screen. There is no shortcut to copy to the desktop for this
product.
Versions
of Word 2002 and later give the user a warning dialog each time MSWI is
used. The warning is that an application
is about to run an SQL command. The user can choose to proceed. Documentation
on how to eliminate this warning permanently can be found at this Microsoft
site:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/825765.
This workaround requires a change to the registry. If you would like assistance
in implementing this solution, please
contact ActionWare Support.
Additional considerations for installing MSWI on Vista
It is assumed you will be installing this application using
an Administrator profile. In any case, it is recommended that instead
of double-clicking on the self installing program that you right-click
on it and select "Run as Administrator".
You will receive additional warnings at the beginning of
the install process such as "The publisher could not be verified. Are
you sure you want to run this software?" You need to reply Run. You
will also see "An unidentified program wants to access your computer." You
need to reply "Allow".
The installation process appears
to finish normally. Then the following message appears: "This program
might not have installed correctly". You need to click on the button
"Reinstall using recommended settings". You will then get the message
"Install completed successfully".
Still to come
• How to configure iSeries Access.
• What to do after installing each
product.
• Combatability issues with other documentation.