MIP Custom Formats Missing After Upgrade or Reinstall

MIP Custom Formats Missing After Upgrade or Reinstall

With version 9.0 released in the fall of 2007, this article will be of use to Sage MIP Fund Accounting users who utilize the Forms Designer module.

Symptom

After an upgrade or reinstallation of the server, custom check formats created with the Forms Designer module are missing.

Cause

During the installation process, the link to the custom formats has been lost or the default directory has been changed.

Resolution

Confirm that the custom formats still exist. Go to Windows Explorer under C:\MIP Share > Formats, or go to Start > Run and type the following: \\servername\MIP Share\Formats directory. There will be a large number of files under the Formats folder.

Files that begin with the letters “DEF” are default system formats. See screen shot below.

Files that begin with a prefix of “FD” (normally) are the custom formats. See screen shot below.

If the files are not in the default directory you will need to locate them on your server. You can do a file search (Start > Search > Files or Folders) for *.FDN.

It is hard to say what the exact name of any file will be because the name is assigned by the system when the format was created.

Search For Custom File

To help with identifying the custom file names, look for a file called Formats.fmt within the Formats folder. Open this file with text editor (WordPad or Notepad for example). You will see lines like this:

"AP Bank Check", "First State Bank Check", "APS", "107", "C:\MIPSHARE\FORMATS\FD5D.FDN", "1"

AP Bank Check is the name given the format when it was saved. This is what you saw in the dropdown menu when selecting a check format.

First State Bank Check is the user-defined description.

APS is the transaction source; in this case it is an AP system check

"C:\MIP SHARE\FORMATS\FD5D.FDN" is the saved location of the check. This is useful because it references the file name called FD5D.FDN as the First State Bank Check. When you re-import your checks into the system, the FD5N.FDN file is what you will need to refer to.

It is a good idea to print this file for future references.

After locating your formats, you may need to move them to the default directory. The proper directory should be the \\Servername\MIP Share\Formats where Servername is the name of the machine that is acting as the MIP server. If you have installed the MIP Server to a new machine or a different location, you will need to move the Formats directory to that location.

Import Custom File

Once you have the Formats in the proper directory, you are ready to import them into Forms Designer. To import a format into Forms Designer go to Accounting > Reports > Forms Designer.

This will bring up a box where you select information about the format you wish to import. In the Layout Type box select the type of format that you wish to import. Select the printer type and choose to use pre-printed stock with “None” as the stock.

See screen shot below.

After clicking OK you will get an empty template screen. There will be icons across the top. You want to click the icon that looks like a paintbrush with an arrow pointing to it. This is the Import Format button.

This brings up a dialog box that allows you to browse and select the format file you wish to import. Leave the file name the same.

After you click the Open button another box will appear. This is where you enter the reference name (the name you will see on the dropdown when selecting formats) and the description. If, for some reason, you get a message that the name has already been used, modify the name slightly.

After you select OK you should get a message that the format has been successfully imported. It should now be available for selection wherever you use the format. You may import additional formats or exit out of Forms Designer.

Note: If you happen to get an error message when you attempt to print checks using the form(s) you imported, check that the Formats.fmt folder contains a valid path. For example, if you reinstalled the workstation thru the UNC path instead of its previously mapped network drive path, be sure that the path of the custom format is not pointing to an old drive letter, and that it is referencing a valid path to the MIP Share folder on the server.