Lennox Computer

Software Design Installation & Support

132 Virginia Avenue HAWTHORNE, QLD 4172 Phone: 07 3395 7733, Fax: 07 3395 7732 http://www.lennox.com.au eMail: sales@lennox.com.au

Newsletter June 2009

Greetings to all our LILAC users and staff. At the end of a pretty torrid financial year, we hope that all our clients are experiencing a bit of the "green shoots" activity that the pundits love to talk about. Lennox Computer have seen continuing good growth in our business, and our clients seem to be doing rather better than the general gloom & doom merchants have predicted.

Anti-virus Software - Best Practise

Doug Lennox

Ailsa Lennox

Lennox Computers stated policy with respect to "Anti-virus" software from any source has always been "don't". In more recent times there have emerged a plethora of scam's masquerading as AV products. Many of which actually introduce threats or pseudo penetrations, and then try to extract money from you for "activation" of the anti-virus product. Zach Lanier, senior network security analyst at Harvard Business School, noted recently that the debate over AV effectiveness isn't new, but the past few years have been increasingly difficult for traditional approaches to malware protection. Most of the current AV options lag behind in updates, have detection engines that are trivial to bypass, and often are themselves vulnerable. So please be aware that any PC operating in the LILAC server or workstation role should not have anti-virus software installed on it, and if Lennox Computer are asked to service or perform work an a machine that has such software installed, that it will be removed. The sole exception to this rule is the genuine Microsoft product "Windows Defender".

Electronic Data Interchange - EDI

Business to Business (B2B) electronic trading is becoming a major topic and is generating a lot of activity in the IT industry at the moment. Lennox Computer are heavily involved in the development and deployment of a variety of EDI strategies for several LILAC users at this point in time, and we invite all our clients to consider the needs and benefits for EDI functionality in their future operations. In some cases the requirement for EDI is driven by particular trading partners. For example many of the large retailers are starting to insist that their suppliers at the wholesale & distributions level deal electronically with them or forfeit the business or in some case incur extra charges or "fines" for continuing to trade on paper. The cost of software and services from Lennox Computer in the deployment of EDI strategies can vary from fairly trivial amounts to quite large expenditure, depending on the strategy selected and the scale and complexity of the relationship. THe following list of strategies is in rough order of increasing cost: 1 Automatic creation & transmission of PDF invoice & order documents by eMail. 2 The interchange of EXCEL compatible data in a bi-lateral agreed format. 3 The use of XML structured order & invoice data to Lennox Computer specification. 4 The use of LILAC Remote Client software into your database by trading partners. 4 Use of Lennox Computer Active Server technology for HTML based access to LILAC data-base by others. 5 Full UN/EDIFACT support to published standards.

Web-sites, HTML LILAC Active Server

The deployment of Lennox Computers Active Server module continues apace. The tight integration to the LILAC database for product data, accounting and order processing is so superior to 3rd party hosted "eCommerce" systems that everyone with aspirations to trade electronically should be looking hard at this option. The traditional "Shopping Basket" option is just the tip of the iceberg. Any aspect of the LILAC database is potentially available for on-line access - stock availability - accounts statements - quotations - brochures - safety certificates - instruction manuals - the list goes on, and all this is possible without any HTML of web skills because the data entry and editing is all performed within the familiar LILAC WYSIWYG Checkout the web-site at http://www.wos.com.au for a very impressive example of the LILAC Active Server module in use.

Lennox Computer's Hardware Products

There is many hours work for Lennox Computer' staff in setting up and configuring a Microsoft Windows PC for optimal operation as a LILAC workstation, and much more in setting up a server - not because LILAC is particularly demanding, but because the complexity and generally flawed nature of the Microsoft product range requires careful management and attention to detail.

Lennox Computer supplied PC hardware generally has an up-market configuration well suited to modern versions of Windows, and supplied with all the appropriate software drivers for the various components, such as video, audio, DVD, modem, Networking, Printers etc, etc. If you source low cost PC hardware from another party, Lennox Computer will undertake the setup and installation work for you, but it will cost you quite a lot more as generally we have to allow for about twice the work, as we will have to quality check and adjust the hardware configuration, find all the right drivers and generally diagnose and solve all the inherent problems of such an approach.

So please let us quote to supply and install workstation, and server hardware for your LILAC and Windows networking needs. You will find our base pricing quite competitive for comparable quality, and you will save money on installation and support costs, and you will achieve much higher performance as a consequence.

Note: Lennox Computer workstations are equipped with 2 Giga-bytes of RAM, and our servers have 4 Giga-bytes to ensure no-compromise performance running Windows Vista & Windows Server 2008

Lennox Computer - Fees & Charges

In the present economic climate with there is no need for large increases in fees & charges this time round. Lennox Computers cost base has been held in check, and our level of activity continues to grow. Therefore we will restrict rises in free and charges to fees & charges to reflect changes in emphasis rather than across the board increases. We have already completed the technical implementation of a significant change to software license and support charges, to replace a work-station based regimen with a "user" license concept. Over the next month or so we will restructure the billing for each client to refect this as the revised version of the software is deployed. There are significant operational and cost benefits in the new approach. It means that a LILAC installation may deploy as many hardware workstations as desired without penalty and an individually licensed user may sign on to LILAC at any one workstation at a time. It should mean that the absolute number of licenses required is less than previously. Payment terms continue as before - 30 days from invoice for service and support, and cash on delivery for capital items, hardware, and pre-packaged software.

LILAC ATO Changes & Revisions for 2009 - 2010

The Australian Taxation Office have released new specifications for the printing of PAYG summaries for payments made from the 1st July 2009, and the associated electronic file formats for submission to the ATO's ECI system. These are respectively V4.0 of the PAYG print format and V9.0 of the Electronic Reporting Specification. The main change is the addition of fields to provide for the reporting of "Reportable Superannuation Contributions". The ATO's approach to these changes is a little clumsy. The new versions should only be used for payments made in the new financial year, and the old versions V2.0 & V8.0 must be used for payments made in pervious financial year(s), so the current LILAC release available for download contains both versions of these programs. The file produced is still called empdupe, and the procedures in the ECI context are much the same as before.