Businesses handle loads of data daily, which is crucial to operations. Small and large enterprises can benefit from data loading tools. An efficient system will help with data management and analytics.
Studies show that companies lose millions of dollars annually due to poor data quality.
Despite being sufficient for business needs, there are certain restrictions to utilizing the Oracle ERP program for data processing. You could discover that entering data into the system takes time, and the forms aren’t easy to use.
A solution to the problem would be integrating data processing tools. Enterprises can get it free, use software developers, or from a tech company like oAppsNET: It will speed up data loading.
Integrating Digital Tools
Nowadays, enterprises largely depend on technology for business growth and to enhance processes. Companies with a developed digital strategy attribute their achievements to technology. Innovation may promote development and profit, but it requires a lot of preparation and strategy.
The two main options when choosing business management tools are build vs. purchase. “Build” means a system developer customizes the program according to the customer’s needs before implementing a digital solution. The “buy” option is getting pre-made software to address a particular business need.
Free Tools for Oracle EBS Data Loading
An example of a free application from Oracle is Oracle EBS WebADI, which enables data entry into well-known apps like Microsoft Office.
Users need not download any extra software to use this tool because it is already available in the Oracle EBS data loading system. The Oracle EBS server incorporates security features and controls the program.
Still, there are limitations to using WebADI, much like Oracle. It never improves the data loading, and the interface is often challenging to use, requiring skilled users.
Customized Data Loading Program
This option involves technicians writing specialized code and scripts for Oracle data processing software according to the business requirements. It requires experts to undertake tasks that might be costly for small enterprises or start-ups.
Programming takes time and necessitates code adjustments for each Oracle EBS data load update. Businesses will also lose a valuable employee if one of your expert’s departments quits the company.
Third-Party Software
Another option is to purchase technologies from third-party firms in the industry, like Dataloader and oAppsNET. It is an affordable and effective solution to improving the Oracle EBS data loading system.
Enterprises can integrate Oracle into an Excel front-end and streamline data loading. There are dozens of digital tools that integrate with the most recent editions of Microsoft Office and streamline your Oracle EBS data processing.
The Benefits of oAppsNET
oAppsNET platform enables you to use Oracle’s complete capabilities within a comfortable interface like Microsoft or Google worksheets, unlike other alternatives provided by rivals like Dataloader, More 4 Apps and Excel 4 Apps.
Our user-friendly solutions remain centered on the end user. The objective is to keep accurate data even while handling massive volumes. oAppsNET assists with simple Oracle ERP data loading procedures, so your team may focus more on technical business activities.
Our licensing structure is based on the number of transactions so it’s not a User based license.
Looking for more information about integrating data loading solutions? Contact us right now or grab a free whitepaper from our official website.
Factors to Consider
Before determining whether to manufacture or purchase software, you must consider all pertinent factors. Evaluate several aspects, including the project’s objectives, the initial cost, ongoing maintenance, etc. In addition to organizational concerns, you must consider how outsiders interact with them.
Below is what to bear in mind:
The Cost
Companies operate on a budget and must always search for the most affordable options. However, the financial burden of IT initiatives may add up very rapidly. Costs associated with the original development, support, testing, updates, and market status are things to consider. Also, more than half of IT projects take longer than expected.
Purchasing a program has a significant upfront expense but is a valuable investment for the long term. Since it is a developed product, organizations use it as it is and do not face unforeseen challenges associated with building software from scratch. Still, businesses save on costs and avoid the hassles of developing their application.
Configurations
You should also consider how much you’ll require to configure the digital tool to suit your existing system. Most software developers and vendors provide customizable templates, meaning you receive a packaged version, which you may easily alter according to requirements. There is less space for error because the layout is simple, and tweaking the application won’t be difficult.
Software development requires more money and prolonged maintenance than buying pre-made digital tools. The implementation will take longer because of the coding process.
Design
Users must find it simple to use the program to get the best outcome from its integration. Software should be straightforward to use, regardless of if you are buying or creating it. If your instrument is difficult to use, it beats the purpose of investing in it. A user-friendly design allows any member of the staff to learn it.
Besides affecting the output, the software design will determine the customer experience. The right technology needs to digitize and streamline processes.
Security
Another thing to consider is company security when investing in digital tools. It is essential if your business involves handling highly private data. Think carefully about data security and its associated risks. You can be safe by strengthening the firewall to lessen the chance of data breaches.
Maintenance
Finally, think about your technology in the long term by determining future maintenance and support needs. If you choose to build, it is best to utilize the same team who created it for upgrades and scaling up, making it challenging to do urgent maintenance or repairs.
Purchasing software is effective because another technician can handle the designs without relying on the service provider for support, updating, and maintenance.
Conclusion
Buying technology or developing it from the ground up is one of the most pressing for businesses.
It is necessary to consider the features of business management applications to pick the right product. The insights in this read will help with choosing the best solution fitting your business’s requirements.
Invoice audits are a great way to ensure your business is protected. Invoice audits help you look at all of your invoices and accounts receivable in a more detailed manner. When you do an invoice audit, you can find out if there are any discrepancies or issues with the invoices. This will help prevent fraud before it happens, which is always the best option.
Automated payments (AP) automation is another excellent way to prevent fraud from occurring. AP automation allows businesses to accept payments online for their goods or services through e-commerce platforms. This means you don’t have to store credit card information for customers to purchase on your website or through an app.
Invoice audits and AP automation are the best defense against fraud. When you automate your accounts payable processes, you can achieve the following;
Reduce Manual Errors
Invoice auditing and AP automation are the best ways to prevent fraud. The invoice auditing process involves reviewing invoices for accuracy and completeness, while AP automation uses pre-defined criteria to determine whether a payment is accurate. This can help reduce manual errors often made by employees or contractors when processing payments.
Reduce Fraud Losses
Fraud losses can be large, especially when dealing with third-party payments. If a company pays a contractor for work that never gets done or if payment is made for services that weren’t performed, then both parties could be losing money and time, and effort. Invoice audits and AP automation can help companies prevent fraud losses by ensuring that all payments are processed correctly and on Time.
Prevent Malicious Use of Vendor Accounts
When people use vendor accounts without authorization, they steal from their employer or client, whether they want to or not. By using invoice audits and AP automation, companies can stop these rogue users from making unauthorized changes to their accounts so that their employers don’t get stuck paying for services they didn’t order or didn’t receive in the first place.
Identify Potential Problems Before They Become a Problem
Invoice audits and AP automation are designed to identify potential problems before they become a problem. If you’re constantly checking invoices against your books, you will know when something has gone wrong or someone is trying to take advantage of your system by adding unnecessary amounts to their invoice. This helps prevent fraudulent activity from occurring.
Increase Accuracy in Your Data
Invoice audits and AP automation helps you increase the accuracy of your data. This is crucial when it comes to fraud prevention because many times, people looking for ways to commit fraud will try to get around the system by just changing their information and going through with the transaction anyway.
Find Suspicious Transactions Faster
Invoice Audits and AP Automation is that it allows you to find suspicious transactions faster. When you use these tools, you’ll be able to go back into older transactions and look for any discrepancies that might have been missed. You’ll see if any changes were made after completing the transaction that wasn’t originally recorded.
Prevent Duplicate Payments
Invoice audits and AP automation allow you to prevent duplicate payments. If someone tries to make two separate purchases with two different credit cards, then both payments will be rejected by the system as being fraudulent unless they’re reconciled with each other within 24 hours of being processed by your bank account or credit card company, depending on which one you use.
Reduce the Time it Takes to Process Payments
The Time it takes to process payments is a significant concern for many businesses. This can be especially true for small startup companies with limited resources. Invoice audits and AP automation can help reduce the time it takes to process payments by speeding up the approval process. Invoice audit technology will give you more accurate information on who has paid your invoices and when that payment was made. You will see the financial impact of any changes made to your software or processes.
Invoice audits and AP automation can help you reduce the number of manual reconciliation processes
Manual processes tend to be error-prone, slow and labor-intensive, which means they are prone to fraud. Automation is a technology that allows businesses to reduce the time it takes for their employees to complete tasks to free up time for other essential tasks. It also reduces errors in data entry by providing a more accurate system for entering data.
Reduce manual labor costs
If you are using manual processes for processing payments, this could mean more work for yourself or your employees. Pre-determining who has paid what can eliminate some of these manual processes and save money in the long run:
Basically, manual work is time-consuming and tedious, so if you have many accounts that need to be monitored and updated, it will take you forever to complete all of your tasks every day. You can reduce your manual work significantly by automating your processes and creating automated scripts for various tasks. This means you can focus more energy on other aspects of your business, such as marketing or sales, instead of having time to enter information into spreadsheets or manually update records daily.
Prevent payment reversals
The most common type of fraud is a customer who receives a credit card statement with an autofill function and returns the item they purchased, but their credit card company reverses the charge. When you run an invoice audit, you can stop this from happening by checking to see if your customers’ names are on file with your processor.
Key Takeaway
Invoice audits and automation are powerful methods for fraud prevention. They can spot invoice anomalies and automate the identification of potential fraud. Auditors will look for patterns in invoice numbers, credit card details, and other data points that could indicate fraudulent activity. Auditors can also use AP Automation to identify potential fraud by comparing invoice data against previously collected data from other sources, such as credit reports or existing accounts receivable records.
Accessing quality data is advantageous for all enterprises because inaccurate facts and inadequate information hamper prudent decision-making. It results in the wastage of resources, a decline in revenue, poor customer service, and wrong projections. Annually organizations incur millions in costs resulting from imperfect data.
Read on to learn more about mistakes staff will likely make when using ERP systems, look at possible solutions, and recommend third-party tools for your business.
Improved ERP processes and technology prevent insufficient data.
ERP system integration enhances data quality by eliminating human error, which can be costly to businesses. Making mistakes is easy during data entry: it may be incorrect number typing, entering values in a wrong field, or omitting information.
Complex systems will make ERP data processing much harder. One of the digital transformation trends in 2023 is integrating data processing tools as businesses attempt to enhance the process and data quality. Technology and digitization will aid in reducing human errors.
Best Practices for ERP Data to Reduce Errors
Utilize ERP Features and Expertise
Businesses must adopt emerging technical data solutions to address issues brought on by outdated procedures. Manual processes encourage human mistakes, and repetitive tasks can lead to errors. If programs do not integrate, they are less valuable. Businesses may manage and exchange all digital data operations with the aid of contemporary ERP solutions, and there is a need for additional tools.
Working with an ERP professional when looking for a technological solution to find the best way to improve data quality is critical.
Cut down on manual data entry
Data input errors arise when done manually, and businesses must automate as many ERP data procedures as possible. Still, It’s best to input as little as possible using the Oracle system.
Making data more accessible to the end user is a fundamental benefit of ERP integration. Digital tools make data from across the businesses readily available to staff and management.
Data Pre-Validation
Pre-validation technologies work to reduce the likelihood that incorrect data will enter your enterprise resource planning (ERP) system, which might reduce your company’s productivity, data accuracy, and ability to make decisions.
When an issue happens, users must immediately know where it is and how to correct it. The program provides immediate error notifications and recommends the best action. Ensure the oAppsNET notifies you in real time for flagged errors.
Automation
Copying and pasting or typing data manually between systems tends to be slow and error-prone. Instead, businesses may use automation to save time and improve accuracy.
Pitfalls of ERP Data Processing Tools that Affect Accuracy
Oracle has several incorporated tools for data management. However, users may find it lacking because they are challenging to use and navigate, which increases the likelihood of mistakes and incorrect data entry into your ERP system. Here are some of the pitfalls;
Forms
Data filling on Oracle forms is exhausting and repetitious. The data is separated into many formats, making the interface unsuitable for bulk data extraction or input. Form parts must be filled out manually and slowly by users. The intricate arrangement of the Oracle forms makes the entire procedure error-prone.
WebADI (Oracle E-Business Suite)
Most users cannot customize spreadsheet layouts using WebADI’s complicated user interface. Instead, users must browse enormous sheets stuffed with pointless fields, which leaves a lot of chances for error. Additionally, to prevent data loss when customizing layouts may require you to call an expert technician for maintenance and patching.
FBDI (Fusion Cloud Applications)
FBDI templates lack a straightforward mechanism to input data sets as they can be ambiguous and inconsistent. Linking many spreadsheets together is necessary to load numerous parts of data. Users must compare the Excel sheet with feedback on errors with the presentation in another document making it difficult to interpret and to make changes. Pre-validation of the data is also not possible.
ADFdi (Fusion Cloud Applications)
ADFdi is easier to use than FBDI. However, it only has a few applications. Users can only view a single field at any moment, and there is no option to view every detail of a chunk of data simultaneously. Catching faults is less probable with this constrained viewpoint.
An External Tool for Better ERP Data Processing
oAppsNET software is a viable solution for users worldwide and many businesses. It seamlessly connects with the Oracle system, enabling users to create and update ERP data using spreadsheets from Microsoft. Oracle ERP data management is made simple and error rates significantly reduce using oAppsNET software.
Users of oAppsNET can access all of Excel’s features, such as formulae, predefined values, and copy & paste. Users may eliminate many laborious, tedious, and error-prone components of maintaining Oracle data. Spreadsheets are readily customizable to display pertinent columns, minimizing confusion and mistakes while handling information for Oracle ERP.
Oracle components like search buttons, dropdown options, and timestamps within the spreadsheet aid in maintaining accurate data. Businesses enhance data quality further by pre-validation before uploading and real-time error reporting. The oAppsNET program identifies each inaccuracy in the datasheet. It provides users with specific warnings detailing how to correct errors so they can proceed quickly and effectively.
Users may immediately evaluate the modifications in Oracle after importing data or exporting tasks directly to the worksheet to ensure users make all necessary changes. Instead of viewing a single item at a time, users of oAppsNET may view multiple data fields simultaneously.
These capabilities aid in returning data control and ownership to company owners using oAppsNET solutions. Teams may increase accuracy and reduce reliance on IT by spotting and fixing problems as they happen.
The Final Thoughts
Companies may eliminate manual data entry and improve the process by utilizing oAppsNET. The tool automates procedures, significantly enhancing data quality. More outstanding reporting, insights, and decision-making result from superb data quality.
Everyone benefits from this as it saves time tracking errors and correcting them, freeing your team members from tedious data input responsibilities.
Learn how the data loading tools from oAppsNET will improve the correctness of your ERP data. Contact a specialist immediately to discuss your requirements and request a free trial.
Oracle Apex workflows and automations help organizations streamline their processes, improve collaboration, increase efficiency, and reduce costs, all while ensuring compliance and better decision-making.
To review the built-in features that Oracle Apex provides, go to the Shared Components page of any Apex application
You will see two links under the Workflows and Automations section for Task Definitions and Automations.
In this article we will be diving into the functionality available in Oracle Apex Task Definitions. In our example, we are using the latest version Apex 23.1 (not yet ready for production release at this time).
Task Definitions
Task Definitions are used to define and manage tasks within a workflow. They provide ways to describe what needs to be done in a specific task, who is responsible for completing the task, and when it needs to be completed.
Common uses of Oracle Apex Task Definitions can include:
Creating workflows: Task Definitions provide a way to define the tasks that need to be completed in a workflow. By specifying the task type, due date, and responsible party, workflows can be created and managed more easily.
Assigning tasks: Once a workflow is created, Task Definitions can be used to assign tasks to specific individuals or groups. This ensures that everyone knows what they need to do and when they need to do it.
Monitoring progress: Task Definitions provide a way to monitor the progress of a workflow. This allows organizations to track which tasks have been completed and which are still outstanding.
Reporting: Task Definitions can be used to generate reports on the status of workflows and individual tasks. This can help organizations identify areas for improvement and ensure that everything is running smoothly.
Let’s use the Oracle Sample Approvals application as a foundation and create a new Task Definition for requesting a work phone, something many employees wish they had, and many others wish they could give back!
After importing the Sample Approvals application, navigate within APEX to the Shared Components page and select the Task Definitions link. Then click Create, to start our example.
After the Task Definition has been created, the next step is to create Participants to assign additional owners of the task and Parameters for the task. Task Definition Participants define the participants of a human task who can act on the task.
The two participant types are either Potential Owner, or Business Administrator.
Potential Owner is responsible for completing specific tasks assigned to them within a workflow, either as an administrator or end user.
The Business Administrator is responsible for managing the overall application and ensuring that tasks are assigned appropriately.
The Participant Value type can be one of the following options:
Static
SQL Query
Function Body
Expression
Participants will also be either named or role-based.
Named participants: A named participant is a specific individual who is assigned to complete a task within a workflow. The named participant is usually specified by their username.
Role-based participants: A role-based participant is a group of users who are assigned to complete a task within a workflow based on their role or responsibility within the organization. This can include roles such as manager, team lead, or executive, for example.
Task Definition Deadlines
After creating the task participants, a deadline can optionally be defined for the task. Here are the options:
Overall, these deadline options in APEX provide flexibility in defining Task deadlines that can be customized to fit the specific needs of a workflow process.
Task Details Page
After creating the participants, a Task Details page is defined to display information related to a specific task within a workflow. It provides a centralized location for viewing and managing details such as task status, due date, priority, and assignee.
Some of the common uses of the Oracle Apex Task Details page include:
Task management: provides a way to manage individual tasks within a workflow. This includes updating task status, adding comments, and assigning or reassigning the task to another user.
Communication: used to communicate information related to a task to other team members. This includes adding comments, attachments, or links to related documents or resources.
Tracking: provides a way to track progress on a specific task. This includes viewing the task status, due date, and any associated comments or updates.
Workflow management: used to manage the overall workflow. This includes viewing the status of all tasks within the workflow, adding or removing tasks, and updating the workflow due date.
In our case, we are reusing a details page defined for other tasks.
Adding Actions to the Task Definition
Actions are created and used to automate various tasks within a workflow. These actions are triggered by events such as task creation, completion, or reassignment. There are several types of Task Definition actions that can be created, including:
PL/SQL actions: PL/SQL actions allow custom PL/SQL code to be executed as part of a Task Definition action. This can be used to perform custom data validation, execute database operations, or integrate with external systems.
Email actions: Email actions can be used to send automated emails to task assignees, stakeholders, or other interested parties. These emails can include task details, attachments, or links to related resources.
Assignee actions: Assignee actions are triggered when a task is assigned to a new user or when a task is reassigned to a different user. These actions can be used to automatically update task status, due dates, or other related data.
Approval actions: Approval actions can be used to require approval from a designated approver before a task can be completed. This can be useful for tasks that require review or sign-off from a supervisor or manager.
To create an action for your task, click on Add Action
In our example, we are creating actions to
Send a reminder email to the Approver to approve the work phone.
Push the Apex email queue to send the email.
Update the work phone request status
There are several “On Event” options available for Apex Task Actions, including:
Claim: Triggered when an unclaimed task is claimed by an owner. Once the task is claimed by a user, the Task transitions to Assigned state, and the actual owner of the task is set to the user who claimed the task.
Complete: This option triggers the Task Definition action when a task is marked as completed.
Delegate: This option triggers the Task Definition action when a task is delegated to another user.
Update Comment: This action fires when an owner or business administrator of a Task adds comments to a Task. These provide additional information about a Task.
Update Priority: This option triggers an action when the priority of a task is changed.
Release: This trigger fires an action when the current owner releases an Assigned task and sets the task to Unassigned state.
Cancel: This option triggers the Task Definition action when a task is canceled or deleted.
Create: This trigger fires the action when the task is created.
Request Information: Fired when a request for more information is requested. The owner of a task can request additional information regarding a Task from the initiator. The task then moves to the Information Requested state and can be acted on by the owner only after the initiator submits the requested information.
Submit Information: This trigger is fired when the task initiator responds with additional information regarding a Task for which information has been requested. For example, an employee may need to provide information on a specific model of work phone or phone carrier in their area.
Before Expire: Trigger fired before a task is about to expire in order to keep the task progressing forward.
Expire: This trigger is fired when a task has expired. It could be used to cancel the task or reassign it to the initiator or business administrator.
Advantages of Oracle Apex built-in Workflow Tasks
There are several advantages to using Oracle Apex built-in workflow tasks, including:
Easy implementation: Oracle APEX provides a set of pre-built workflow task APIs that can be easily customized and integrated into your application.
Reduced development time: By leveraging built-in Oracle APEX features, developers can significantly reduce the time and effort required to build custom workflows from scratch.
Improved productivity: Using built-in workflow tasks allows users to focus on their core business processes rather than spending time on workflow development.
Consistent user experience: Oracle Apex provides a consistent user experience across all workflow tasks, which can help improve user adoption and reduce training time.
Integration with other Oracle products: Oracle Apex built-in workflow tasks can be seamlessly integrated with other Oracle products such as Oracle Database, Oracle Business Intelligence, and Oracle Integration Cloud.
Flexibility: Oracle Apex workflow tasks can be easily customized to fit the specific needs of your organization, allowing you to create workflows that align with your business processes and goals.
Overall, using Oracle Apex built-in workflow tasks can help organizations streamline their business processes, reduce development time, and improve productivity while providing a consistent and flexible user experience.
In a future article, we will continue exploring the benefits of Oracle APEX by looking into the features available in Oracle APEX Automations.
Mobile push notifications are the most popular type of push notification and are often referred to simply as push notifications or push, and it’s important to follow push notification best practices. They are mostly clickable pop-up messages that appear on mobile screens.
Web push notifications are a way for web apps to send notifications to a user’s device even when the user is not currently on the website. These notifications can be sent to a user’s desktop or mobile device and can be used to alert the user to new content or events on the website or to re-engage the user with the website.
Oracle APEX with PUSH!
These push notifications are well-designed by ORACLE to grab attention and can convey reminders, updates, and promotions. And they appear very elegant with industry-standard features that consist of a message title, body, icon, and link by the user tapping on notifications, then it gets redirected to an APEX app or a specific page of the app.
Apex sends a push notification to a user. All devices that the user subscribed to will receive the push notification.
Enabling this option will:
Add a new navigation bar entry: User Settings
Allow users to subscribe and unsubscribe to push notifications.
When subscribed, users can receive push notifications from the APEX app.
This option is default enabled for any newer applications.
Now , let’s create a sample PUSH application.
Create a new application and choose the Install Progressive Web App and Push Notification methods under the features section.
Note: A couple of new pages #20000 and #20010 appear automatically for this feature.
These setting pages appear because of the Easy Subscription method that lets users allow or disallow push notifications on their device.
Easy Subscription
APEX users can subscribe to push notifications from within their applications, while instance administrators can manage a queue of notifications.
The setup of push notifications can be configured either by Process or API invoke.
A new process type “Send Push Notification” is introduced under the process configuration section and execution point of this process invoke can be of any of its type like Before header , after region or after submit .
This process type comes along with of the supporting components of a process configurations setups like Server-side Condition, Authorization Scheme, Build Option, Comments and Audit Information.
New fields to consider 👍
Under the setting tab:
To:
Username of the application user who should receive the push notification. To receive the notification, the user must have subscribed to the application first. Username is case-sensitive.
Title : Title of the push notification.
Body: Body of the push notification.
Next, the application must be installed first before notification subscription by enabling the notification setting that appears in the top right corner.
Initially, the notification appears as Off.
Push notifications need to be enabled by each user. It works like that to respect user privacy and preferences. By explicitly enabling push notifications, users grant the application permission to send them notifications. This ensures that users have control over the information they receive and can opt out if they feel overwhelmed or uninterested.
Enable push notifications by letting the browser allow it as per the below example.
Subscription enabled.
Then, users log in and install the application to let push notifications appear on their device.
Notification Appears.
We can also send the notifications using a new apex_pwa API.
Windows/Brave & macOS/Brave: supported with privacy settings adjusted. iOS/Safari: with iOS 16.4 or higher — and only in installed PWAs. iPadOS/Safari: with iOS 16.4 or higher — and only in installed PWAs.
