22 February, 2023 Many years ago, SoftBrands chose to support the Microsoft SQL database engine with Fourth Shift.  One benefit is the power of the SQL database manager. Users can create and use SQL Views to access all information stored within the database in real-time. This is a significant improvement.  SoftBrands expanded this capability by including Foundation Business Views. This provides predefined access to data like the old Data View Definition (DVUD) method. However, there are many benefits of SQL Views over DVUDs:Execute SQL Views in real-time; DVUDs must be referenced by Fourth Shift batch tasks that create dBase, Excel,...

22 February, 2023 Time and again we have talked with people at companies using Fourth Shift who have modules they don’t know how to use. Or worse yet, they have no idea what modules they do or don’t have. How can this be, you ask? Let’s go back in time to look at how Fourth Shift was initially licensed and then move forward as SoftBrands and Infor made business decisions that impacted those companies running Fourth Shift. When it was initially sold, and for a very long time, Fourth Shift was licensed on a module-by-module basis. For example, System Administration...

17 January, 2023 Thanks to our customers and partners for making 2022 the biggest year for ICG yet. We are expecting 2023 to be another great year for our manufacturing and banking verticals. ICG continues to invest in staff and partnerships that provide value and great customer service to our core customer base. Below are ICG’s three areas of focus for 2023:.1.Fourth Shift ERP and VISUAL ERP customers are key to ICG’s business.ICG is dedicated to supporting both ERP communities.– For the Fourth Shifters, we are excited about Tableau’s BI/KPI capabilities, and MFGStream’s enhanced functionality to replace VisiBar and VisiWatch.–...

14 January, 2023 ICG’s first focus for 2023 is that Fourth Shift ERP and VISUAL ERP customers are key to the success of ICG’s business. In an earlier blog, we reviewed our 3 cores areas of focus for this year. ICG remains committed to our legacy ERP customers. And we have a number of product and service enhancements that we believe are beneficial to those customer bases. The first is MFGStream. MFGStream is our recommendation for next generation data collection & process automation. This is because it offers unparalleled flexibility. It is device- and manufacturing software-agnostic. And, it runs on...

12 January, 2023 ICG’s third focus for 2023 is that your IT department is critical to the overall success of your business. We discussed this briefly in an earlier blog. Now we will take a deeper dive into what that really means. ICG has decades of experience with technology, and we’ve always had a security-first approach. For IT we focus on: Architecture – IT Process – End User Applications, Infrastructure Maintenance & Administration. These in turn underpin all business operations. And it’s important for that technology to be secure and to be resilient. It must be able to withstand internal...