Macros -- Why not implement them in Store Operations Manager?

I had not thought about that, good point. What would really be helpful to me would be able to extend the macro capability of MS Office (Excel, Word, Outlook, etc) with an add in that would allow macros to 'speak the language' of QSRules. (add the QSRules object model to Office). That would allow me to sell more Office packages to my RMS customers and in addition would address the issue of multiple stores. What do you think John? ps Thanks for your vote:))

"John M" wrote:

Well, Office still uses VBA, which can access COM obkjects, so there's no reason that you couldn't create an instance of QS Rules in an Office Application. It wouldn't be connected to a 'live' session though. Much easier to just create an ODBC Connection to the RMS Database and connect Office to that.

There is a knowledgebase article that details how to export Macros from one register to another. You could extend this information to export the Macro to a different store. Some Macros would not work correctly in a different store, but if it is just a combination of keystrokes, it should be universal ( not dependent on the existance of a specific ItemLookupCode for example).

RMS Rookie,

Another route is to get a macro creator that isn't a part of any other program.. Go to Google and type macro creator and you will get hundreds of hits - anything from free to ~$99.

Or the hardware way.

Glenn,

Where can I get the documentation for QSRules. I have been exploring the newgroup, Google, etc. In order to increase the quality of a COM application I may attempt to write, it would really be a bonus to have a type library for the QSRules.dll file object model. The COM application I am thinking about would be a re-usalbe component written in C++ that would use COM automation via iDispatch. I have noticed that a larger number of components in QSRules are visible as Automation Servers in Excel->Tools->Add-Ins->Automation-> bunch of QSRules components. The application would invoke SOManager from within Excel. I think this is called using SOManager as a COM server where Excel would be the COM client. Since Excel has such a rich Object, the app could also invoke other COM servers to integrate data across the applications in a (type) safe manner. It kind of worries me to use QSRules.ocx because the instance of QSRules in the ocx might not be an exact match for the corresponding items in QSRules.dll.

Would it be worth while to ask Microsoft for a type library in this effort?

S> Well, Office still uses VBA, which can access COM obkjects, so there's no

There is no QSRules.ocx - the only ocx installed with RMS is QSBridge.ocx, which can only be used within the internal brower of RMS POS.

If you are a certified reseller of RMS, you can download the Customization Guide from PartnerSource.

The Customization Guide is a good starting point, but there's a lot of stuff in QS Rules that is not documented at all - just open up the Object Browser in Visual Studio - the object model isn't all that hard to figure out...

Remember what I told you before - you can get an instance of QSRules in Excel, but it's not going to be a 'live' session - meaning that it won't be connected to the database or otherwise active.

Good Luck!

Glenn,

You are right, I got confused about the names of the implementation files. The two files that I was concerned about were QSRules.dll and QSBridge.ocx.

Since my last post, I dusted off my Visual Studio and installed it to start getting back up to speed coding c++. I appreciate your experience and comments about the design. Please help me understand the reason that the application could not open a connection to the database (via calls to QSRules or QSBridge) and also be real time with the current Excel Workbook Object via iDispatch?

I will admit it has been a long time since I have coded.

Sincerely Kent Smith RMSRookie

"Glenn Adams [MVP - Retail Mgmt]" wrote:

Some of the logic that initializes QSRules is built into SOPOSUSER.exe and SOManager.exe. Namely the part that loads the DB connection information out of the registry and binds the QSRules instance to that DB. There is quite a bit of other startup/initialization stuff going on to get QSRules prepared to operate, but the DB stuff is the most obvious example. None of this initialization process is documented, and the registry encryption is proprietary - at a minimum, you would need to manage your own connection information.

You can easily create an instance of QSRules.SessionClass in VBA, but it won't be connected to anything. The process MS has provided to extend RMS using QSRules is for POS or SO Manager to initiate an external program via 'hooks' which are really late bound (iDispatch?) calls FROM RMS into your COM Server component. In most cases, these 'hooks' would pass an already 'activated' SessionClass object into your component.

You seem to be trying to attack the issue from the other direction and I don't think it's going to work. Of course, you can do a lot of things in C++ that aren't possible in other environments, so maybe you'll figure it out...

Good Luck!