All seemed quiet on the Sage front. Things have been moving along with somewhat ease as Sage resellers jockey for positioning and seek out new accounting software VAR opportunities with other products. NetSuite continues to court former MAS users and Microsoft recently made note that the sale of Dynamics was strong.
All indications show that the mid-sized business management and accounting software market is alive, well and healthy - even though the former leader, MAS 90 and MAS 200, are not.
At it's own hand Sage has been significantly wounded again. Released today to VARs and next week to MAS 90/200 users. Sage announced that their engineering department found a significant bug in the new version 4.2 release of MAS 90/200. Version 4.2 has been out for about a year almost and is currently on it's 9th service pack release, and today Sage notified resellers that 4.2 has a bug that removes data from the system.
The bug removes good data from the sales invoice history and sales order history among others. Essentially eliminating a businesses ability to accurately analyze their sales data.
I would like to say it is no real big deal, but unfortunately it is a big deal. Since the bug has been out and active for about a year, and it resides in a utility frequently used by all businesses, it is safe to say that a very large percentage of any business that upgraded to the new version of MAS 90 or MAS 200 has inadvertently lost sales history data.
If it wasn't before it now is extremely difficult to recommend businesses upgrade and tell the truth at the same time.
Keep checking back to see how things progress - however my recommendation is that if you are a MAS 90 or MAS 200 VAR or consultant it would be wise to figure out what you will do next, because the future of MAS 90 and MAS 200 is looking increasingly grim.
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5 comments:
Hi Roy,
I am a MAS90/200 VAR and have had no trouble upgrading clients to version 4.20. We have done about 40 upgrades without issue. Our clients love the new version and it is working well.
Merilyn Van Zwieten
Hi Roy:
I am the VP of product management for the Sage MAS 90/200 product and the feedback from our customers regarding our 4.2 release has been overwhelmingly positive. Also, we have confirmed recently that we are continuing to enhance the Sage MAS 90/200 product line by working to support additional modules in our new business framework, which will further enable our business partners to add value and customize the product to meet their customers needs. Sage MAS 90/200 is one of our strategic mid-market ERP products, and I am positive you will see that reflected in our level of investment and new release enhancements going forward. Please let me know if you are interested in hearing more specifics. Thanks.
Dan DeRosa
Thank you for the comments. Your feedback is truly appreciated. If you would like to offer a written example of a successful upgrade scenario or want to highlight areas where Sage is working to meet the needs of its MAS 90/200 customer base, I would be glad to add blog entries that include your examples and information. Again, thank you for your feedback and if I can be of any further assistance, pelase let me know.
Hi Roy,
I am the product line manager for Sage MAS 90 and 200 and would like to clarify a few points in your recent posting. The bug you are referring to is in the Rebuild Key Files utility that was developed to resolve specific types of data issues with MAS 90 and 200 4.x data tables. The utility also contains a feature that automatically makes a backup copy of the data table selected for rebuild before the utility runs. This is not optional for the 4.x rebuild utility; it always copies the file before running the utility. In addition, the utility creates a report that indicates how many of the original records in the table have been recovered. If the utility is run and the log indicates a large number of records have been lost, a user can simply rename the backup table and all lost data is restored.
However, because users may not heed the warning message that directs them to only run this utility under the advice of a qualified support technician, Sage sent a bulletin to channel partners and customers to advise them of the potential risk to their data. Sage also accompanied that bulletin with a posting of a service update to correct the utility as an additional safeguard. Preserving and protecting our customer’s data is very important to Sage.
Erika Jelovsek
Sr. Product Manager, Sage Software MAS 90 and 200
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