Networking 2 POS on the same PC?

[Melvyn]

Hi Dale/Andrew,

Seek your kind advice on the following scenario:

I am running DHPOS v6.16 on a WinXP and using POS as an inventory and customer management system for our retail business. We have a single outlet but do not use POS in the outlet. We however use it in the office to track inventory, customer purchases and associate sales.

We have recently added another location, and we plan to continue this set up. Hence I have set up another POS for the second location in another directory on my PC. However, in order to use the same stock table, customer and associate database, I was thinking of networking the two POS systems ON THE SAME PC. So I set up a Global POS to do so and set the network option on for the 3 POS set ups.

But when I tried to key in sales, there was an error on the disk - it did not recognise the "C:" drive which I used in the network setup, though it registered the sale. I also noticed that upon closing the register, it showed twice the amount of the sale. And in the Global POS, it did not register the total sales of the two POS.

Am I able to network 2 POS on the same PC?

Thanks and best regards
Melvyn

[Melvyn]

Sincere apologies, I accidently posted this twice.

Melvyn

[Andrew]

Melvyn,

Sure you can, I do this now to test DHPOS networking, seeing as I have no network I currently have two folders a global and a local. On the machine you want to use for this you must have 3 folders if you are to have 2 different "registers" making sales...

- 2 LOCAL folders, this is where you will run sales from as if they were two registers
- 1 GLOBAL folder, this will be the folder the stock table etc are shared from.

Make sure to set the GLOBAL/LOCAL settings in each "register" (folder). The global folder must be run first when "opening", and run last when "closing". Be sure to close the other registers before closing out the GLOBAL one.

PS: I have deleted the double-post, if the forum takes a while to post a message, just hang tight - might be a bit of congestion or indigestion as the case may be.

[Melvyn]

Hi Andrew,

Thanks for your reply. I checked my settings on the 3 folders and everything looks ok.

Could it be that I'm running WinXP? I have chosen very simple folder names i.e. C:\POS1, C:\POS2 and C:\GLOBAL instead of creating them in Documents and Settings folder.

Thanks
Melvyn

[Andrew]

Melvyn,

We must dismiss the myth floating around the forum that Windows XP is the root of all evil

My only recommendation is to perhaps try starting again unless Dale has any ideas. Maybe one of the registers got closed twice or something weird like that.

I am a strong believer in installing DOS programs in 8.3 format, whereby the foldername is not longer than 8 characters. 8 characters for files and folders was all we used to have in the olden days - and makes it easier when browsing via DOS as you don't have to convert the long folders into DOS shortened format which can be a pain in the ...

[Dale Harris]

Melvyn,

I am assuming then that the network path set on the global folder and all the local folders is C:\GLOBAL

[Melvyn]

Hi Dale and Andrew,

Both your advice were most helpful - I managed to get it to work! It was eventually Dale's reminder about the pathname that pointed to my error in setup.

However, I encounter an error when ringing in sales, which I have emailed to Dale. But it doesn't seem to impact the system when I choose the option to resume the program, so it's more for your info.

Thanks again for your help,
Melvyn

[Stan Pokras]

Hi, all.

Thanks for this forum. I just emailed Dale about my set up. But I'd like to repeat here. I downloaded version 6.17 and set up new Local and Global folders on one computer and a Local folder on the remote computer. I'm not getting any information at closing of the Global POS.

Here are a couple of questions:

Is the Global POS supposed to remain OPEN during the sales day? I believe that the instructions say to close it after an initial OPENING in the morning.

When does the Global start recording sales information? For example, will it show sales information after any sale and before it is closed for the day? In other words can I take a peek at the accumulated sales informaiton by using the 7 menu item in the Global prior to actually closing Global for the day?

I know that the global folder is being addressed because the files from the Local folders have shown up in the Global folder. I'm just not getting ANY sales info from either the Local folder on the shared computer or from the remote computer.

Thanks for your help!
Stan

[Andrew]

Stan,

The global folder is just a storage point for all your networked sales data and stock table as well as other global settings.

The instructions state the global folder must be the first to be OPENED, this doesn't mean leaving the program running. It must be the last register to be CLOSED.

You can look at the close register screen of the global folder anytime of the day.

The files in the global folder will look exactly like the files in the local folders because the global/local folder stores exactly the same data just if it's networked local copies will be retrieving certain data from the global folder.

As for your last problem, if your sales on local copies are not showing in the global copy. You have probably not entered the location to the global folder from the Network feature in EVERY LOCAL copy.

If you don't do this DHPOS will not know where to push the sales data.

[Guest]

Andrew,

Thanks for your reply. As it turns out, I was able to speak with Dale about my problem and he explained that each register must have the SAME FILE NAME (in the create a new register procedure) in addition to having the proper path name (in the Network setup) as you suggest.

I'm a very fussy and literal sort of person. So, I created each of my registers from scratch just to make sure that each had fresh copies of the installations files. As I did this, I gave each register a different name, which turns out to be a mistake. Dale's instructions call for copying an initial folder. Copying the POS local folder would serve the function of making all the folders use the same file name. But for people like me who want to do everything for scratch, it's important to include instructions to make each network folder (including the Global folder) have the same file name in the "create a new register" procedure. Once I did this, everything seems to be working well from multiple registers accross the network.

Stan