Author: Ian Grieve

Ian is a Microsoft Dynamics GP certified consultant specialising in the delivery of Microsoft Dynamics GP projects and currently the Lead ERP Consultant for ISC Software Ltd., a Microsoft Partner, VAR and ISV in England. Ian has worked with Microsoft Dynamics GP since 2003 and, over the nine years since, has dealt with all aspects of the product life-cycle from presales, to implementation, to technical and functional training, to post go-live support and subsequent upgrades and process reviews. In his spare time, Ian runs the azurecurve | Ramblings of a Dynamics GP Consultant blog dedicated to Microsoft Dynamics GP and related products.

Implementing SmartList Builder: Series Index

Ian Grieve2 minute read13 Comments

eOne SolutionsI’ve posted series on a few different ISV addons for Microsoft Dynamics GP over the last few years, but, somewhat ironically I guess, have not posted all that much about the addin I’ve used the most over the years.

That addin is SmartList Builder from eOne Solutions.

SmartList Builder allows you to create both brand new SmartLists or modify existing SmartList. You can link up to 32 tables together. Tables can be standard GP tables, any of the Third Party (ISV) tables, any SQL table, SQL views or SQL Scripts, other SmartLists or Extender resources.

This series is going to cover the implementation of SmartList Builder; I’ll take a look at report builder in a future series.

Implementing SmartList Builder
What is SmartList Builder?
SmartList Builder vs. SmartList Designer
Download and Install
Register
Security
Review

Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Update Blocklists

Ian Grieve2 minute read0 comment

Raspberry PiThis post is part of the series on using the Pi-hole; this series is a sub-series of the Adventures with a Raspberry Pi.

When the Pi-hole is installed, you have the option to select which blocklists should be used. The blocklists will be downloaded at that point, but need to be kept up-to-date. Fortunately, there is a cron job which runs automatically once a week and updates these blocklists.

If you want to run a manua update of the blocklists, log into the Pi-hole admin interface and select Tools and then click Update Gravity; when the page loads, click Update:

Update Gravity (list of blocked domains)

Continue reading “Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Update Blocklists”

Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Whitelisting a Site

Ian Grieve1 minute read2 Comments

Raspberry PiThis post is part of the series on using the Pi-hole; this series is a sub-series of the Adventures with a Raspberry Pi.

When using a Pi-hole to block adverts, you will come across sites which you want to access, but which are being blocked. The message you will see is not readily apparent that the site has been blocked by the Pi-hole:

Site blocked by Pi-hole

Continue reading “Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Whitelisting a Site”

Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Disabling Pi-hole

Ian Grieve2 minute read0 comment

Raspberry PiThis post is part of the series on using the Pi-hole; this series is a sub-series of the Adventures with a Raspberry Pi.

While the Pi-hole has worked very well, there are times when I’ve had issues and wondered if it was the Pi-hole causing them. One of the good features of the Pi-hole is that it is very easy to temporarily disable it, which allows you to either easily rule out the Pi-hole as the cause of the problem or confirm that it was responsible.

To temporarily disable the Pi-hole, log into the admin interface and click Disable on the right pane:

Pi-hole disable menu

Continue reading “Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Disabling Pi-hole”

SQL Function to Remove Alphanumeric Characters

Ian Grieve3 minute read2 Comments

Microsoft Dynamics GPI created a customisation recently for a client which would generate a Vendor ID based on the name, by removing alphanumeric characters. In order to make it as flexible as possible, I created the function to accept a parameter for type which will cause the function to strip different characters:

  • A – leaves alpha characters only.
  • N – leaves numeric characters only.
  • AN – leaves alphanumeric characters.

The second parameter is the string which should have the characters stripped:

IF OBJECT_ID (N'uv_AZRCRV_StripCharacters', N'FN') IS NOT NULL
	DROP FUNCTION uv_AZRCRV_StripCharacters
GO

CREATE FUNCTION uv_AZRCRV_StripCharacters(@Type VARCHAR(100), @String VARCHAR(MAX))
	RETURNS VARCHAR(MAX)
/*
Created by Ian Grieve of azurecurve|Ramblings of a Dynamics GP Consultant (https://www.azurecurve.co.uk)
This code is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 Int).
*/
BEGIN
	DECLARE @PatIndex VARCHAR(20)
	IF (@Type = 'Alpha' OR @Type = 'A')
		SET @PatIndex = '%[^a-z]%'
	IF (@Type = 'Numeric' OR @Type = 'N')
		SET @PatIndex = '%[^0-9]%'
	IF (@Type = 'AlphaNumeric' OR @Type = 'AN')
		SET @PatIndex = '%[^a-z0-9]%'

	WHILE PATINDEX(@PatIndex, @String) < 0
		SET @String = STUFF(@String, PATINDEX(@PatIndex, @String), 1, '')

	RETURN @String
END

GRANT EXECUTE ON uv_AZRCRV_StripCharacters TO DYNGRP
GO

Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Admin Interface

Ian Grieve2 minute read0 comment

Raspberry PiThis post is part of the series on building my new Raspberry Pi; this series is a sub-series of the Adventures with a Raspberry Pi.

The Pi-hole admin interface is where you maintain your blocklists, whitelists and general settings. You can access it in two ways:

  1. http://{ip address of pi-hole}/
  2. http://pi.hole/

When the admin page interface, you will see basic information for the last 24 hours:

Pi-hole admin interface not logged in

Continue reading “Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Admin Interface”

IIS Rewrite Rule for Redirect to Directory

Ian Grieve3 minute read0 comment

Microsoft Dynamics GPThe web hosat I am currently with allows multiple domains, but only 6 websites; this means I have to be a little creative sometimes when creating additional sites.

I actually have a lot more than six websites being hosted on my account, due to a mix of WordPress MU and redirects to folders.

The redirect is done using an IIS rewrite rule. As I may be moving web host soon, I’m posting this so that I have easy access should I need.

This code goes in the rewrite section of the web.config file:

/*
Created by Ian Grieve of azurecurve|Ramblings of a Dynamics GP Consultant (https://www.azurecurve.co.uk)
This code is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 Int).
*/
<rewrite>
	<rules>
		<rule name="Rewrite subdomain.azurecurve.co.uk subdomain to dir" enabled="true">
			<match url="^(.*)$" />
			<conditions>
				<add input="{HTTP_HOST}" pattern="^subdomain\.azurecurve\.co\.uk$" />
			</conditions>
			<action type="Rewrite" url="_subdomain.azurecurve.co.uk/{R:1}" />
		</rule>
		<rule name="subdomain.azurecurve* wordpress" patternSyntax="Wildcard">
			<match url="*subdomain.azurecurve*" />
			<conditions>
				<add input="{REQUEST_FILENAME}" matchType="IsFile" negate="true" />
				<add input="{REQUEST_FILENAME}" matchType="IsDirectory" negate="true" />
			</conditions>
			<action type="Rewrite" url="_subdomain.azurecurve.co.uk/index.php" />
		</rule>
</rewrite>

The second rule is, I believe, required specifically for redirects for WordPress sites, the majority of which my rewrites are for.

Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Blocked Adverts

Ian Grieve2 minute read0 comment

Raspberry PiThis post is part of the series on building my new Raspberry Pi; this series is a sub-series of the Adventures with a Raspberry Pi.

With Pi-hole installed and configured, the main way you will use your Pi-hole is to simply browse the Internet.

With the router directing all DNs queries to the Pi-hole, it will use the loaded block lists to stop adverts from those domains being loaded. I’ve found the experience of surfing the Internet far smooth since I installed the Pi-hole. The amount of data has also noticeably dropped.

I have been white-listing some sites which do not have overly intrusively adverts (no sound, no video or moving images). I’ll cover white-listing later in this series.

Adventures With A Raspberry Pi

Adventures With A Raspberry Pi
Building The Raspberry Pi: CanaKit Raspberry Pi 3 B+ Complete Starter Kit
Building The Raspberry Pi: Raspberry Pi Build
Building The Raspberry Pi: Install Operating System
Building The Raspberry Pi: First Run
Building The Raspberry Pi: System Configuration Tool
Building The Raspberry Pi: Enable SSH For Remote Access
Building The Raspberry Pi: Securing the Raspberry Pi
Building The Raspberry Pi: Conclusion
Installing Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: What is Pi-hole?
Installing Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Install Pi-hole
Installing Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Change Pi-hole Admin Password
Installing Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Configure Network to use Pi-hole
Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Blocked Adverts
Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Admin Interface
Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Disabling Pi-hole
Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Whitelisting a Site
Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Update Blocklists
Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Maintain Blocklists
Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Change DNS Servers
Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Connecting With SSH
Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Updating the Pi-hole
Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Conclusion
What Else Can I Use It For?
Prepare New SD Card For Raspberry Pi OS: Download SD Card Formatter
Prepare New SD Card For Raspberry Pi OS: Install SD Card Formatter
Prepare New SD Card For Raspberry Pi OS: Format SD Card
Prepare New SD Card For Raspberry Pi OS: Download NOOBS
Prepare New SD Card For Raspberry Pi OS: Copy Files To The SD Card
Prepare New SD Card For Raspberry Pi OS: Conclusion
Installing Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Changing the IP Address
Raspberry PI Update Fails
Check Version of OS on Raspberry Pi
How to Update the OS on a Raspberry Pi

Disable AutoSave OneDrive and SharePoint Online Files by Default on Excel

Ian Grieve1 minute read1 Comment

OneDriveI recently got a new laptop at work which meant getting all applications installed. Previously I’d had Microsoft Office 2016 installed; on the new laptop I got Microsoft Office 365 which came with AutoSave enabled by default in all of the applications, such as Excel and Word, for files opened from SharePoint Online:

Microsoft Excel autosave on

Continue reading “Disable AutoSave OneDrive and SharePoint Online Files by Default on Excel”

Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Series Index

Ian Grieve1 minute read0 comment

Raspberry PiThis series is a sub-series of the Adventures with a Raspberry Pi, in which I am going to show how to use the Pi-hole.

If you’re reading this post on azurecurve, this index will automatically update, otherwise you need to check back to the original post.

Adventures With A Raspberry Pi

Adventures With A Raspberry Pi
Building The Raspberry Pi: CanaKit Raspberry Pi 3 B+ Complete Starter Kit
Building The Raspberry Pi: Raspberry Pi Build
Building The Raspberry Pi: Install Operating System
Building The Raspberry Pi: First Run
Building The Raspberry Pi: System Configuration Tool
Building The Raspberry Pi: Enable SSH For Remote Access
Building The Raspberry Pi: Securing the Raspberry Pi
Building The Raspberry Pi: Conclusion
Installing Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: What is Pi-hole?
Installing Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Install Pi-hole
Installing Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Change Pi-hole Admin Password
Installing Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Configure Network to use Pi-hole
Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Blocked Adverts
Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Admin Interface
Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Disabling Pi-hole
Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Whitelisting a Site
Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Update Blocklists
Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Maintain Blocklists
Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Change DNS Servers
Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Connecting With SSH
Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Updating the Pi-hole
Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Conclusion
What Else Can I Use It For?
Prepare New SD Card For Raspberry Pi OS: Download SD Card Formatter
Prepare New SD Card For Raspberry Pi OS: Install SD Card Formatter
Prepare New SD Card For Raspberry Pi OS: Format SD Card
Prepare New SD Card For Raspberry Pi OS: Download NOOBS
Prepare New SD Card For Raspberry Pi OS: Copy Files To The SD Card
Prepare New SD Card For Raspberry Pi OS: Conclusion
Installing Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi: Changing the IP Address
Raspberry PI Update Fails
Check Version of OS on Raspberry Pi
How to Update the OS on a Raspberry Pi
Using Pi-hole On A Raspberry Pi
Disabling Pi-hole
Whitelisting a Site
Update Blocklists
Maintain Blocklists
Change DNS Servers
Connecting With SSH
Updating the Pi-hole
Conclusion
Adventures With A Raspberry Pi: Raspberry PI Update Fails