Hello all,The NEX Accounting Group manuals??????

[john at timescape.com]

By any chance does anyone out there still have copies of the NEX Accounting Manuals?  There were 4 spiral bound individual items, General Ledger, Accounts Receivable, Accounts Payable and Payroll).  We used to bind them with those plastic strips that go through dozens of punched holes in the paper. I can not remember the name of that binding method, sorry.  

I am looking specifically for the Accounts Payable and Accounts Receivable module booklets... although it would be great to have all 4.   

Obviously, I lost any copies I had kept, or sent every one of them out to people who asked for them over the last 35 years. .  About 15 years ago when I moved from Pennsylvania to Florida, I did a massive culling of my huge shed, and none of them survived. ☹  I thought there was a carton of them, but it turns out to be a box of brochures.  ☹

My last legacy client who uses the whole system, has hired a new employee, and she is spending most of her time making little notes, and writing huge explanations of how the system works... and it is so unnecessary , since everything she is writing down for herself is so clearly laid out in the booklets already.  

The employer, who knows the system well now after using it for so long, thinks the new girl is "wasting time" and not learning quickly enough.  She, herself is way too busy to sit there and show her each routine in each module, of which there are many. (Employer does the G/L and P/R, new woman does the A/P and some A/R..  Others in the place do the A/R which is point of sale and they work only at the counters, so don't know any other module - they can't help teach new person.))  

I do understand the main reason for the hassle. , The new girl says that there are no "prompts" for the main screen, and for the main IUA records (which is where everything starts) she is right.  There are mostly only the clerk prompts. Once any function is actually chosen, I provide complete and very clear prompts for all the activity, but if the very first @key is not visible, the poor girl just scratches her head wondering how anyone would know what to press.

Sounds like terrible programming on my part, and yes, there is no real defense here other than that the 4 modules were written mostly in 1986 and 1987 and at that time, it wasn't as easy to provide good custom IUA prompts... or it took way to long to develop them.  Once any was pressed, I went to absurd lengths to show all prompts, and later even added help screens for almost everything in the system.  None of this matters because this old client is on Version 1.0 and so the only way to know how the modules work, and what keys to press (while going through regular clerk on the records) to initiate the actual programming resides only in those little manuals.

I saw that a couple people recently referenced here that they used these old programs, and was hoping against hope that  one of them might have those instruction booklets - and would be willing to part with them. I'm sure having the manuals  to reference would speed up this new girl's learning curve immensely, and maybe even save her job for her.

Oh yes, and before you ask, why doesn't the legacy client have these booklets?  I have a significant yet blurry memory of going through this once before with another NEX accounting user... and I found the 4 manuals in amongst the graveyard of hardware and software trove of this current client in need, and asked her if I could take them.  I remember her telling me that she hadn't looked at them in decades, and sure I could take them.   I did, and immediately forwarded them to someone else who wanted them.  Here is where the blurriness takes over... or I would call that other user and check if they were still needed.  ��  It's a bitch getting old, isn't it?  ☹

If that is enough explanation of the problem, here is how you can help, if you wish to, and don't mind clearing out some relics from your bookshelves.  It would be great if you could contact me through email, or this list, and let me know that you will send them directly to the employer in need.  Here is the address.

Joan/Lyle
Wyckoff Lighting Center
390 Franklin Ave
Wyckoff NJ 07481

I will send you $50 for your trouble in finding a 9x12 envelope and dropping them in the mail with required postage.  Sent as a Priority  Mail, it might cost about $10 to $15. Yes, I am completely aware that the whatever is left after the shipment does not begin to cover your time in any way... but that is how the help on this list has ever been, more done mostly out of collegial, professional courtesy than anything else. (Some might disagree with my rose-colored-lens, but I *did* say "mostly". �� )

Thanks for anyone who has the booklets, and is willing to take the time to get them mailed.  Look forward to hearing from you.

(Obviously, this is pretty much a first come, first served situation.  If a couple of people have the booklets and want to send them, I would also love to have a set in my files for myself(or for Posterity when he comes around) but $100 is about all this little need is worth. ��  

Thanks for listening.