Mike Urbonas
July 29th, 2008, 11:38 AM
<TABLE style="FONT: 12px arial; BACKGROUND-COLOR: #fff" width=880 align=center border=0> </tr><tr><td colspan="2"><H1 align=center> <img src="http://www.monarchforums.com/images/Monarch_Report.gif" alt="The Monarch Report"></H1></td><tr> <TD width=540> <STRONG>July 2008<BR><BR>The Monarch Report</STRONG> informs users of our Monarch-powered solutions of the latest product news, tips, user stories, upcoming events and more. This newsletter is sent to our online subscribers and anyone who has purchased or expressed interest in Datawatch products.<BR><BR></TD> <TD style="PADDING-LEFT: 10px; VERTICAL-ALIGN: top" rowSpan=14><SPAN style="COLOR: #f00; TEXT-ALIGN: center"><STRONG>Read More About our Solutions...</STRONG></SPAN><BR> <P><A href="http://www.datawatch.com/_products/monarch_overview.php" target=_blank>Monarch</A> <SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 10px">is the de facto standard in Report Mining, trusted by over 400,000 users to easily mine data from reports, PDFs and more into live, actionable data without programming and without IT help.</SPAN></P> <P> <A href="http://www.datawatch.com/_products/monarch_data_pump.php" target=_blank>Monarch Data Pump</A> <SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 10px">is a server-based enterprise reporting and data ETL solution, creating and delivering customized data across your organization, at a fraction of the cost and time of alternative solutions, with no new database programming.</SPAN></P> <P><A href="http://www.datawatch.com/_products/monarch_rms.php" target=_blank>Monarch|RMS</A> <SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 10px"> (Report Mining Server) turns any traditional COLD report archive or existing document management system into a powerful source for business intelligence. </SPAN></P> <P><A href="http://www.datawatch.com/_products/datawatch_es.php" target=_blank>Datawatch|ES</A> <SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 10px">uniquely leverages existing reports as a source of web-enabled enterprise business intelligence, providing enterprise report management, online data analysis, MS Excel integration and more, at a fraction of the complexity and cost of other solutions.</SPAN></P> <P><A href="http://www.datawatch.com/_products/datawatch_bds.php" target=_blank>Datawatch|BDS</A> <SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 10px">(Business Document Server) is a high speed, high volume document archive system, archiving text, images, intelligent data streams and unstructured content, complete with file compression. Unlike other document archive systems, Datawatch|BDS also offers advanced business benefits, including optional automatic email notification to end users of newly archived documents, as well as optional web-enabled transformation of reports and PDF files, into customized data using Monarch|RMS.</SPAN></P> <P><A href="http://www.datawatch.com/_products/datawatch_mailmanager.php" target=_blank>Datawatch|MailManager</A> <SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 10px">is a highly scalable e-mail management solution that provides complete lifecycle, compliance, and storage management for Microsoft Exchange environments. Datawatch|MailManager captures internal, outgoing and incoming email correspondence, indexing it and managing its retention based on your corporate policies. In the case of audit or legal discovery, related e-mail can be instantly and accurately retrieved for rapid response.</SPAN></p>
</TD> </TR> <TR> <TD style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f00"> </TD> </TR> <TR> <TD> <H3 style="COLOR: #f00">Rush North Shore Medical Center Turns to Monarch Data Pump for Automated Reporting, Data ETL Made Easy</SPAN></H3> <P>Rush North Shore Medical Center, located on the northwest border of Chicago, is a 265-bed acute care hospital affiliated with Rush University Medical Center, one of the nation’s leading research and teaching hospitals. For years, Rush North Shore has utilized Monarch Data Pump to enable automated enterprise reporting and data ETL (extraction, transformation and loading) with no new programming.</P>
<P> <a href="#article1"><b>Read More...</b></a></P><BR> </TD> </TR>
<TR> <TD style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f00"> </TD> </TR> <TR> <TD> <H3 style="COLOR: #f00">Furniture Maker/Retailer American Signature Furnishes its ERP Reporting Needs with Monarch</SPAN></H3> <P>American Signature is a US manufacturer and retailer of furniture and bedding with 130 stores and three US and two non-US manufacturing facilities. The company operates under the name Value City Furniture in the Midwest and Northeast and American Signature in the Southeast. To help furnish the company's ERP reporting needs, American Signature turned to Monarch to easily obtain data from existing reports with no new programming.</P><P> <a href="#article2"><b>Read More...</b></a></P> </TD> </TR> <TD style="background-color: #ccc; border: 1px solid #000; padding: 0 10px 0 10px;">
<p><strong>Reminder: Don't Miss our Monarch Summer Sizzler...</strong> </p><p><ul>
<li>Buy 4 copies of Monarch Standard or Monarch Pro V9...Get the 5th copy FREE! If others in your organization could benefit from using Monarch, now is the time to buy!</li>
<li><a href="http://www.datawatch.com/emailers/mV9_buy4/index.html" target="_blank"><b>View our the Monarch Summer Sizzler offer now</b></a>. Hurry, your chance to save up to $849 ends August 31, 2008!</li>
</ul></p>
</td></tr>
<br><TR> <TD style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f00"> </TD> </TR> <TR> <TD> <H3 style="COLOR: #f00">Hot Voodoo Monarch Tip! Mine Multi-Column Data with Varying Column Widths</H3>Anyone can reap substantial benefits very quickly using Monarch, and yet, in the hands of an expert user, Monarch is an amazingly powerful tool, able to meet highly complex report mining and analytical challenges the average Monarch user might deem impossible. We call such highly advanced Monarch skills "Voodoo Monarch."<br>
<br>Olly Bond, who served for years as Monarch consultant for Avanquest, the leading reseller of Monarch in Europe, and was on hand as a presenter and Solution Lab consultant at the recent Datawatch 2008 User Conference, has developed a powerful Voodoo Monarch technique to mine Multi-Column Region (MCR) data despite varying column widths.
</P><P> <a href="#article3"><b>Read More...</b></a></P><BR> </TD> </TR>
<TR> <TD style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f00"> </TD> </TR> <TR> <TD> <H3 style="COLOR: #f00">Global Imaging Systems Selects Monarch Data Pump for Programming-Free ETL</H3> <P><b>Monarch Data Pump Customer Review in DM Review Magazine</b></p><p>Global Imaging Systems, a Xerox company, must easily consolidate the results of all 23 of its core businesses (with 23 separate ERP systems) to enable timely financial and operational performance reporting. Monarch Data Pump automatically mines, customizes and exports the data from each core business with no new programming and no need for database connectivity. Monarch Data Pump has drastically reduced the complexity of the company's enterprise data acquisition and consolidation.
</P><P> <a href="http://www.dmreview.com/issues/2007_49/10001513-1.html?type=printer_friendly" target=_blank><b>Read the Entire Review...</b></a></P><BR>
</TD> </TR></H3>
<TR> <TD style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f00"> </TD> </TR> <TR> <TD> <H3 style="COLOR: #f00">Certified Monarch & Monarch Data Pump Training - Exclusively from Datawatch</H3> <P>Our Monarch training classes for beginner, intermediate and advanced users, led by our own in-house team of Certified trainers, will supercharge your personal productivity!
<br><i>"[I was] very impressed with the instructor's teaching style and knowledge of the software. I will definitely be signing up for the intermediate and advanced Monarch classes."</i><br> -- Jason Roossien, Comcast
<br><a href="http://www.datawatch.com/_services/training_overview.php" target=_blank><b>Visit our Training homepage</b></a> for full details and to find a Monarch class near you!<BR>
<a href="#top">Return to top of page</a>
</TD> </TR> </P><BR> </TD></TR> </table>
<TABLE style="FONT: 12px arial; BACKGROUND-COLOR: #fff" width=880 align=center border=0> </tr><a name="article1"></a>
<TR> <TD style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f00"> </TD> </TR> <TR> <TD> <H3 style="COLOR: #f00">Rush North Shore Medical Center Turns to Monarch Data Pump for Automated Reporting, Data ETL Made Easy</SPAN></H3>
<p>Rush North Shore Medical Center, located on the northwest border of Chicago, is a 265-bed acute care hospital affiliated with Rush University Medical Center, one of the nation’s leading research and teaching hospitals. For years, Rush North Shore has utilized Monarch Data Pump to enable automated enterprise reporting and data ETL (extraction, transformation and loading) with no new programming.
<br>
"We have over fifty Monarch Data Pump processes in constant use to automatically acquire and deliver customized healthcare data for a wide array of critical, ongoing informational needs," says Jerry Juneman, Applications Manager, Information Systems, for Rush North Shore.
<br>
Much of Rush North Shore's operating activity is maintained within its Siemens Invision healthcare information system. "Invision produces a large library of existing reports which Monarch Data Pump easily and automatically transforms into actionable data, for delivery in a number of ways," Jerry says. "We utilize Monarch Data Pump many times a day to automatically create and send data needed on a repetitive basis. For example, Monarch Data Pump fulfills certain regulatory requirements, such as automatically mining and then delivering via FTP patient diagnosis data sourced from Invision reports to county infection control offices every six hours. It's very liberating to know that ongoing informational chores like this are set up once and then constantly managed automatically by Monarch Data Pump.
<br>
"That's just the tip of the iceberg as to what Monarch Data Pump can do," Jerry says. "Monarch Data Pump lets us design multi-step processes which let us combine data from multiple, disparate systems.
<br>
"For example, Rush North Shore, like any healthcare organization, must avoid issuing late charges: patient services which are not charged until after the patient has already been billed. Late charges require the patient to be rebilled and greatly increase the time and work necessary for Rush North Shore to get paid for services.
<br>
"Monarch Data Pump mines late charge data from reports sourced from Invision as well as from a separate operating room information system," Jerry explains. "Monarch Data Pump then produces a single, unified summary view of all late charges by department in PDF format. This summary data view enables Rush North Shore executives to hold department managers accountable for issuing late charges and to take active steps to minimize late charges in the future. Monarch Data Pump provides us with the automated reporting necessary to ensure maximum collection efficiency."
<br>
Monarch Data Pump goes further to help ensure Rush North Shore collects patient receivables due as quickly as possible. "Monarch Data Pump has made it very easy to provide past due patient receivables to our external collection agencies," says Jerry. "Monarch Data Pump mines needed data from Invision receivables aging reports on a daily basis and delivers it via FTP to our collection agencies. Before Monarch Data Pump, providing this data was a totally manual process. If the data was not received by a collection agency, we may not have been made aware of it until some weeks later.
<br>"Instead, Monarch Data Pump ensures our collection agencies have the data they need for immediate collection efforts, automatically and with no programming."
<br>Monarch Data Pump is again used to close the collection loop. "Rush North Shore receives daily patient payments and/or makes adjustments to accounts. These activities generate reports out of Invision. To keep the collection agencies up to date, data is mined off the reports and sent to the collection agencies.
<br>
"After the agencies have worked the accounts for their allotted time, the accounts are returned to Rush North Shore. In order to tell the Invision system that the account is no longer with the agency, Monarch Data Pump, using a model template created with Monarch Pro, creates batch records which are then uploaded into Invision. This process used to take the patient accounting department many hours of manual work to complete. With Monarch Data Pump processing the transactions it takes a matter of minutes.
<br>
"Monarch Data Pump plays a critical role in ensuring the most expedited collection process possible, while dramatically simplifying the process of acquiring and delivering needed data."
<br>
Monarch Data Pump also facilitates data integration with other Rush North Shore enterprise systems. "We use Monarch Data Pump as a data ETL solution to populate a SQL Server-based revenue reporting system which enables managers to design their own patient accounting reports. Monarch Data Pump ensures fresh data, sourced from Invision reports, is constantly updated, quickly and easily, with no database programming of any kind.
<br>
"Monarch Data Pump also plays a pivotal role in integrating data from Invision to our time and attendance system. Every four hours, we run a patient census report to Monarch Data Pump, which automatically mines and directs needed data from the report for automatic importing into the time and attendance system. This enables us to ensure there is sufficient staff on hand for the next shift.
<br>
"Additionally, Monarch Data Pump automatically mines data from new employee reports and builds the data necessary to add those new employees to our time and attendance system. Thanks to Monarch Data Pump, there is no need to build an interface between systems.
<br>
"I have actively recommended Monarch Data Pump to other hospitals," concludes Jerry. "Any repetitive informational task can be automated with Monarch Data Pump.
<br>
"Monarch Data Pump enables automated reporting, data delivery and data integration between multiple systems, all without programming. It is an absolutely essential solution for Rush North Shore, and any healthcare organization."
<br>
<a href="http://www.datawatch.com/case_studies/case_studies.php" target=_blank>Read more Monarch Data Pump case studies.</a>
<br>
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</TD> </TR> </P><BR> </TD></TR> </table>
<TABLE style="FONT: 12px arial; BACKGROUND-COLOR: #fff" width=880 align=center border=0> </tr><a name="article2"></a>
<TR> <TD style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f00"> </TD> </TR> <TR> <TD> <H3 style="COLOR: #f00">Furniture Maker/Retailer American Signature Furnishes its ERP Reporting Needs with Monarch</SPAN></H3>
<p>American Signature is a US manufacturer and retailer of furniture and bedding with 130 stores and three US and two non-US manufacturing facilities. The company operates under the name Value City Furniture in the Midwest and Northeast and American Signature in the Southeast. To help furnish the company's ERP reporting needs, American Signature turned to Monarch to easily obtain data from existing reports with no new programming.
<br>
"We use a legacy enterprise information system designed specifically for the furniture industry for our inventory, purchasing and order management, and use Lawson for our accounting needs, including general ledger, receivables and payables," says Earl Stripe, Manager of Manufacturing Accounting for American Signature. "Monarch enables us to easily acquire the data we need from both systems for a wide variety of reporting purposes.
<br>
"Our primary use of Monarch is to mine data from our legacy system reports to facilitate historical analysis, notably cost variances by product, on a month to date and year to date basis," Earl says. "Other data provided by Monarch also enables us to establish and manage our standard costs.
<br>
"I also recently used Monarch to complete a project in which I audited all Bills of Materials (BOMs) for a new line of bedding," Earl adds. "Managing the numerous BOMs for each variation of each article of furniture and bedding can be very complex. Monarch dramatically simplifies this process. Instead of wading through a 900-page indented BOM report, showing all component parts, overhead and labor costs for each item, I mined the data from the report using Monarch.
<br>
"The end result was a crosstab summary, counting all parts for each bedding size in a single view. I was able to pinpoint errors within certain BOMs immediately, ensuring proper inventory management and costing, thanks to Monarch."
<br>
American Signature’s legacy system helps successfully manage the unique business challenges of the furniture industry, but it has its limitations. "One significant shortcoming with our legacy system is it retains the current standard cost but not historical standard costs," Earl explains. "Fortunately, we can easily track our standard costs and other historical data by maintaining this and other data in Access. Monarch makes the process of creating and maintaining our Access databases very easy.
<br>
"Also, if we do not run certain reports at month end, it is very difficult to replicate that same month end data later. We run over fifteen various inventory, costing, production, and purchasing-related reports at month end and use Monarch to mine needed data and export the customized data to Access and Excel. Without Monarch, we would simply be producing product without easy access to critical historical costing and production data."
<br>
American Signature recently extended its use of Monarch to easily acquire and share data sourced from the company’s Lawson General Ledger (GL) system. "We used to print and ship a detailed expense report for each store; 700 pages or more per week," said Earl. "Instead we mine only certain needed data through Monarch. The final data can be exported to PDF. Stores print what they need. We have begun to extend this practice to several other Lawson reports and will continue to expand the process.
<br>
"Thanks to Monarch, we have cut our paper consumption for reports by an average of 70%, and climbing. So far, we have realized annualized savings of $11,000 in reporting costs, which I expect will increase to $30,000 per year as we utilize Monarch with more and more reports from our existing system."
<br>
Summing up the benefits Monarch has provided American Signature, Earl says, "Monarch is an outstanding tool to mine and customize data from reports to facilitate analysis as well as populate our numerous Access databases, all without programming. Monarch is an exceptional, hassle-free data bridge from our enterprise systems to MS Office.
<br>
"Monarch does a great job extending the value and cutting costs of our legacy system as well as our Lawson GL system, leveraging our existing reports as a programming-free source for the actionable data we need."
<br>
<a href="http://www.datawatch.com/case_studies/case_studies.php" target=_blank>Read more Monarch case studies.</a>
<br>
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</TD> </TR> </P><BR> </TD></TR> </table>
<TABLE style="FONT: 12px arial; BACKGROUND-COLOR: #fff" width=880 align=center border=0> </tr>
<a name="article3"></a>
<TR> <TD style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f00"> </TD> </TR> <TR> <TD> <H3 style="COLOR: #f00">Hot Voodoo Monarch Tip! Mine Multi-Column Data with Varying Column Widths</SPAN></H3>
<p>Anyone can reap substantial benefits very quickly using Monarch, and yet, in the hands of an expert user, Monarch is an amazingly powerful tool, able to meet highly complex report mining and analytical challenges the average Monarch user might deem impossible. We call such highly advanced Monarch skills "Voodoo Monarch."
<br>
Olly Bond, who served for years as Monarch consultant for Avanquest, the leading reseller of Monarch in Europe, and was on hand as a presenter and Solution Lab consultant at the recent Datawatch 2008 User Conference, has developed a powerful Voodoo Monarch technique to mine Multi-Column Region (MCR) data despite varying column widths.
<br>
Beginner and expert Monarch users alike would have no problem using conventional report mining methods to obtain data from the report shown below:
<br>
<img src=http://www.monarchforums.com/images/001-Monarch-Report-July-2008.jpg>
<p><small>Fig. 1</small></p>
<br>However, what we might really want is to show the data for each month <i>as its own unique row of data,</i> suitable for export to a database, like this:
<br>
<img src=http://www.monarchforums.com/images/002-Monarch-Report-July-2008.jpg>
<p><small>Fig. 2</small></p>
<br>The Monarch MCR feature, available in Monarch V8 and V9, makes this possible. The MCR feature is activated for the detail trap (see Fig. 3), while the product name and year are trapped using Append and Page Header traps, respectively.
<br>
<img src=http://www.monarchforums.com/images/003-Monarch-Report-July-2008.jpg>
<p><small>Fig. 3</small></p>
<br>However, reports often have columns with varying widths, while PDF reports may not scale to perfectly uniform column widths either, preventing us from defining a suitable MCR region:
<br>
<img src=http://www.monarchforums.com/images/004-Monarch-Report-July-2008.jpg>
<p><small>Fig. 4</small></p>
Is there any way we might still be able to use the Monarch MCR feature? Yes! -- thanks to Olly's ingenious Voodoo Monarch trick.
<br>
The solution begins very counter-intuitively: for your detail trap, you will define the number of needed MCR columns starting way off to the right of all the desired data, with a width of 1. We will define six MCR columns; one for each month of data:
<br>
<img src=http://www.monarchforums.com/images/005-Monarch-Report-July-2008.jpg>
<p><small>Fig. 5</small></p>
<br>Then we will trap the detail as shown below, as one single, long Memo field, with nothing in the MCR area. We will call this field "Blob of Text." We will also trap the Product name separately as an Append trap and the Year as a Page Header template.
<br>
Monarch naturally sorts MCRs down the first column of data, then on to the next column, etc. It will be necessary to resort your MCR data so the data is displayed in order across each row, not down each column.
<br>
Using two calculated fields containing simply the Page() and Line() functions respectively, Monarch can sort the MCR fields across each row:
<br>
<img src=http://www.monarchforums.com/images/006-Monarch-Report-July-2008.jpg>
<p><small>Fig. 6</small></p>
<br>Now we have the MCR fields in proper order, we'll create a calculated field using the RowNo function and Mod function (based on our number of MCR columns, which is six), to count each set of data per product. And more good news: this field will also double as our field referring to the correct Month!
<br>
<img src=http://www.monarchforums.com/images/007-Monarch-Report-July-2008.jpg>
<p><small>Fig. 7</small></p>
<br>We will use the results of this field in one more additional calculated field (Sales Amount) to display each month of data from our "Blob of Text" field:
<br>
<img src=http://www.monarchforums.com/images/008-Monarch-Report-July-2008.jpg>
<p><small>Fig. 8</small></p>
<br>This formula uses the handy InTrim function, available in Monarch V8-V9, to replace each instance of consecutive spaces in the Blob of Text field with just one space. The LSplit function then "splits" the field into 6 parts using the occurrence of a space as the separator; and finally displays the first, second, etc. part based on the Month value. The Val function wraps things up by displaying the end result as a numeric value.
<br>
Finally, hide all fields except for Month, Year, Product and Sales Amount to export the desired data shown in Fig. 2 above!
<br>
This Voodoo Monarch tip shows how to transform reports with MCR data into a table with a separate row for each instance of data, even with varying column widths, all a single Monarch model!
<br>
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</p></TD> </TR> </P><BR> </TD></TR> </table>
</TD> </TR> <TR> <TD style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f00"> </TD> </TR> <TR> <TD> <H3 style="COLOR: #f00">Rush North Shore Medical Center Turns to Monarch Data Pump for Automated Reporting, Data ETL Made Easy</SPAN></H3> <P>Rush North Shore Medical Center, located on the northwest border of Chicago, is a 265-bed acute care hospital affiliated with Rush University Medical Center, one of the nation’s leading research and teaching hospitals. For years, Rush North Shore has utilized Monarch Data Pump to enable automated enterprise reporting and data ETL (extraction, transformation and loading) with no new programming.</P>
<P> <a href="#article1"><b>Read More...</b></a></P><BR> </TD> </TR>
<TR> <TD style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f00"> </TD> </TR> <TR> <TD> <H3 style="COLOR: #f00">Furniture Maker/Retailer American Signature Furnishes its ERP Reporting Needs with Monarch</SPAN></H3> <P>American Signature is a US manufacturer and retailer of furniture and bedding with 130 stores and three US and two non-US manufacturing facilities. The company operates under the name Value City Furniture in the Midwest and Northeast and American Signature in the Southeast. To help furnish the company's ERP reporting needs, American Signature turned to Monarch to easily obtain data from existing reports with no new programming.</P><P> <a href="#article2"><b>Read More...</b></a></P> </TD> </TR> <TD style="background-color: #ccc; border: 1px solid #000; padding: 0 10px 0 10px;">
<p><strong>Reminder: Don't Miss our Monarch Summer Sizzler...</strong> </p><p><ul>
<li>Buy 4 copies of Monarch Standard or Monarch Pro V9...Get the 5th copy FREE! If others in your organization could benefit from using Monarch, now is the time to buy!</li>
<li><a href="http://www.datawatch.com/emailers/mV9_buy4/index.html" target="_blank"><b>View our the Monarch Summer Sizzler offer now</b></a>. Hurry, your chance to save up to $849 ends August 31, 2008!</li>
</ul></p>
</td></tr>
<br><TR> <TD style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f00"> </TD> </TR> <TR> <TD> <H3 style="COLOR: #f00">Hot Voodoo Monarch Tip! Mine Multi-Column Data with Varying Column Widths</H3>Anyone can reap substantial benefits very quickly using Monarch, and yet, in the hands of an expert user, Monarch is an amazingly powerful tool, able to meet highly complex report mining and analytical challenges the average Monarch user might deem impossible. We call such highly advanced Monarch skills "Voodoo Monarch."<br>
<br>Olly Bond, who served for years as Monarch consultant for Avanquest, the leading reseller of Monarch in Europe, and was on hand as a presenter and Solution Lab consultant at the recent Datawatch 2008 User Conference, has developed a powerful Voodoo Monarch technique to mine Multi-Column Region (MCR) data despite varying column widths.
</P><P> <a href="#article3"><b>Read More...</b></a></P><BR> </TD> </TR>
<TR> <TD style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f00"> </TD> </TR> <TR> <TD> <H3 style="COLOR: #f00">Global Imaging Systems Selects Monarch Data Pump for Programming-Free ETL</H3> <P><b>Monarch Data Pump Customer Review in DM Review Magazine</b></p><p>Global Imaging Systems, a Xerox company, must easily consolidate the results of all 23 of its core businesses (with 23 separate ERP systems) to enable timely financial and operational performance reporting. Monarch Data Pump automatically mines, customizes and exports the data from each core business with no new programming and no need for database connectivity. Monarch Data Pump has drastically reduced the complexity of the company's enterprise data acquisition and consolidation.
</P><P> <a href="http://www.dmreview.com/issues/2007_49/10001513-1.html?type=printer_friendly" target=_blank><b>Read the Entire Review...</b></a></P><BR>
</TD> </TR></H3>
<TR> <TD style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f00"> </TD> </TR> <TR> <TD> <H3 style="COLOR: #f00">Certified Monarch & Monarch Data Pump Training - Exclusively from Datawatch</H3> <P>Our Monarch training classes for beginner, intermediate and advanced users, led by our own in-house team of Certified trainers, will supercharge your personal productivity!
<br><i>"[I was] very impressed with the instructor's teaching style and knowledge of the software. I will definitely be signing up for the intermediate and advanced Monarch classes."</i><br> -- Jason Roossien, Comcast
<br><a href="http://www.datawatch.com/_services/training_overview.php" target=_blank><b>Visit our Training homepage</b></a> for full details and to find a Monarch class near you!<BR>
<a href="#top">Return to top of page</a>
</TD> </TR> </P><BR> </TD></TR> </table>
<TABLE style="FONT: 12px arial; BACKGROUND-COLOR: #fff" width=880 align=center border=0> </tr><a name="article1"></a>
<TR> <TD style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f00"> </TD> </TR> <TR> <TD> <H3 style="COLOR: #f00">Rush North Shore Medical Center Turns to Monarch Data Pump for Automated Reporting, Data ETL Made Easy</SPAN></H3>
<p>Rush North Shore Medical Center, located on the northwest border of Chicago, is a 265-bed acute care hospital affiliated with Rush University Medical Center, one of the nation’s leading research and teaching hospitals. For years, Rush North Shore has utilized Monarch Data Pump to enable automated enterprise reporting and data ETL (extraction, transformation and loading) with no new programming.
<br>
"We have over fifty Monarch Data Pump processes in constant use to automatically acquire and deliver customized healthcare data for a wide array of critical, ongoing informational needs," says Jerry Juneman, Applications Manager, Information Systems, for Rush North Shore.
<br>
Much of Rush North Shore's operating activity is maintained within its Siemens Invision healthcare information system. "Invision produces a large library of existing reports which Monarch Data Pump easily and automatically transforms into actionable data, for delivery in a number of ways," Jerry says. "We utilize Monarch Data Pump many times a day to automatically create and send data needed on a repetitive basis. For example, Monarch Data Pump fulfills certain regulatory requirements, such as automatically mining and then delivering via FTP patient diagnosis data sourced from Invision reports to county infection control offices every six hours. It's very liberating to know that ongoing informational chores like this are set up once and then constantly managed automatically by Monarch Data Pump.
<br>
"That's just the tip of the iceberg as to what Monarch Data Pump can do," Jerry says. "Monarch Data Pump lets us design multi-step processes which let us combine data from multiple, disparate systems.
<br>
"For example, Rush North Shore, like any healthcare organization, must avoid issuing late charges: patient services which are not charged until after the patient has already been billed. Late charges require the patient to be rebilled and greatly increase the time and work necessary for Rush North Shore to get paid for services.
<br>
"Monarch Data Pump mines late charge data from reports sourced from Invision as well as from a separate operating room information system," Jerry explains. "Monarch Data Pump then produces a single, unified summary view of all late charges by department in PDF format. This summary data view enables Rush North Shore executives to hold department managers accountable for issuing late charges and to take active steps to minimize late charges in the future. Monarch Data Pump provides us with the automated reporting necessary to ensure maximum collection efficiency."
<br>
Monarch Data Pump goes further to help ensure Rush North Shore collects patient receivables due as quickly as possible. "Monarch Data Pump has made it very easy to provide past due patient receivables to our external collection agencies," says Jerry. "Monarch Data Pump mines needed data from Invision receivables aging reports on a daily basis and delivers it via FTP to our collection agencies. Before Monarch Data Pump, providing this data was a totally manual process. If the data was not received by a collection agency, we may not have been made aware of it until some weeks later.
<br>"Instead, Monarch Data Pump ensures our collection agencies have the data they need for immediate collection efforts, automatically and with no programming."
<br>Monarch Data Pump is again used to close the collection loop. "Rush North Shore receives daily patient payments and/or makes adjustments to accounts. These activities generate reports out of Invision. To keep the collection agencies up to date, data is mined off the reports and sent to the collection agencies.
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"After the agencies have worked the accounts for their allotted time, the accounts are returned to Rush North Shore. In order to tell the Invision system that the account is no longer with the agency, Monarch Data Pump, using a model template created with Monarch Pro, creates batch records which are then uploaded into Invision. This process used to take the patient accounting department many hours of manual work to complete. With Monarch Data Pump processing the transactions it takes a matter of minutes.
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"Monarch Data Pump plays a critical role in ensuring the most expedited collection process possible, while dramatically simplifying the process of acquiring and delivering needed data."
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Monarch Data Pump also facilitates data integration with other Rush North Shore enterprise systems. "We use Monarch Data Pump as a data ETL solution to populate a SQL Server-based revenue reporting system which enables managers to design their own patient accounting reports. Monarch Data Pump ensures fresh data, sourced from Invision reports, is constantly updated, quickly and easily, with no database programming of any kind.
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"Monarch Data Pump also plays a pivotal role in integrating data from Invision to our time and attendance system. Every four hours, we run a patient census report to Monarch Data Pump, which automatically mines and directs needed data from the report for automatic importing into the time and attendance system. This enables us to ensure there is sufficient staff on hand for the next shift.
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"Additionally, Monarch Data Pump automatically mines data from new employee reports and builds the data necessary to add those new employees to our time and attendance system. Thanks to Monarch Data Pump, there is no need to build an interface between systems.
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"I have actively recommended Monarch Data Pump to other hospitals," concludes Jerry. "Any repetitive informational task can be automated with Monarch Data Pump.
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"Monarch Data Pump enables automated reporting, data delivery and data integration between multiple systems, all without programming. It is an absolutely essential solution for Rush North Shore, and any healthcare organization."
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<a href="http://www.datawatch.com/case_studies/case_studies.php" target=_blank>Read more Monarch Data Pump case studies.</a>
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<TABLE style="FONT: 12px arial; BACKGROUND-COLOR: #fff" width=880 align=center border=0> </tr><a name="article2"></a>
<TR> <TD style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f00"> </TD> </TR> <TR> <TD> <H3 style="COLOR: #f00">Furniture Maker/Retailer American Signature Furnishes its ERP Reporting Needs with Monarch</SPAN></H3>
<p>American Signature is a US manufacturer and retailer of furniture and bedding with 130 stores and three US and two non-US manufacturing facilities. The company operates under the name Value City Furniture in the Midwest and Northeast and American Signature in the Southeast. To help furnish the company's ERP reporting needs, American Signature turned to Monarch to easily obtain data from existing reports with no new programming.
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"We use a legacy enterprise information system designed specifically for the furniture industry for our inventory, purchasing and order management, and use Lawson for our accounting needs, including general ledger, receivables and payables," says Earl Stripe, Manager of Manufacturing Accounting for American Signature. "Monarch enables us to easily acquire the data we need from both systems for a wide variety of reporting purposes.
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"Our primary use of Monarch is to mine data from our legacy system reports to facilitate historical analysis, notably cost variances by product, on a month to date and year to date basis," Earl says. "Other data provided by Monarch also enables us to establish and manage our standard costs.
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"I also recently used Monarch to complete a project in which I audited all Bills of Materials (BOMs) for a new line of bedding," Earl adds. "Managing the numerous BOMs for each variation of each article of furniture and bedding can be very complex. Monarch dramatically simplifies this process. Instead of wading through a 900-page indented BOM report, showing all component parts, overhead and labor costs for each item, I mined the data from the report using Monarch.
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"The end result was a crosstab summary, counting all parts for each bedding size in a single view. I was able to pinpoint errors within certain BOMs immediately, ensuring proper inventory management and costing, thanks to Monarch."
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American Signature’s legacy system helps successfully manage the unique business challenges of the furniture industry, but it has its limitations. "One significant shortcoming with our legacy system is it retains the current standard cost but not historical standard costs," Earl explains. "Fortunately, we can easily track our standard costs and other historical data by maintaining this and other data in Access. Monarch makes the process of creating and maintaining our Access databases very easy.
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"Also, if we do not run certain reports at month end, it is very difficult to replicate that same month end data later. We run over fifteen various inventory, costing, production, and purchasing-related reports at month end and use Monarch to mine needed data and export the customized data to Access and Excel. Without Monarch, we would simply be producing product without easy access to critical historical costing and production data."
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American Signature recently extended its use of Monarch to easily acquire and share data sourced from the company’s Lawson General Ledger (GL) system. "We used to print and ship a detailed expense report for each store; 700 pages or more per week," said Earl. "Instead we mine only certain needed data through Monarch. The final data can be exported to PDF. Stores print what they need. We have begun to extend this practice to several other Lawson reports and will continue to expand the process.
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"Thanks to Monarch, we have cut our paper consumption for reports by an average of 70%, and climbing. So far, we have realized annualized savings of $11,000 in reporting costs, which I expect will increase to $30,000 per year as we utilize Monarch with more and more reports from our existing system."
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Summing up the benefits Monarch has provided American Signature, Earl says, "Monarch is an outstanding tool to mine and customize data from reports to facilitate analysis as well as populate our numerous Access databases, all without programming. Monarch is an exceptional, hassle-free data bridge from our enterprise systems to MS Office.
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"Monarch does a great job extending the value and cutting costs of our legacy system as well as our Lawson GL system, leveraging our existing reports as a programming-free source for the actionable data we need."
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<a href="http://www.datawatch.com/case_studies/case_studies.php" target=_blank>Read more Monarch case studies.</a>
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<a name="article3"></a>
<TR> <TD style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f00"> </TD> </TR> <TR> <TD> <H3 style="COLOR: #f00">Hot Voodoo Monarch Tip! Mine Multi-Column Data with Varying Column Widths</SPAN></H3>
<p>Anyone can reap substantial benefits very quickly using Monarch, and yet, in the hands of an expert user, Monarch is an amazingly powerful tool, able to meet highly complex report mining and analytical challenges the average Monarch user might deem impossible. We call such highly advanced Monarch skills "Voodoo Monarch."
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Olly Bond, who served for years as Monarch consultant for Avanquest, the leading reseller of Monarch in Europe, and was on hand as a presenter and Solution Lab consultant at the recent Datawatch 2008 User Conference, has developed a powerful Voodoo Monarch technique to mine Multi-Column Region (MCR) data despite varying column widths.
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Beginner and expert Monarch users alike would have no problem using conventional report mining methods to obtain data from the report shown below:
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<img src=http://www.monarchforums.com/images/001-Monarch-Report-July-2008.jpg>
<p><small>Fig. 1</small></p>
<br>However, what we might really want is to show the data for each month <i>as its own unique row of data,</i> suitable for export to a database, like this:
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<img src=http://www.monarchforums.com/images/002-Monarch-Report-July-2008.jpg>
<p><small>Fig. 2</small></p>
<br>The Monarch MCR feature, available in Monarch V8 and V9, makes this possible. The MCR feature is activated for the detail trap (see Fig. 3), while the product name and year are trapped using Append and Page Header traps, respectively.
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<img src=http://www.monarchforums.com/images/003-Monarch-Report-July-2008.jpg>
<p><small>Fig. 3</small></p>
<br>However, reports often have columns with varying widths, while PDF reports may not scale to perfectly uniform column widths either, preventing us from defining a suitable MCR region:
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<img src=http://www.monarchforums.com/images/004-Monarch-Report-July-2008.jpg>
<p><small>Fig. 4</small></p>
Is there any way we might still be able to use the Monarch MCR feature? Yes! -- thanks to Olly's ingenious Voodoo Monarch trick.
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The solution begins very counter-intuitively: for your detail trap, you will define the number of needed MCR columns starting way off to the right of all the desired data, with a width of 1. We will define six MCR columns; one for each month of data:
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<img src=http://www.monarchforums.com/images/005-Monarch-Report-July-2008.jpg>
<p><small>Fig. 5</small></p>
<br>Then we will trap the detail as shown below, as one single, long Memo field, with nothing in the MCR area. We will call this field "Blob of Text." We will also trap the Product name separately as an Append trap and the Year as a Page Header template.
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Monarch naturally sorts MCRs down the first column of data, then on to the next column, etc. It will be necessary to resort your MCR data so the data is displayed in order across each row, not down each column.
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Using two calculated fields containing simply the Page() and Line() functions respectively, Monarch can sort the MCR fields across each row:
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<img src=http://www.monarchforums.com/images/006-Monarch-Report-July-2008.jpg>
<p><small>Fig. 6</small></p>
<br>Now we have the MCR fields in proper order, we'll create a calculated field using the RowNo function and Mod function (based on our number of MCR columns, which is six), to count each set of data per product. And more good news: this field will also double as our field referring to the correct Month!
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<img src=http://www.monarchforums.com/images/007-Monarch-Report-July-2008.jpg>
<p><small>Fig. 7</small></p>
<br>We will use the results of this field in one more additional calculated field (Sales Amount) to display each month of data from our "Blob of Text" field:
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<img src=http://www.monarchforums.com/images/008-Monarch-Report-July-2008.jpg>
<p><small>Fig. 8</small></p>
<br>This formula uses the handy InTrim function, available in Monarch V8-V9, to replace each instance of consecutive spaces in the Blob of Text field with just one space. The LSplit function then "splits" the field into 6 parts using the occurrence of a space as the separator; and finally displays the first, second, etc. part based on the Month value. The Val function wraps things up by displaying the end result as a numeric value.
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Finally, hide all fields except for Month, Year, Product and Sales Amount to export the desired data shown in Fig. 2 above!
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This Voodoo Monarch tip shows how to transform reports with MCR data into a table with a separate row for each instance of data, even with varying column widths, all a single Monarch model!
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