July 2008

Press Release

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

CustomWare Designs Receives 2008 Best of Salt Lake City Award

U.S. Local Business Associations Award Plaque Honors the Achievement

WASHINGTON D.C., July 12, 2008 -- CustomWare Designs has been selected for the 2008 Best of Salt Lake City Award in the Computer Software category by the U.S. Local Business Association (USLBA). The USLBA "Best of Local Business" Award Program recognizes outstanding local businesses throughout the country. Each year, the USLBA identifies companies that they believe have achieved exceptional marketing success in their local community and business category. These are local companies that enhance the positive image of small business through service to their customers and community.Various sources of information were gathered and analyzed to choose the winners in each category. The 2008 USLBA Award Program focused on quality, not quantity. Winners are determined based on the information gathered both internally by the USLBA and data provided by third parties.

About U.S. Local Business Association (USLBA)

U.S. Local Business Association (USLBA) is a Washington D.C. based organization funded by local businesses operating in towns, large and small, across America. The purpose of USLBA is to promote local business through public relations, marketing and advertising.The USLBA was established to recognize the best of local businesses in their community. Our organization works exclusively with local business owners, trade groups, professional associations, chambers of commerce and other business advertising and marketing groups. Our mission is to be an advocate for small and medium size businesses and business entrepreneurs across America.

SOURCE: U.S. Local Business Association

CONTACT:
U.S. Local Business Association
Email: PublicRelations@USLBA.net
URL: http://www.USLBA.net

CustomWare Designs' CustomWare^® trademark infringement suits status.

September 2005

System Designs, Inc. changed its name to CustomWare Designs, Inc.

June 2004

CustomWare^® has had bar coding reading and printing support for over 15 years. We now also support RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) and EPC (Electronic Product Code) support.

1. What is EPC?

   • An electronic product code or EPC is a lot like a bar code. It simply contains information about a product. However, unlike bar codes which can tell you that a box contains product XYZ, EPCs can identify one box of XYZ from another box of XYZ or, one serial # from another. You can see how that could help with monitoring product expiration dates or acting quickly during recalls. EPCs also help suppliers and retailers improve their supply chain process so that they have the right products in the right places at the right time.

2. What is RFID?

   • RFID is the acronym for radio frequency identification. This technology has been around since the 1940s. If you have a toll way tag or a remote keyless entry device for your car, you are already using RFID.

   • RFID is a technology that involves tags, that emit radio signals, and devices called readers, that receive those signals.

   • In retail, RFID will allow you to read electronic product codes from tags as product cases or pallets move through distribution centers and into stores. You will then be able to have a better understanding of where products are in your supply chain.

Read more about RFID and EPC.

December 2003

• A Merry Christmas and/or Happy Hanuka to all and wishes for a very prosperous New Year.

• A friendly reminder to all to backup before year end and after you have completed the year end closing processes. These should be archive backups -- you do not update them. You must close or set up for the new year:

  • General Ledger You must close the general ledger before any new journal entry producing program is run. Adjustments (journal entries and/or source documents such as A/R or A/P invoices or Payroll) can be run by setting the General Ledger AND Transaction File Year End flags to LAST YEAR.

  • Payroll  You must close the payroll files before a new payroll is run. W-2's (and adjustments such as bonus checks or payments to 401k accounts) can be run by setting the Payroll Year End flag AND the General Ledger and Transaction File flags to LAST YEAR.

  • Inventory (This should be closed to move the year's usage to the previous year and zero out the current (new) year usage). If you are performing an inventory count, make sure that your General Ledger and Transaction File year end flags are set to LAST YEAR.

• A new page on this site has been set up - Trouble shooting. This page deals mostly with installation problems but also addresses common problems and not-so-common problems. This can be accessed through the SITE MAP page or clicking here.

October 2003

• Distributors for Taylor Company now have an option to the high-maintenance fee software they are currently using. We customized CustomWare^® to use Taylor's non-standard EDI work order reporting uploading via FTP to Taylor's site. Conversion takes about a ½ day and is automated. See complete package offer - click here.

August 2003

• Emphasis has been placed on automatic integration of CustomWare^® with the internet. As a result, several CGI (Common Gateway Interface) web programs have been written and integrated into CustomWare^®. We write the programs in Perl. Why?

  1. 80% of CustomWare^® users are outside the United States.

  2. 85% of the world's Internet Service Providers (ISP) use some form of UNIX.

  3. 99.9% of the world's ISPs use Perl.

  4. Perl runs on virtually any platform -- from MS-DOS to UNIX to Windows to Macintosh.

  So for the obvious reason of universality, we write the web programs in Perl.
  
  A company may generate data files (including log in and password files) and programs that will work the first time. The format is generic but your company logo can be placed and used or, if you know HTML programming you may modify the header and footer without concerns for damaging the program. Of course, we can also make custom web programs for you.
  
  Data may be uploaded and downloaded to/from the internet at specified intervals - from continous to hourly to semi-daily to once a day. Each and every program is linked to the other -- seemlessly. Every program has a search engine to find information either in the inventory or customer invoices. The programs current available are:

  1. Accounts Receivable
     A customer may log on and view statements, open invoices, paid invoices, invoices from and to given dates, etc., may make payments (this program only asks for credit card information and sends an email to you. To hook up directly with a bank (direct payment/wire transfers) or a credit card company will require a special link). In short, if your customer wants to know anything about their account they can find it online -- inlcuding open orders pending processing.

  2. Online Product Purchasing
     Your product line can be viewed either by matrix descriptions or department then category. A customer may place the quantity, know their price and receive an order confirmation. Sales tax and freight are computed.

  You will need the most recent update. After that you may download the current CGI.PFM file for new programs and/or enhancements to the Perl programs.
  
  These programs require that you provide certain information. The information must be entered through SET UP (# 8 from the Master Center), and then in Company Information (#7). In that center, there is option # 17 - WORLD WIDE WEB INFORMATION. The fields will be blank but when you select one an example will be provided. If you are not sure, contact your Internet Service Provider.

  1. If you generate the Online Ordering you will also need to put in the parameters as found in option 10 of the WWW menu.

  2. To generate the programs, use option 12. To generate the inventory data file, go to the INVENTORY CENTER (6 from the Master Center) and then Maintenance Center then 18, then choose option 5.

  3. The customer file has been modified to include a customer's login and password and this file is generated in the CUSTOMER MAINTENANCE CENTER, option 11.  A future update will have a WWW center which will have all the options in one place.

July 2003

• The trademark infringement lawsuit against New CustomWare has been successfully finalized, setting national precedence. With precedence set and successful defense of the trademark, CustomWare Designs will now vigoursly pursue all infringers of the trademark and servicemark in the United States of America. The URL of customware.com will soon be our domain name. To view the decision, click here.  

• We updated our web site with a new design. Hope you enjoy it. Some pages and links are still being updated so if you have any questions or comments, please let us know.

• A new application for Records Management is being finished up. With one beta site with 3 warehouses using it for over 3 years, we feel it is ready to be added to the CustomWare suite of applications. For information this application, click here.

• A new application for Time Management is being written and tested. This is designed for law firms, support companies and other service oriented businesses that bill for time. Using the law firm as an example, it has:

  • Timer - log in a lawyer, select a client, give a description and click it off when finished. Computes time which is roundable by a specified number of minutes (5 mintues spent with 3 minute rounding will bill for 10 minutes).

  • Different rates by lawyer - regular, court, travel, assistant, etc.

  • Ties into Records Management for the Individual

  • 3 different new invoice formats to choose from.

  • Option for over credit limit (for support companies will indicate customer needs to purchase more time)

  • More...

• The method to download and install CustomWare^® has been streamlined. You will now download only the CustomWare^® package of choice and the installation program for the operating system you want. The installation program will have the correct Pragma^® program and files and install them in the correct directories.

• The Fleet Center is being modified for easier maintenance set up. It will also use the work order system for making work orders for repair shops.

June 2003

• The Fleet Center has been added to the Master Center menu. This center allows the tracking of vehicle maintenance performed and what is to be performed. The parts items are not tied to inventory.

• Obsolete updates from the ftp site have been deleted. If you need these updates please contact CustomWare Designs to recieve a CD or to have the required update(s) temporarily re-uploaded to the ftp site. The only updates now availabe for download are:

  • 004306 dated 11/17/01

  • The most current 34500 dated 02/06/03.

• Logical Business Systems, the provider for Pragma^®, the programming language that CustomWare^® is written in, has released version 4.43.  The files PRAGMA.EXE, PRMSG.PFM, PRMSG2.PFM, PRAREF.PFM PRAREF2.PFM and PRSTD.PFM are in the downloadable files NEW.EXE, CWDEMO.EXE and the current upgrade, 34500.EXE.  This version fixes some minor bugs in the programming language.

• CustomWare Designs in conjunction with Logical Business Systems has compiled the Pragma language for Linux. CustomWare^® will now work on Linux UNIX.

March 2003

CustomWare Designs, Inc. has been suing companies who violoate CDI's trademark and servicemark, CustomWare^®. This month landmark precedence was set in regards to jurisdiction for internet based companies. The infringers of the trade/service mark will have to come to Salt Lake City to defend their infringement as opposed to CDI going to the several States.

Many updates, enhancements and options have been added to CustomWare^®. Among these are:

• Serialized Inventory. Used by those companies wishing to track serial numbers of merchandise sold.

• Work Order System. Used in conjunction with the Order Entry System, Work orders allow distributors and other types of companies that need to perform maintenance or installation of equipment. The system keeps a history of each serialized part number and tracks parts used and service quality.

• Options for customized Accounts Receivable Invoices and Cash Disbursement/Payroll Checks.

• When entering A/R invoices, you may review or change the invoice before saving (items are saved in a TEMP file before posting to the actual files but until this update if the invoice were wrong, you had to delete it and re-enter the entire invoice.)

• Options for laser printer checks.

• For companies that wish to produce A/R invoices "on the spot" but not produce a register or post a journal entry until the end of the day, Deferred A/R Invoicing has been added as an option. This can be used in conjuntion with counter sales and regular A/R invoicing.

• Recurring Sales Center added. This allows for inventory parts to be sent to customers on regular intervals. This differs from Fixed Sales in the frequency. Fixed sales are by calendar months whereas Recurring Sales are by "starting month," e.g., fixed sales using quarterly will invoice every January, April, July and October whereas recuring sales will invoice every 3rd month from any starting month.

• The general ledger system used to use 1 GL file to store 11 years of data but the transactions were lost. There are now 11 GL files and 11 Transaction files which keeps all detail for 11 years. The 11th year GL will still have the previous 11 years stored but without transaction detail.

• Each inventory item has the option to be used or not used when computing commissions.

• Many other small enhancements and options added to the varying centers.

November 2002

CustomWare Designs moved from Millcreek Road in Salt Lake City to Holders Hill Lane in Taylorsville.

November 17, 2001

The last of this type of update program was uploaded to the site. In the future, updates will be easier and more controllable.  Since the last posting to this news we have done much to enhance and improve CustomWare^®. Interactive internet programs, auto-generation of CGI/Perl web programs and more.

August 13, 1999

An option for ELECTRONIC PAYMENTS or direct deposits is being added.  This option can be instigated for either ACCOUNTS PAYABLE and/or PAYROLL.  You may need to contact CustomWare Designs for help in setting this up for your bank as different banks have different requirements.

April 6, 1999

The updates page now contains information on what the updates contain.  It also has the code and instructions to make your CustomWare® Y2K compliant should you wish to do it yourself.

July 27, 1998

There are several updates to the standardized CustomWare® software. These include:

1. Y2K (Year 2000) Compliance
2. Standardized web program for online ordering. This CGI (Common Gateway Interface) program runs off our server with your data loaded. Cost: $500.
3. Inventory data transfer program for putting your inventory on the internet.  There are two options:
   • i. The standardized CustomWare® CGI code that automatically creates the necessary files for usage by the standard web program.
   • ii. Customizable creation of your inventory data for use in spreadsheets, internet applications, etc.

If you're running on a customized version of CustomWare® you will need to contact us to make a couple of very simple changes to 2 programs to make your system Y2K compliant.

There have been price modifications to the Web Pricing structure.

July 18, 1996

Updates to CustomWare® are available through this web site.  Instructions on downloading and running the update program are on the Update page.  This should make it easier for you to obtain up-to-date changes and enhancements to CustomWare®.

June 14, 1996

Don't have a web site?  No problem!!  CustomWare Designs will rent you space on our web site VERY inexpensively.  We will design your web page for you or you can simply e-Mail us your web pages created by another company and we will put your pages into your own site on the web.

We can provide you e-Mail and the software to download your mail and respond.  All you need is a computer and a modem and an existing account with someone like America On Line or Compuserve.

Cost for web site:  $1.00 per megabyte per month.  The average company uses less than 2 megabytes so you can have an internet presence for $2.00 per month!  Your internet address would be:  http://www.xmission.com/~sysdes/your company name. If you want an address such as "www.your_company_name.com" there is an additional set up fee of $100 and an additional $50 per month.

Cost to put your presence in 100 of the major search engines:  $175.  This will allow net surfers to find you when they use such search engines as Lycos, WebCrawler or Yahoo!

Cost to create your web pages:  $100 per hour.  You should know that YOU do most of the work for what goes onto your web page.  We can help you design it, provide custom graphics, etc.  The normal cost of a 4 page web site is around $300.

April 22, 1996

CustomWare Designs is now developing World Wide Web pages for businesses and indivduals who would like to have the presence on the web.

We can make your custom page with graphics, animation, sound, movies -- all of the bells and whistles that are available on the "net".  We can also put on your company's order forms so that net shoppers can order your products directly from on line.