Cold Tonight?

The forecast is for -21°F, with windchills around -35°. The block heater on Vger seemed to work great last night (0°F).

Today has been a day of frustration. I'm trying to do the EOY for our Great Plains installation, and it's not going well at all.

Up to (and including) version 8, upgrades were simple. But, M$ was still using the old programming that they bought. With Version 9, they made the break with the old Great Plains and made it more of a M$ program, including using the Windows Installer. Before v9, everything was controlled by .ini, .set, and .dic files. In v9, in addition to using these files there are also many many Registry entries.

Well, to make a long story short, something on the Server in the Windows Installer is broken. Something in the Registry. As usual, M$ suggestion is to re-install Windows. On a server. That is a Domain Controller. That is a DHCP server. That hosts all the SQL databases for the company.

Well, I've been going to demote the server to a member for quite a while, and there is a plan to move most of the databases to new hardware that has just started arriving today. But, the updates to GP must be done before the first payroll of 2009 can be processed (taxes), so now the problems cannot be pushed back any longer.

So, guess what I will be doing New Years Eve and Day? Building a server and restoring databases to it. Just what I've always wanted to do. Got to have it done by Friday morning so that reports that need to be run at the beginning of 2009 can be run before the first Payroll.

yep. A marathon session. yippee.