How To Create Previous Years' Directories?

Contains common questions about CARAT software and CARSA applications
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ctsbbadmin
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How To Create Previous Years' Directories?

Post by ctsbbadmin »

This tutorial is for CARAT software running in a local hard disk in a Windows operating system.

Most CARAT software can keep several years' worth of data for you to refer to. This is convenient but the amount of data that accumulates will eventually slow down your data retrieval process and your program will run slower. There comes a time when breaking up the data and archiving the previous years' data is necessary to boost the speed of your program usage.

You may even need to do this on a yearly basis for payroll programs because of statutory constraints like changes in contribution tables for EPF or Socso which will cause problems if old payroll data is re-processed with current rates.

The following example shows you how to create a directory to store your previous years' data. We will be using the CARAT Payroll+ directory structure as an example, but the concept applies to any CARAT software.

In CARAT Payroll+, the installation directory is by default, C:\CARAT\PAYPLUS. This is called the home directory and should always contain the current year's data files. It will also contain previous years' data files if there is no previous years' directory created.

Assuming that the current year is 2018 and at the beginning of the next year, 2019, you decide that you want to archive the previous year's data in preparation for new data for 2019.

The steps are as follows:-
  1. In Windows, search for the Command Prompt, select it to drop down to the command prompt
  2. Type C: and press ENTER
  3. Type CD\CARAT\PAYPLUS and press ENTER
  4. Type MD PAY2018 and press ENTER
  5. Type CD PAY2018 and press ENTER
  6. Type XCOPY ..\*.DAT . and press ENTER (Several files will be copied. Wait for the command prompt to re-appear)
  7. Type XCOPY ..\*.IDX . and press ENTER (Several files will be copied. Wait for the command prompt to re-appear)
  8. Type XCOPY ..\*.BLB . and press ENTER (Several files will be copied. Wait for the command prompt to re-appear)
  9. Type XCOPY ..\*.RTM . and press ENTER (Several files will be copied. Wait for the command prompt to re-appear)
  10. Type EXIT and press ENTER to close the command prompt
  11. At the Windows desktop, right click on the shortcut you use to start the program and select Copy
  12. Right click on a blank area of the Windows desktop and select Paste Shortcut
  13. Right click on the new shortcut and select Properties
  14. In the "Start In" field, type \PAY2018 after the existing entry so that it becomes C:\CARAT\PAYPLUS\PAY2018
  15. Click the OK button
  16. Right click on the shortcut and select Rename
  17. Type in an appropriate name to refer it as Payroll for 2018
  18. Test the new shortcut by double clicking on it
  19. After the program has started, the directory shown at the bottom left corner should be C:\CARAT\PAYPLUS\2018
  20. Test the existing shortcut by double clicking on it
  21. After the program has started, the directory shown at the bottom left corner should be C:\CARAT\PAYPLUS
  22. If the directories are correct, you can now clear the payroll data for the previous year from the home directory
Note: If the CARAT program has a company data management module, you can skip all the above steps and just follow the steps to create a new directory from the online help file. The only thing you need to adhere to is the directory naming convention for previous years' data and the need to use the home directory for current year's data.
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