Differences Between ACCPAC Plus for DOS and Windows Financial Reporters

The Financial Reporter in Sage Accpac is a more powerful and flexible tool than its DOS-based counterpart, offering these advantages:

• It's easier to use.

• It provides access to more information.

• It can manipulate, format, and graph General Ledger data.

The Financial Reporter adds Sage Accpac-specific functions and commands to Excel to allow them to read General Ledger data. The financial reports are generated within a spreadsheet which uses special Sage ERP Accpac functions. Once the data is in the spreadsheet, the Financial Reporter uses the spreadsheet's formatting and printing capabilities to produce the statement.

Ordinarily, you do not see the spreadsheet when you print a report: you simply select the report, choose the print options you want, then click Print. However, if you want, you can open the report specification directly, generate the report, then use the spreadsheet to manipulate the data.

The Financial Reporter gets a lot of its power and flexibility from the spreadsheet it uses.

Report Specification Files

Like the DOS version of Financial Reporter, each financial statement is defined in a report specification. The specification tells Financial Reporter which data is included on the statement, and how it should be formatted.

Because the specification is actually a spreadsheet, you can use spreadsheet formulas, formatting commands, and graphing abilities to embellish the report, and you can transfer the data to multidimensional models for more sophisticated data analysis.

Excel Report Files

When you use Print Financial Statements, Sage ERP Accpac looks at the filename extension of the spreadsheet you specify, and if the file you specify has an XLS filename extension (or XLSX for Excel 2007), the Financial Reporter starts Excel. If the file does not use one of those extensions, Financial Reporter will have a problem detecting the Excel program directory while reading the registry record stored during your installation of Excel.

See also

Comparison of ACCPAC Plus for DOS and Sage ERP Accpac Specification Codes