ERPNext 14... What would you like to see?

ERPNext
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The biggest one for me is A more friendly UI… Taking a look at Axelor and Dynamics 365 we can see how the UI really brings out the features. The UI of ERPnext can be intimidating, lets take notes from Monday.com, Axelor and UI concepts that make software’s nice to use. For example, using colours for tags, instead of a colour dot, using a rounded highlight over the text. Also the sidebar could be a lot nicer… it gets in the way and is such an eyesore for how bland it is

Make it easier to use, e.g on Issues, remove the dot, instead highlight the text in colour, allow the status to be quickly changed by clicking it and getting a drop down menu… these kind of shortcuts are what we need.

I think we’ve got enough features, ERPnext 14 has to be all about optimisation, lets make it feel fun and productive to use. I’d also like to see the Helpdesk worked on to be a true HelpDesk, instead of Issues make it into more of a ticket/case management system that you see with CRMs

This is not to discredit any of the work done by the amazing developers, just some areas that need focus to really bring out the potential of this software.

What would you like to see?

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  • LMS (Learning Management System) for employees (should be part of employee on-boarding and continuing education/training).
  • Better Helpdesk
  • Job application process where someone can apply to open job postings and is then part of the other HR hiring processes.
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Personally, I would outsource the LMS. ERPnext should only contain the data to show they’ve passed it or to remind them, maybe even restrict them until its marked as passed but not to actually have it built in, seems quite out of scope unless you’d want a limit functionality. Perhaps something from the education module could cross over?

Helpdesk is a must! I think it should get a Vue.js front and be distinctive to the rest of the platform. Helpdesk/CRM in itself is a highly advanced system so it should stand out to other ERP features, not blend in.

That’s a good idea, especially for the Frappe website front

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ERPNext already has a LMS module but it’s tailored for an educational environment with student/teacher relationships. I’m not sure how extensive it is, but it would be nice to have it available for employee training.

https://docs.erpnext.com/docs/user/manual/en/education/setting-up-lms

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How about integrate with some BPM like Activiti? It’s great to create more sophisticated workflow.

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Give some attention to the shop, as online sales got more attention in the pandemic. E.g. show in which stage of the order and payment process the user is. Allow several payment options in the shop, not just one. Allow to have multi-lingual item description on the web page.

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I will keep my suggestions simple…

  • Finally add real “Waste Management” to the manufacturing module. Been requested for years now!

  • Add back a “live” mode of operation to the POS module, the current method of updating inventory and ledgers at the end of shift has forced many of us to look at other POS solutions (and in some cases other ERP solutions).

  • Find a shopping cart solution that does not limit the system to a single warehouse for keeping the shop provisioned.

  • Adding a WYSIWYG report builder into the system would be beneficial. I know this is not an easy task but it the single most requested option by clients I visit. Maybe there is an open source one that would agree to let us add it into the system. Regardless, there is a cry in the user base for a custom report builder that someone only familiar with ‘MS Word’ could intuitively figure out.

Those are my suggestions (in priority order).

~BKM

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@bkm, as report builder there reportbro ReportBro

1 - It’s open source
2 - It’s javascript + python
3 - It’s well done

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I definitely agree with @Tai_Tran1. Better Workflow Management or even a proper Business Process Management capability. See BPM topic on this forum.

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WhatsApp integration to enable sharing of documents easily via WhatsApp

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Implement real document versioning that keeps references.
Right now an amended document is just created as a completely new document.

Would be good to just have revisions of a document, not a chain of new documents.

This would e.g. help with not breaking cross references.

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I agree with you on this part

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I’d like to see an integration with Nextcloud. Also versioning as Paul_Frydlewicz defines. Thanks to everyone for there efforts.

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I’ll start my wish list, quoting the brazilian writer “Luciano Ramalho”, who wrote “Fluent Python”

The limits of do-ocracy: FLOSS often follows the model of power for those who do. To earn power, one must contribute code. It works, but there's a limit: how to represent the needs of users of the software who aren't able to contribute code? #citationneeded

— 😷 Luciano Ramalho ☔ 🐍 ⚗ ▶️ (@ramalhoorg) May 11, 2021

I would like to see an ECA (ERPNext Comunity Association), like odoo has OCA (Odoo Community Association), where people from the community can work together to contribute, improve and make mature contributions to ERPNext, but not only this, where people that doesn’t know how to code, also can be listened, because they also have they own needs, and a community need to include, not to exclude people!

I wished that the now defunct ERPNext Foundation, will take that leadership, to make ERPNext community more stronger, but since it was under Frappé umbrella, it followed Frappé needs, becomming FOSS United, and focusing in Indian needs (what’s makes perfect sense!).

Many of the points on that thread, are great features, but I believe, that Us, as community, is who should take that role, to work around our needs!

Have been a while, that I perceive, that community is beeing neglected, and I fell that, I’m also neglecting the community!

ERPNext is an mature product, but the Idea that “one size fits for all”, doesn’t apply to this community, like, here in Brazil, we have so many freaking tax rules, that doesn’t make sense let people in Gana, Ireland or India burn they mind to understand, our tax way.

If someone need a feature, there should be a group of people, that can mentor and guide members of the community, to make they contributions mature and stronger, and as consequence, making ERPNext great for everyone else!

In the other hand, there should have a group of people, that can listen, the community needs, and organize the “Coders” here, to bring better things to the community.

An ECA, should be an “Community Iniciative”, and should be managed by this “Community” too, because initiatives like the Foundation and FOSS United are always under the umbrella of Frappe.

That’s my wish, but, that’s my responsability also!

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Proper Standard Costing workflow to track variances from budget

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@max_morais_dmm, does ReportBro support raw SQL queries as a data source?

The tool looks very interesting.! But if you must know Python to use it, that would likely prevent me from installing on my customers’ sites (they rarely have any IT staff, least of all programmers)

Also, +1 for a community-owned ERPNext Community Association (User Group).

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Interesting to note, that everyone openly expressed their ideas on this thread, but the thread was started by a regular user like the rest of us. This makes me believe that the developers and teams that steer the project will either not bother reading the input or simply consider it forum chatter and not give it any weight.

Unfortunately that is the “regular” path of such exercises. We have no such thing as @max_morais_dmm community owned ERPNext community association.

Fun to see everyone’s ideas though. Gives us some things to look for when we evaluate other ERP projects we might consider as a replacement.

BKM

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@brian_pond yes it allows, but some python knowledge will be needed to plug it into frappé

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That’s the sad part, after make years of investment in knowledgement (like I did, I’s about 12 years now, in that community), just throw away that and seek for an replacement ERP, doesn’t look as a good path, that’s why I suggested, that we should look into a way to support ourselfs, and find ways to get these ideas into the product, even they don’t come from the developers.

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I know it doesn’t look like the best thing to do , but as you already noted here:

It appears the ERPNext project has become more of a product for the India businesses and not so much the rest of us. You are right that it makes perfect sense for them. They are only doing what is best for their local business population because the laws there are changing quickly and it is hard to keep up.

This has always been a tightly held project of the frappe group. It has also always been a blessing to have access to it here in the USA. However, I must work at meeting the needs of my local businesses just like the frappe group must meet theirs. So, if the project no longer seems to support us, then we have only 2 choices:

1- Find an alternative to ERPNext that will fit our needs, or

2 - Fork everything and start with a new developer challenge to take what was ERPNext in the direction we need it to go for the USA and other world markets.

I am not a developer, so I cannot take option #2 for myself. I would gladly support a dev community that does take that option, but I am not able to manage a software project myself (not being a developer).

I continue to use ERPNext for now. And I continue to add to the knowledge base where I can with tutorials, app ideas, and developed code when I have clients that can afford the changes.

BKM

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