23.7 Release Notes

With this release, budget managers can view and manage the profile information or login settings with the user menu's new Manage your Account feature. This update empowers budget managers to perform some basic yet essential account management activities that make the account more personalized and secure, thus, reducing the dependency on admins.

Budget managers can do the following activities from the account management page:

• Change profile picture
• Change profile name
• Change profile password
• Change the secret question
• Set or update two-step verification settings

In Practice: Access Account Management Options

1. Login to your Planful account.
2. Click on your profile icon in the top-right corner of the screen that displays the user menu.
3. Click Manage your Account to access the profile or login settings options.

For more information, refer to Manage Account Settings.

With this release, budget managers can open the Workforce Planning template from the Budget Manager Experience home page if they have access to it. The home page now has a new Workforce pane above the Planning pane from which budget managers can access the workforce template. Budget managers can select any scenario from the scenario list in the Workforce section and click Show Employees to view the employees.

To know more about the Workforce Planning Template, refer to Workforce Planning Template.

With this release, we have enhanced our template notifications. Now, when you open a template in Input mode and another user is actively working on the same template with the same scenario, you will be automatically redirected to View mode, where you cannot make any changes. Furthermore, a notification will be displayed at the top of the template, informing you that someone else is currently working on the template and editing is restricted. To check if the other user has completed editing, click the Reload option. This will take you back to Input mode, and you can make your changes. This enhancement ensures a better user experience and streamlines the handling of locked templates.

With this release, we have introduced the new Template Snapshot feature in Cloud Scheduler to simplify your template management. Now, you can easily create backups of the template for a selected scenario and budget entity. This feature automates the snapshot creation process, eliminating the cumbersome task of manually creating snapshots and saving your time and effort.

This feature allows you to create a recurring schedule for the template snapshot creation. Once scheduled, the Cloud Scheduler will automatically create snapshots. This ensures the template is consistently backed up at the roll-up level without continuous user intervention. It also maintains the history of template versions, providing easy comparison, analysis, and recovery.

Let's understand this with an example.

Alex, a finance business partner, wants to share her Operating Expenses template with Emily, a budget manager, and her team at the end of every month. With Cloud Scheduler's Template Snapshot Backup feature, Alex can securely automate creating a backup of the Operating Expenses template by scheduling monthly template snapshots. The feature's flexibility automatically creates a backup of the desired template for selected scenarios and budget entities as scheduled, simplifying template management and collaboration.

Cloud Scheduler requires the appropriate user permissions for the template, budget entity, and scenario levels when creating snapshots. If you have view permission, you can only see the existing snapshots of a template. Only users with access to Cloud Scheduler and the Template Snapshot feature enabled for their navigation role can take snapshots. By default, the Snapshot feature is enabled in the application. To disable it, deselect the Enable Template Snapshot checkbox in your user profile's Approval Role Setup screen.

In Practice: Scheduling the template snapshot creation using the Template Snapshot feature

1. Cloud Scheduler can be accessed either from Maintenance > Admin> Cloud Scheduler.
   
   Or when you take a snapshot from the leaf level in the Planning Control Panel.
2. Click Cloud Scheduler to be directed to the Cloud Scheduler page.
   
   Note:

   Access to Cloud Scheduler is restricted to users with the appropriate permissions. If you do not have access, please contact your administrator for assistance in getting access to Cloud Scheduler.
3. Click Add from the Process Flow page.
   
   Three tabs are displayed on the Add Process Flow page: General Information, Tasks, and Scheduler.
4. Fill in all the details in the General Information.
   
5. Now, go to Tasks > Add Task, and on the New Task popup, select Template Snapshot from the Task Type.
   
6. Enter the Task Name, Scenario, Entity, Template,and Dependencies (this is an optional field) and click Save.
   
7. Use the Scheduler tab to run the process flow at a scheduled date, time, or a selected frequency.
   
8. Click Save or Save & Schedule to save the task. Click Run, if you want to run the scheduler immediately.
9. Go to the Job Manager to view the completed process and the status of each run.

With this release, we are providing you with the ability to unlock multiple entities in a single click. Now, while performing unlock periods action for multiple periods, you can also select multiple entities in the Consolidation process. This enhancement eliminates the tedious task of manually unlocking individual entities.

In Practice: How to unlock multiple entities and multiple periods in Consolidation Process

1. Navigate to the Consolidation Control Panel > Consolidation Process.
2. Select the required Scenario, Period, and Entity. The selected entity appears with periods.
3. Select any period and click Unlock. The Unlock Period(s) window appears.
4. Select the required Entities from the list, and click Apply.
   
   
5. Select the required period From the calendar icon, and click Unlock. The selected entities and periods are unlocked.
   
   

With this release, we have enhanced the process of locking an entity for multiple periods in Consolidation Process. Now, with a single click, you can lock an entity for multiple periods while performing the lock periods action. Previously, you had to select an individual period to lock an entity. This enhancement eliminates the manual clicks needed to lock each period and makes the process easy and less time-consuming.

In Practice: How to lock multiple periods for an entity

1. Navigate to the Consolidation Control Panel > Consolidation Process.
2. Select the required Scenario, Period, and Entity. The selected entity appears with periods.
3. Select any period and click Lock. The Lock Period(s) window appears.
   
   
4. Select the required period From the calendar icon, and click Lock. The selected periods are locked.