CoolSpools

Applications

Here are just a few ideas for ways in which CoolSpools can help your organization adapt to the demands of the modern IT world.

Ÿ               Automated distribution of reports and documents

Still sending reports out on paper? Maybe you take orders over the Web but still have to send invoices by snail-mail because the invoicing application is an old iSeries package?

Files created by CoolSpools can be e-mailed to users, colleagues and customers, rather than sent out on paper. This not only saves you money and simplifies your business processes, it also makes clear to everyone that you business is responding to the challenges of the Internet era.

If you have Communiqué email product installed, you can email the output from CoolSpools directly to one or more recipients as an attachment.

Ÿ               Information sharing

However many copies of a report you print, it's never enough. There's always someone else who'd like to see it but is in an office on the other side of the country and can't get access to a copy.

Files created by CoolSpools can be stored on a central corporate server, such as your iSeries, or a PC server, and shared amongst all your users as a corporate information resource. 

Alternatively, you could publish them on your Web site for customers worldwide to see, or on a secure Intranet or Extranet.

Ÿ               Enhancing and colorizing your reports

CoolSpools doesn’t just convert your reports, it enhances them too. For example, when converting to PDF format, you can add bookmarks that index the pages of your report so your users can find the information they want quickly and easily. 

Also, when you create a PDF or HTML document from a spooled file, you can colorize your text and add a colored background to improve the presentation as well. Maybe you couldn’t afford an iSeries color printer: now that’s no longer an issue since you can simply convert your spooled file to PDF and print your document on an inexpensive PC color printer!

Ÿ               Archiving and offline storage

The iSeries provides no built in means of saving and restoring spooled files. Yet for many companies their iSeries reports are a critical part of the business process, and may not be easy to re-create. Maybe you have to waste large amounts of expensive iSeries disk just keeping copies of old reports online. Doing this can also impact your system's performance, since jobs which created spooled files remain in the system even when they have ended if they created spooled files which still exist on an output queue,

Files created by CoolSpools can be stored on inexpensive storage media such as PC disk or CD-ROM for easy retrieval. Once CVTSPLSTMF has converted your report into a stream file, you can move this file to a PC server, or save it to tape or to CD-ROM, then delete the original spooled file, freeing up precious iSeries resources. In the event that you need to re-print the report, you use the PDF file rather than the original report.

CoolSpools offers two options for archiving spooled files. You can convert the spooled file to a PDF file, in which case you would use Adobe Acrobat reader to re-print the report; or you can use the TOFMT(*SAV) option, in which case the CVTSTMSPLF (Convert Stream File to Spooled File) command can be used to restore the original spooled file from the stream file archive.