Winpriser is offered in two editions. The Standard Edition is designed to be used on a stand-alone computer and allows item lookup, creation of worksheets, and the production of estimates, invoices and purchase orders. The Professional Edition has all the capabilities of the Standard Edition and, in addition, can be used to share a single Catalogue database on a network and to export worksheets to the QuickBooks and Simply Accounting accounting programs.

If your screen resolution is set to 640x480, Winpriser will automatically remove the main toolbar with the Catalogues, Worksheets, Setup and Exit buttons to allow more space for displaying data. The Open Catalogues, Open Worksheets, System Setup and Exit functions are all available by clicking on the File menu header at the top left of the Winpriser window.

Use the Ctrl and Tab keys together to bring each open Catalogue or Worksheet window "to the front". Alternately, click on the Window menu at the top of the Winpriser window and click on the Catalogue or Worksheet you wish to view.

If you want to close all the open Catalogue and Worksheet windows without exiting Winpriser, click on the Window menu at the top of the Winpriser window and choose Close All.

As software problems are identified and corrected and as new features are added, we will make Patch files available to upgrade your copy of Winpriser.

You can use your internet connection to upgrade Winpriser automatically by clicking Help | Internet Access | Download Winpriser Patch File on the Winpriser main menu.

The Upgrade will be downloaded and applied.

Or, you can go to our website at www.allpriser.com to download the Patch file and then run the Patch to install the upgrade.

The patches are also available from Allpriser Computer Services on CD.

Each subsequent patch contains all the changes included in all previous patches.

If a correction or enhancement is considered significant, we will notify all subscribers of the availability of an upgrade.

Winpriser has the ability to display small one to two line help messages that explain the control under the mouse pointer. We call these messages "Tool Tips". To turn on the Tool Tip messages start Winpriser, click on the Setup button (or File | Setup), click on the Display tab and click in the box beside "Use Tool Tips". A check mark in the Use Tool Tips box will cause the tips to be displayed.

Clicking the Right mouse button in Windows often causes a menu of choices to be displayed. There are numerous places in Winpriser that respond to a right click by displaying a popup menu showing the additional functions and features that are available at that point in the program. For example, right clicking while your mouse pointer is pointing to the right half of the Catalogue window will allow you to quickly change from Normal view to the Resale, Trade or Labour views. Try right clicking.

Searching the Catalogue - Moving to a Specific Group/Product Type/Page

Searching the catalogue by Group, Type or Page presents you with a long list of groups, types or pages. You can avoid scrolling down through this list by clicking on any item in the list and then keying in the first few characters of the group or type name or page number that you are searching for. This also works for other lists within Winpriser.

Please note: The characters that you key in must be entered in a continuous stream. If you pause, the program will start the search again at the next character you type in.

Several lists of items within Winpriser are displayed using Windows "Tree Views". An example, would be the list of groups you see when you choose the Group search tab. Clicking on the plus sign (+) beside a group name will open up the tree and show the component names contained within that group. Clicking on the plus sign beside a component will cause the sizes to be displayed.

You can move around the tree with the arrow keys if you prefer. The up (# ) and down ($ ) arrows will move the highlight up and down the list. The right (" ) arrow will open the tree at the highlighted item. The left (! ) arrow will close a branch of the tree.

Each of the Catalogue Search methods (Type, Group, Page, Text and Shortcut) has an Advanced Search feature built in. If the initial list of items is too long to browse, you can click on the Search button (or press Function Key 2 - F2) and enter a word or part word. Winpriser will then search through your long list and return all items that have the word in their description. If you double-click an item in the Search list or click the Apply button, you will be taken back into the Catalogue to that item.

You can print basic information about individual Catalogue items or all items in a Component, Group, Type or Page. Right click on the item or Component, Group, Type or Page name and choose Print…… .

Occasionally a user will want to eliminate items from the Winpriser Catalogue. Typically these are items that he does not use in his type of business. Deleting items is permanent. There is no undo delete feature in Winpriser. You would have to request a special update file from Allpriser to "re-add" the deleted items.

If you want to delete, right click on the item, Component, Group, Type or Page and choose Delete……. .

Some users make a copy of their Winpriser Catalogue and then delete the unwanted items from the copy. This way they have access to all items when they open the original, complete catalogue and quicker access to their most used items when they open the "cut down" catalogue. Pricing updates have to be applied twice – once for each copy of the catalogue.

You can assign labour units (time to install) to catalogue items. Winpriser will extend and total the labour units for each item in a worksheet and produce an estimate of total man-hours.

Labour units can be assigned to an individual item by right clicking that item in the catalogue, and selecting Edit Labour.

Labour units can be assigned for several items in a group by right clicking in the Group Lookup window of the catalogue and choosing Edit Labour by Size. You select a group, and then sizes (with like labour units) within that group. You can select more than one size using Window's Shift-Left Click and Ctrl-Left Click methods. Clicking the Load Selected Sizes button will display a list of items in the group with the sizes that you selected. Click in the check box beside any items that are not to receive the labour unit. Then key in the labour unit and click apply.

Please note: The Options button (extreme top right of Edit Labour by Size window) contains several choices that can make assigning easier and faster.

Winpriser keeps a log of the updates that have been applied to your RedBook Catalogue. To see the log start Winpriser, click on the Catalogues button and click once on RedBook Catalogue icon to highlight it. Then click on the Properties button and click the Update History button.

The list of Groups in the Rate Assignments window is displayed in a tree view. This tree view differs in that there is a check box shown between each plus sign (+) and Group name. In order to expand the tree click on the plus sign or double click on the Group name.

Do NOT click in the check box unless you want to assign all the items in that group to your rate class. Clicking in the check box takes longer than clicking on the plus sign if you just want to open up the tree.

If you have two wholesalers with similar discount categories, you can create the Discount Rate Sheet for Wholesaler A and then duplicate it to create Wholesaler B's Discount Rate Sheet. Even if you have to make some changes to the second Discount Rate Sheet, duplicating will still be faster than creating the whole second Rate Sheet.

Duplicating is allowed only for Discount Rate Sheets.

You can copy a Supplier's discounts rate sheet to another copy of Winpriser on another computer with the Rate Sheet Export/Import feature. On the Discount tab of the Rates window, right click on the supplier that you want to export. Choose "Export the selected Supplier Ratesheet to an external file". The rate sheet information will be written out to a file. You can then transport that file to another computer and import the supplier's rate sheet. You import by going to the Discount tab of the Rates window and right clicking in the suppliers area. Choose "Import a Supplier Ratesheet from an external file".

Within the Rates area, you can create and use any number of Markdown, Discount and Labour Rate Sheets.

Currently, the program allows you to create multiple Markup Rate Sheets but only one Markup Rate Sheet (the first created) is used by Winpriser.

Once you have located and highlighted the item you want to add to your worksheet you can press the Enter key (to select the item), key in the required quantity and press the Enter key a second time (to add the item and quantity to the worksheet). This combination of Enter, quantity, Enter can speed up the takeoff process.

You can have Winpriser automatically convert any item that is priced "per hundred" in the catalogue to a per each/foot price during takeoff. To set this option, open the catalogue, click the Options button in the toolbar and click in the check box beside "Convert price per hundred to price per each". Click Ok to save.

Clicking on the button beside the Add Quantity box in the Catalogue Takeoff window to display a calculator. The result of the calculation done on the calculator is placed in the Add Quantity box when you click Ok.

You can drag the calculator to any position on the screen by pointing to the blue title bar at the top of the calculator window, holding down the left mouse button and moving the mouse.

It is possible to cut and paste items in order to rearrange the sequence of items in the worksheet.

You can also drag an item to another position in the worksheet by clicking and holding the mouse button while moving the mouse pointer to the new position. Releasing the mouse button will drop the item at the new position.

You can use the Worksheet Material Edit window to change one item or all items that you highlight. First you highlight the items you want to edit -

To highlight a continuous list of items in the Worksheet, click on the first worksheet line item in the list. Then move the mouse pointer to the last item in the list, hold down the Shift key and then click on the last item in the list.

To highlight a collection of items that are scattered through the worksheet, point to each item, hold down the Ctrl key on your keyboard and click.

Once you have highlighted the items, click on the Edit button in the Worksheet Toolbar (or point to the highlighted area, right click and choose Edit Selected Items). The Multiple Material Edit window will be displayed. Type in the information you want to change, click in the Apply Block Check Box beside each field you are changing and click the Save button.

You may not want to see all the available columns in your Worksheet. You can control which columns appear in a particular Worksheet or in all new Worksheets and the order in which the columns appear.

To rearrange the order of the Worksheet columns, point to the heading of the column you wish to move, hold down the left mouse button and "drag" the column to its new position.

To remove columns, open a Worksheet, select the View All extension and point to any line in the Worksheet. Now right click and choose Show Material Browser Fields. A list of all Worksheet column headings will be displayed. Click in the check box (to remove checkmark) beside the column that you do not want displayed.

You can save your new column organization as the default for any new Worksheets. Just click in the check box labeled Save As Default before clicking the Save button.

You can change the order of the list of Worksheets on the Worksheet Directory Job View tab. Click the Worksheets button (or File – Open Worksheet) to display the Worksheet Directory. Click on the Job View tab. Clicking on any of the column headings (Worksheet Title, Job#, etc…..) will sort the Worksheets in ascending (A to Z) alphabetical order based on the information in that column. A second click on the same column will sort the Worksheets in reverse order (Z to A).

You can also drag the headings of the Worksheet Directory columns to change the order in which the columns are displayed.

You can produce a quick printed list of items in a worksheet. Highlight the items you want printed. Point to the highlighted area, right click and choose Quick Print.

You can copy the contents of a worksheet into another worksheet. This is useful if, for example, you have a separate Worksheet for each phase of a job and you want to combine all phases to get a total of all materials and labour. You can also use this feature if you have created worksheets containing the items that make up standard assemblies (for example – all the items needed to install an American Std Marina Lav – Lav, Stops, Faucet, supplies, etc…). When you need the items in an assembly in a job you simply insert the assembly worksheet.

To insert a worksheet into another worksheet, open the worksheet that is to receive the items, click on the Merge button in the Worksheet Toolbar and click on the name of the worksheet that you want to copy. Clicking the Insert button will copy the items.

You may want to bring the pricing in a worksheet up-to-date after applying a price update to the Catalogue or if the worksheet was originally created sometime in the past. Open the worksheet, choose the View All Extension, click on the Extensions menu and choose Refresh Worksheet Pricing from Catalogues. Or, right click on the right side of the worksheet window in the materials table and choose Refresh Worksheet Pricing from Catalogues on the popup menu.

Winpriser can choose the Supplier with the best discount for items in a worksheet. Open the worksheet, choose the View All Extension and highlight the items you want to assign discounts to. Right click on the highlighted area and choose Auto Select Supplier. Then choose Select Supplier with Highest Discount.

You can send a copy of the information contained in the Material Extensions views to the Excel spreadsheet program for further analysis. To export to Excel, highlight one or more items, point to the highlighted area and right click. Choose Export Selection to Excel. The data will be written out as an Excel .XLS file.