Converting Documents
Conversion is how one document becomes the next. The engine copies it forward according to a map you define, and records where every line came from.
Where to find it
Architect Panel → ERP - Setup:
- Document Conversion Map — which slot on the source populates which on the target
- Documents — the console where conversion is performed
The field map
The map says which slot on the source populates which slot on the target. Most of it is obvious — customer, dates, currency, item, quantity — but you decide, so a field that should not carry forward simply is not mapped. Internal notes on a quote need not reach the customer's invoice.
Line-level provenance
This is what distinguishes a real document flow from copying records.
Fulfilment is rarely a whole-document affair: order line 10 of 100 is despatched today, 40 next week, and the whole thing is invoiced across three invoices. Conversion therefore records provenance per line and per quantity, which makes these answerable without a spreadsheet:
- How much of this order is still outstanding?
- Which invoices covered this despatch?
- Has this line been invoiced twice?
Partial conversion is normal
Because provenance is per line and quantity, converting part of a document is ordinary rather than a special case. Despatch what you have and the order retains an outstanding balance that the next despatch draws down.
The remaining quantity is derived from the links rather than stored in a column that could drift — so it cannot disagree with the despatches.
Converting is not copying
The new document has its own lifecycle. Editing an order after despatch does not retrospectively change what was despatched, and should not: if a customer queries a figure, the despatch note says what left the building on the day it left.
Worked example
An order for 100 units is despatched 60 then 40. The first despatch is invoiced immediately; the second is invoiced with another order on one consolidated invoice. Every line on both invoices links back to the despatch line and through it to the order line, so the order shows nothing outstanding and the customer's query about the consolidated invoice is answered by following the links.
Auditing
Turn auditing on for both header and line datastores. Between the audit trail and the provenance links you can reconstruct not only what a document says now, but what it said at every stage and what it was derived from.
Recommendations
- Map deliberately. Anything unmapped is a decision, so make it consciously.
- Never recalculate outstanding quantities into a column — derive them from the links.
- Enable auditing on both datastores before the first conversion.
- Test a partial conversion before go-live; it is where mapping errors surface.