Glossary

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Application Programming Interface (API)

An API, or application programming interface, consists of protocols that enable communication between different software applications. An API can either be language-dependent or independent. Within the context of cloud computing, the structure of an API is extremely important for the Platform as a Service (PaaS) layer.

Business Intelligence (BI)

Business intelligence (BI) refers to software used to extract and analyze business performance metrics, such as financial, sales, service or marketing performance. A good BI software package has built-in real-time dashboards, reporting and analysis that allows users to identify exceptions, trends and opportunities, and to drill down to any underlying transactions for greater detail.

Case

A record created to document a problem, question, or other feedback from a customer. Case records can be assigned to support reps, who can use the case record to respond to the customer by email or to document a support phone call. Cases are customer-facing records, whereas issues, are internal company records.

Category

A division of customer and vendor records into groups you specify in NetSuite. Categories help organize records to make it easier to manage your business. Use Accounting Lists to set up customer, vendor or budget categories. You can use Web Site Categories in a Site Builder web store to organize products for sale online. To set up categories for Site Builder, go to Lists > Web Site > Categories (Administrator).

Center

The set of tabs each role has access to. For example, Administrators work in the Classic Center, which has the Lists, Transactions, and Reports tabs. Accountants work in the Accounting Center, which has the Customers, Vendors, Payroll and HR, and Financial tabs.

Class

A way to separate and track records such as financials, transactions and employees. For example, a janitorial service wants to track household and commercial accounts separately. After they set up a class for each of these account types, they can track the financial performance of each class over any period of time.

Crosslinks

Crosslinks enable you to navigate between pages centered around the same record type rather than access these pages through menus. Typically crosslinks appear at the top of record pages. Common examples of crosslinks are Search and List.

Customer

The person or entity that buys goods from you or your business.

Custom form

A form you can modify based on the needs of your business.

Customer Center

A user-restricted role that has permission to: See current orders, estimates and transaction histories. Enter an order. Make payments on open invoices.

Customize menu

This is a user interface element in NetSuite. The Customize menu is located in the upper-right corner of all customizable records.

Department

A division or section of your business. Use departments to separate and track records such as financials, transactions and employees. For example, you can create a department for each team of employees dedicated to a certain area of business, and then track income and expenses by each department over any period of time.

Disclaimer

A statement or explanation of your company’s policies and terms. You can use a disclaimer to familiarize your customers with important information about your company. In NetSuite, you can print a disclaimer on custom forms.

Drill down

Click a link in a list, report, or register to view, or edit at a more detailed level. For example, you can drill down on a check by clicking the date of the check to see when it was written or when it cleared the bank.

Dynamic group

A group of relationship records created from a saved search. Because the set of criteria for the group is saved, new records that fit the criteria of the group are automatically added to the group.

Employee Center

A user-restricted role that has permission to: See approved and unapproved expense reports, purchase requests and time reports. Enter expense reports, purchase requests and time. Edit unapproved expense reports and purchase requests.

Entity

Entity records include those records that define people or organizations such as company, contact, vendor, and employee records.

Field group

A collection of fields grouped together into a logical group. You can use a field group to organize fields on a form.

Field-Level Help

A popup window containing specific information about a field on a NetSuite page. To read field-level help, click the label next to the field.

Handler

The action or process performed by the business events framework in response to a business event that occurs on a record. For example, when a sales order is approved, the Automatic Location Assignment handler is called and the process to assign locations automatically is initiated.

Internal ID

Records and forms in NetSuite each have a unique internal ID. The internal ID is useful when writing SuiteScript and when referring to custom records and custom fields. Internal IDs are also useful for understanding the default URL parameters in your web store. You can set a preference to always view internal IDs for records on lists. To set the preference, go to Home > Set Preferences. On the General subtab in the Defaults section, check the Show Internal IDs box.

Issue

A record used to document a product problem, or defect that needs to be resolved. This is an internal-facing record, as opposed to a case, which is a customer-facing record.

Key Performance Indicator (KPI)

Key Performance Indicators are quantifiable measurements that reflect the critical success factors of an organization. They help you define and measure progress toward organizational goals. You can add up to three graphical meters to your dashboard that describe key performance indicator (KPI) information. For example, you can set up a KPI meter for your Sales indicator. Your meter will show your date comparisons graphically and flag your threshold values.

Lead source

A name or code that designates how a lead, prospect, or customer was referred to your company. If you use the Marketing Automation feature, your list of lead sources consists of the names of campaigns. If you do not use the Marketing Automation feature, you can create lead sources at Cases > Other > CRM Lists > New. You can select a lead source on a customer, lead, or prospect record.

Login access

Access to individuals and companies who need to enter and view information in a NetSuite account. Each individual can have a different level of access different roles can be assigned on each individual record.

Message field

A field where you can select a personal message to appear on invoices and other forms you send customers and vendors. A field that appears on the Checkout, Welcome and Catalog pages of your NetSuite website. Use the store message fields to provide general information to customers who visit your website.

Note

There are two types of notes in NetSuite: system notes and user notes. System notes are generated automatically when changes are made to a record. User notes are created manually to keep track of information about a record.

Partner

A partner is an outside company you have a business relationship with who is not a customer or a vendor.

Password

The secret code that you, your employees, or others use to gain access to NetSuite. Password requirements are affected by the password policy in place, the role assigned to the user, and access to secure information such as credit card data. For more information, see NetSuite Password Requirements. For security reasons, passwords are not included in email notifications. Contact users directly by telephone or regular mail to assign passwords.

Plug-In

A plug-in is functionality, defined by an interface, that can be customized. After it is installed, a third party can override the plug-in’s default logic with logic that suits its specific needs. For more information, see Custom Plug-in Overview.

Portlet

A dynamic data display window in a NetSuite tab or dashboard. Some portlets provide direct access to raw data, whereas others display data that has been synthesized into critical business metrics, such as key performance indicators (KPIs), performance scorecards, trend graphs, and report snapshots. Other portlets allow you to display data from website RSS feeds.

Preferences

Options available in NetSuite to make the application function according to your business needs. Preferences are unique to each feature area and are based on your role. You can set preferences that only affect your personal experience of NetSuite, such as time zone, language, drop-down menus, and color theme. Depending on your role, you may also have permission to set company-wide preferences that affect areas such as accounting, invoicing, and inventory management.

QuickView

This is a user interface element. A QuickView is a summary view of a record. For some record types, the QuickView also contains buttons that allow users to make changes to the record.

Rank

The position of an item in a list of similar items. In a region, each location can be given a rank, which is used to determine the order in which locations are assigned to sales order lines when the optimal fulfillment strategy is set to Highest Ranked Location.

Record status

The status of all transaction records appears to the right of the record title.

Reminders

The reminder list automatically appears on your NetSuite Home page each time you log in. It displays various matters of business to be taken care of. You can customize the list to display items specific to your daily routine, or you can turn it off completely. In NetSuite, Reminders can also be event reminders, which pop up at the time you designate on event records.

Role

A set of permissions that gives access to specific areas of your data to employees, customers, partners, and vendors. Standard roles can be assigned to employees. User-restricted roles, that provide access to a very limited set of tasks and a different Help Center, can be assigned to employees, customers, partners, and vendors.

Shortcut

A link to your most frequently used pages in NetSuite. On your home page you can customize shortcuts to link to the tasks you perform most often. You set them up by clicking the star icon on the tab to the left of the home tab.

Solution

An answer or recommendation to a common customer question or problem. Solutions are organized under topics and published as a knowledge base. They can also be attached to case records for quick responses to customer messages.

SuitePeople

A comprehensive and integrated Human Capital Management (HCM) solution. SuitePeople enables Human Resources professionals to manage employees within NetSuite, thus eliminating repetitive and manual processes with one source of where employee data is kept. At the same time, SuitePeople empowers employees and managers with self-service functionality to complete most everyday tasks. SuitePeople leverages NetSuite to provide customizable workflows tailored for how you do business.

SuiteScript

SuiteScript is the scripting platform for NetSuite solutions. It includes custom code capabilities that operate within the client/browser framework, as well as server-side scripting capabilities that can be scheduled or event-based and operate within the server framework. General Notices Copyright © 2005, 2019, Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved.

SuiteSocial

A social collaboration tool delivered in a SuiteApp that enables you to more tightly connect social interactions to your NetSuite data and track important changes to that data. You can see updates posted by your colleagues and real-time posts when relevant NetSuite records are created or edited. For more information, see SuiteSocial.

Support manager

A standard role that has permission to: Set up case assignment and escalation Create online case forms View and edit issue and case records View support and sales reports

Support person

A standard role that has permission to: View and edit issue and case records View case and issue reports TeleVantage®: Software-based phone system created by Artisoft® that enables you to use a non- TAPI enabled telephone with a NetSuite.

Topic

A heading or category to use for organizing solutions in a knowledge base.

User

A customer, contact, partner, vendor, or employee who is assigned access to the data in your NetSuite account. The level of access depends on the role you assign to the user.

Vendor Center

A user-restricted role that has permission to: View purchase orders. View accounts payable registers. View non posting registers.

User-restricted role

Gives customers, employees, and vendors external access to your account so they can view or enter their transaction information. When logged in with these roles, users can complete only a limited set of tasks. For example, the Employee Center role lets employees enter and view time reports, expense reports, and purchase requests.

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