Happy New Year! We are looking forward to assisting you this year with your PastPerfect software, whether you use our desktop or cloud-based program. Our staff is available during our business hours of Monday through Friday, 9:00am to 5:30pm Eastern. You can reach us by calling 1-800-562-6080 or emailing support@museumsoftware.com.

When you need assistance outside of our business hours, we have a number of self-help resources available from the Resources menu of our website. This year we are working on adding more articles to our Knowledge Base, developing new video tech tips, and releasing the first Web Edition training courses. If you are a Web Edition user, we will be sending an email to all Web Edition Administrators when these free courses are available. We will also be offering more webinars this year for users of PastPerfect 5.0/PastPerfect Online. These will be announced in the PastPerfect Online newsletter.

Wishing you and yours a happy and healthy 2024!

At the start of the new year, you should backup your data and perform a full reindex to make sure yearly dues and donations totals are correctly calculated for Contacts.

Here are the steps to backup and reindex your data:

1. If your organization is using PastPerfect on multiple workstations, make sure all users completely close PastPerfect before performing the next steps.
2. Go to the main PastPerfect computer or server, or a workstation with a fast and reliable network connection.
3. Open PastPerfect
4. From the Main Menu, click "Hard Drive Backup" and then click "Backup Data to Hard Drive". This is an important step before you reindex any time.
5. Once the backup has completed successfully, exit back to the Main Menu.
6. Click "Reindex".
7. On the Reindex screen, make sure all files are checked, including Spelling Dictionary, Rebuild Catalogs, and Keyword List.
8. Click "Start Reindex Now". This process may take several minutes.
9. Once the reindex is complete, exit back to the Main Menu.

If you have any questions about this process or run into any issues, please contact our support office.

As you look back on your organization's accomplishments in 2023, you can easily create a list of collection items your team cataloged in PastPerfect 5.0 throughout the year by querying on the Catalog Date field.

1. From the Main Menu, click on "All 4 Catalogs" under Research.
2. Use the Field drop-down to select "Catalog Date". (If you don't see Catalog Date listed, you will need to add the field to the All Catalogs | Fields to Include in Query under Setup | Query Fields.)
3. For Condition, select "Greater than or equal to".
4. Enter the Value "01/01/2023".
5. Click "Add to Statement".
6. If you have already started cataloging items in 2024, you'll need to add a second filter statement for Catalog Date Less than or equal to 12/31/2023.
7. Click "Run Query to Select Records".

Your Query Results will display in the grid on the bottom half of the screen. You can then view records and images, print reports, and export to Excel.

Additional resources about using the query functions in PastPerfect 5.0:

• How do I use the Query Function?
• Query Condition Explanations
• What is the difference between the Search Results reports?
• How do I add fields to my Catalog Search Results?

After you have run a query in PastPerfect 5.0, you can save the query so you do not have to keep building the filter statement each time you want to get the list of records that match the filter statement. Click the "Save Query" button in the left sidebar. The name of the query is automatically populated with the first line of the filter statement, but can be changed to something of your choice. Then click "Save".

When you want to return to a saved query, open the Query screen and click "Retrieve Query" in the left sidebar. Select the query from the list and click "Retrieve" at the bottom. Click "Run Query to Select Records" to see all the records that currently match the filter statement.

Please keep in mind each catalog (Objects, Photos, Archives, Library), as well as All 4 Catalogs searches, have their own Query screens. For example, you can save and retrieve queries for just the Objects catalog. You can change the fields for filters and the fields that appear in the results grid by going to Setup | Query Fields.

PastPerfect 5.0 includes a number of helpful reports that enable you to look back on monetary donations received throughout the last year and past years. These reports can be run from Reports | Dues & Donations.

The Target Donors report and its related reports allow you to find donors who gave within a date range, but not in another date range. A good use of this report is to find donors who gave in 2022, but not in 2023. Now that it is 2024, you might create a targeted mailing to encourage this group to donate once again. The Target Donors report can also be used to generate a report of the donors that did not give to a specific fund or campaign. Once you've chosen your options, this report can be printed and exported to Excel.

If you want to fine tune your donor list even further, you can run the Target Donors Donation Summary or Target Donors with Donations Details reports. These reports allow you to narrow the list of donors by both date range and multiple funds, and can include contact information and donation details. The results can be printed, exported to Excel, and saved to a Contact List.

Technical support is included with Web Edition annual hosting and our staff is always happy to answer any questions you have. However, sometimes you may need help when our support office is closed or would prefer to find the answers on your own.

Our Knowledge Base includes articles on performing various functions in Web Edition, common technical support questions, and general software or museum practices.

Recently added articles to the Web Edition Knowledge Base include:

• How do I create Membership Types and SubTypes?
• How do I create a new membership in Web Edition?
• What is the difference between an Active Membership and Current Membership?
• How do I change the Primary Member for a membership?

The Knowledge Base is just one of the free resources available to you from the Resources menu on our website.

The Contacts - Query screen has several Standard Views, which are designed to give you quick access to subsets of your contact records. When you click on a view, you will see the filter used to the select the records displayed in the Browse Grid in the lower half of the screen.

Standard View - This includes all Contacts. There is no filter for this view.

All Members - This includes all members whether they are active or inactive, the primary member or a joint member. 

Primary Members - This includes members who should receive renewal notices and are not included in another membership. When a membership is created for a contact, that contact is automatically the primary member.

Joint Members - This includes members who are included in another contact's membership. These secondary members should not receive renewal notices. Joint members are listed as Contacts included in the Membership on the Primary Member's Contact record | Membership accordion.

Memberships Overdue - This includes Primary Members who are not marked as Inactive and whose Membership Paid Thru Date is in the past. Members who have an empty Membership Paid Thru Date are excluded.

Non-Members - This includes contacts who are not members.

Pledged - This includes contacts who have made a pledge. It does not matter if the contact has made a donation toward this pledge.

Never Pledged - This includes contacts who have never made pledge.

Upcoming Membership Renewals - This includes Primary Members who are not Inactive and whose Membership Paid Thru Date is within the next two months. If you select this view, you an change the date range and Apply your changes to the filter.

For more information, view the user guide topic on Contacts Standard Views.

Each Query screen in Web Edition has a Standard View, which displays all records in that area of the program and a set of default fields in the Browse Grid. If you want to see a different set of records and/or fields when you go to a Query screen, you can create a custom view and set that view as the default view. Custom Views are unique for each user account.

Steps to create a custom view:

1. Within the Filter section of a Query screen, build the filter you want to use to narrow your group of records.
2. Expand the Options section and select the fields to include in your view, by moving fields from the Available Fields column to the Included Fields column.
3. Once you've selected the fields to include, you can change the order of the fields by clicking on a field and dragging it up or down into the desired position.
4. Set the Sort by field.
5. Click "Apply" to update the list of records and fields in the Browse Grid.
6. Click "Save as Custom View" and enter a unique name for your custom view.
7. Click "Save". The new custom view will be listed on the left under My Custom Views.

Steps to change the default view:

1. Click the name of the custom view under My Custom Views for the view you want to set as the default view.
2. Click "Mark as Default View" in Filter & Option Field Settings.
3. Click "Yes" to confirm.
4. "(Default)" will appear next to the view name under My Custom Views.

In Contacts, there are multiple Standard Views. You can set one of these as your default view or use one of these Standard Views as a starting point for a new Custom View.

For more information about Query screens, working with filters, and creating custom views, check out our User Guide topics on Collections Query Screens and Development Query Screens.

Curious about upgrading to PastPerfect Web Edition? We invite you to register for our hour-long, on-demand or live webinars that walk through the collections and contacts capabilities of our cloud-based software. Register for either webinar here: https://museumsoftware.com/demo.html.

After the webinar, if you think Web Edition is the right choice for your organization, contact the team at webedition@museumsoftware.com to get started on the next steps.