[hermes] Integration with Quickbooks

[Jason M. Felice]

Quoting Guy Davis <davis at guydavis.ca>:

> Thanks to both Jan and Jason for responses to my previous question.
> This time I'm wondering about the timeline for the new version of Hermes
> I saw mentioned in a previous message.  I think it said a few weeks?
>
> I'd like to start using Hermes at work as we're currently using
> Quickbooks but everybody hates entering their time using the QB Timer
> app which is nearly a decade old now.  For Hermes to work for us, we'd
> need to be able to export our time into IIF files.  As well, it would be
>  cool if the client/job information could be loaded from the export of
> Customer List that QuickBooks provides.
>
> Any idea if this functionality is coming down the pipe?

We just (finally) signed more billable contracts than we can handle, so 
I can't really say.  It is still a high priority for us, but an 
internal one, and you know the shoemaker's kids...

We did hit a snag which I have to research.  In fact, if you'd like to 
speed things up a bit, there's no reason *I* need to do the research.

The snag: QuickBooks has deprected the IIF import format, and they 
suggest it may be unsupported in the future.

They have another import "format" called qbXML.  The problem is that 
the format appears to require interaction, (e.g. application connects 
to running quickbooks, sends qbXML invoice, parses qbXML response, 
sends next invoice...)  This all seems like a real pain in the ass, 
with a whole slew of new levels of complexity I just don't really care 
to implement.

I have not been able to determine whether QuickBooks does offer a way 
to import a flat qbXML file non-interactively, or if there is another 
flat file which is supported.

If neither of those is possible, it looks like we'll have to use qbXML 
interactively.  If so, I'm confliced on how to implement that.  I don't 
like the idea of a web-server making outbound connections to a 
QuickBooks running on some PC, and a standalone program introduces more 
complexity.  I suppose the standalone program is the way to go, but let 
the server track state and drive the process once connected.

Anyway, I'd be grateful for any help with the research. :)

-- 
Jason M. Felice
Cronosys, LLC <http://www.cronosys.com>
216-221-4600 x302