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FAST Downloading:
Electronic Transfer of Budget Activity Transactions

FAST is retiring to support UW Finance Transformation (UWFT) and the implementation of Workday Finance.

To learn more, refer to System Crosswalk – Current to Future State.

This document is for the employee who uses a local database or spreadsheet to analyze or further process budget activity data. FAST Downloading provides for the electronic transfer of Budget Activity data from the central Financial Accounting System to a local computer/system.

To use FAST Downloading, you need a PC, MAC or other work station connected to the campus network. You will also need to have your Keynes administrative system usercode modified to allow it to run FAST.

Budget Activity data is available for downloading by FAST for the current biennium plus 3 prior biennia.

Send email to help@u.washington.edu.

1. Make a network connection to keynes.u.washington.edu.
   You will get a "SIGN-ON SCREEN".

2. Sign on using your administrative system Usercode and Password.

   Note: If you have more than one usercode, use the one that was modified to run FAST Downloading.

3. Authenticate to the server.
   

   You will get a "MAIN MENU".

4. Type "EXTRACT" in the Choice box
   
5. Press [Enter]

   You will get a "HOST DATABASE EXTRACTION SCREEN".

6. Fill out the screen as follows:
   (use upper case, tab between entries, shift/tab to go back)

   Application System: Type "FIN"

   User: and Password: Type your administrative system Usercode and Password.
   If you have more than one, use the one that provides FIN system inquiry access to the budgets you want to download.

   File Name: Type a name of your choice. Use letters and numbers, no special characters, generally no more than 8 characters. The limit is 17 characters.

   Request: Type in the selection criteria that you want to use, from the Parameter Code Table.
   Parameters can be referenced using two-character codes or keywords. Most parameters allow for up to 20 instances or ranges of values to be specified. You must specify at least one of the following parameters: Accounting month, Posting date, or Budget number. In addition, you must always specify a File format. If you have high-level access, then you must specify either Budget number or Organization code. You can only extract data for budget numbers that you have access to.

   Biennium: You may specify a Biennium, using the Biennium parameter. If you do not specify a biennium, FAST will default to the current biennium, unless:

   • You specify an accounting month greater than the current accounting month, or
   • The current accounting month is 25, 26, or 27

   In which case FAST will default to the previous biennium.

Example: To extract data records for budget number 14-9999, for accounting month 22, and put those records into a DASCI8 format file, you would type the following:

Note that there is no space between the parameter code, colon and value.

It could also have been entered as follows:

to send your extraction request.

You will see several messages as your request (job) is placed in the "queue", then the message: "Please press enter key to return to Menu". At this point, you may either:

Press [Enter]
to close your on-line session, and let your request be processed unobserved, or

leave your on-line session active to observe the progress of your request.

Your request may process immediately, or it may take several hours to be processed, depending on the number of requests ahead of yours in the queue, and the other work that the system is doing.

If you choose to keep your on-line session, you will eventually see:

This is the number of records extracted into your file. Two messages beginning with , "#EOT", and "#EOJ", after the previous message, mean your extract is done.

1. File extracts are automatically transferred to a secure file server
2. Locate your file on the file server in the folder named after your netid
3. Your netid folder will be under this directory: \\it-fsc1grp1.s.uw.edu\MCP\MCPShare\QUIPU
4. Files will be automatically deleted after 60 days
5. If you select the same file name for a subsequent Extract it will overlay an existing file of the same name.

Once you have successfully copied your extracted file to your work station, you should remove the original file from quipu.

If you would like to see the files you have on keynes,

Special Note for LARGE or COMPLEX Extracts

If your request extracts a very large file, or if it is complex (such as a range of budget numbers) your run may exceed the default processing limit of 15 seconds, and fail. In that case, specify a larger processing limit by including the Processor time parameter in your selection criteria. Run times will be longer for higher values, often overnight for 900, so use the lowest value that will do the job.

Note: The Processor time parameter, when used, must ALWAYS be entered as the FIRST PARAMETER in the Request box.

UW Information Technology
help@uw.edu
Modified: June 21, 2023