Navigating through the KFS

After you access the KFS by typing or pasting the URL for it into your browser's address bar, you need to know where to find information and how to navigate. This section covers these topics.

KFS Menus

The KFS portal is organized into three menu tabs. The Main Menu tab displays the list of transactions and functions that regular users are permitted to initiate. The Maintenance menu tab is geared towards the central administration staffs who maintain various reference tables to support field validation and lookups. The Administration menu tab displays the list of functions that the only technical staff or super users in the functional area are likely to use.

Main Menu

The main menu for the Kuali Financial System lists electronic documents and functions that departmental users are usually allowed to initiate.
Main Menu submenus

Category	Description
Transactions	Allows the financial representation of a basic business activity. Transactions are recorded in e-docs or journals that are then posted to the General Ledger and affect the financial statements of the organization. Examples of transactions are customer invoices, cash receipts and requisitions.
Administrative Transactions	Allows the financial representation of a business activity performed by an administrative or central office. Administrative transactions are like all transactions in that they are recorded in journals or e-docs that are then posted to the General Ledger and affect the financial statements of the organization. Examples of administrative transactions are effort certification recreate, cash management, and journal voucher.
Custom Document Searches	Allows searches for specific types of documents based on attributes of the transactions, primary key data elements, or both. Additional fields, specific to different modules, are available on custom document searches. Examples are customer invoices, Contracts and Grants proposals, and requisitions. Special access may be required to retrieve custom document searches.
Lookup and Maintenance	Allows users to search for documents using specific criteria values and (depending on the user's role) maintain the retrieved documents in a variety of ways.
Balance Inquiries	Allows retrieval of General Ledger balances by account or other criteria or retrieval of labor distribution data in a format that combines the impact of multiple transactions including budgets, pending entries and available balances.
Reports	Allows standard reports to be generated from the KFS. These include customer aging report and trial balance.
Year End Transactions	Allows processing of transactions necessary for year-end closing of the General Ledger. These processes are normally done centrally. Examples of year-end transactions include budget adjustments and transfer of funds.

Each of these submenus is further subdivided by module.
For information on working with the Chart of Accounts, Pre-Disbursement Processor, and Vendor functions listed on the Main Menu tab, see the appropriate sections in the KFS Guide to Core Components and Functions. For information on working with functions in any other module, see the KFS guide to the specific module.

Maintenance Menu

The Maintenance menu provides access to a variety of user-defined reference tables that are essential to the KFS. These tables define attributes the system uses to validate transactions and allow users to look up values as necessary. The tables also control the often-complex relationship between elements for internal and external reporting. For example, the KFS relies on maintenance tables for basic information such as the sub-fund groups to which new accounts may be assigned and the calendar month that correlates to the first month of your institution's fiscal year. This table-controlled flexibility is one of the features that make the KFS a highly configurable application.
These important reference tables are maintained by electronic documents called maintenance documents or e-docs. Each of the KFS reference tables is maintained by a specific maintenance e-doc that is routed for approval before the table is updated.
All users can look up values in the KFS reference tables via the lookup screens on the maintenance menu, but only members of the KFS-SYS Manager role may initiate most documents in the maintenance menu.
Categories of maintenance documents

Category	Purpose
Chart of Accounts	Allows central maintenance of COA documents. See note below.
Financial Processing	Allows maintenance of documents that support central financial operations including the disbursement voucher documents.
Pre-Disbursement Processor	Provides access to Pre-Disbursement Processor (PDP) maintenance functions
Endowment	Allows central maintenance of documents that support the Endowment module.
Accounts Receivable	Allows central maintenance of documents that support the Accounts Receivable (AR) module.
Vendor	Allows central maintenance of documents that support the Vendor document.
Purchasing/Accounts Payable	Allows central maintenance of documents that support the Purchasing and Accounts Payable (PURAP) module.
Capital Asset Management	Allows central maintenance of documents for attributes needed by the Capital Asset Management (CAM) module.
Contracts & Grants	Allows central maintenance of documents that support the functionality of the Contracts and Grants module.
Effort Certification	Allows central maintenance of documents that support the Effort Certification module.
Labor Distribution	Allows central maintenance of documents that support the Labor Distribution module.
Budget Construction	Allows central maintenance of documents that support the Budget Construction module.
System	Allows central maintenance of attributes used across the KFS.

A few Chart of Accounts maintenance documents (Account, Global Account, Account Delegate, Account Delegate Model, Global Account Delegate, Object Code, Global Object, Organization Code, Project Code, Sub-Account, and Sub-Object Code) are used by both central and departmental users. These documents are accessible via the Main Menu tab, not the Maintenance menu tab.
For information on working with the Chart of Accounts, Pre-Disbursement Processor, and Vendor functions listed on the Main Menu tab, see the appropriate sections in the KFS Guide to Core Components and Functions. For information on working with functions in any other module, see the KFS guide to the specific module.
Your institution may choose to add attributes to maintenance tables for reporting purposes. For information on adding these 'extended' attributes, see Extended Attributes.
For information about initiating maintenance documents, see Performing Common Maintenance E-Doc Operations.

Administration Menu

The Kuali Financial System enables users with proper permissions to perform a number of administrative functions that affect the entire system. These functions, which are accessible via the Administration menu tab, allow authorized users to:

Support the Kuali Identity Management (KIM) module
Define basic types of location and reference information
Control the running of batch jobs
Support the Kuali Enterprise Workflow (KEW) module and
Enable authorized users to perform a variety of other functional and technical activities.

!worddavbc8d93fff1d854b3182ccbac6911d512.png|height=15,width=15!Only members of KFS-SYS Manager and KR-SYS Technical Administrator roles may initiate most documents in the Administration Menu. Other users may look up values from the lookup screens but may not be able to access other options at all.
Administration menu groups

Menu Category	Description
System	Provides a means of viewing and updating KFS user identification information; defining valid values for various types of location information; and defining valid types of personal information collected for the Identity module.
Configuration	Provides access to a variety of functional and technical configuration options that affect the entire KFS.
Batch	Allows you to view job schedules and manage key KFS batch upload processes.
Monitoring	Allows you to monitor messages that are flowing through the service bus, view the Service Registry for it, and change the size of its thread pool. Also allows you to access any document in order to perform operations on it and generate statistics reports.

For information about using functions that are accessible via the Administration menu tab , see "System" in the KFS Guide to Core Components and Functions.

Screen Elements

Each menu tab is organized into multiple submenus that group similar types of functions. Each menu tab also has these standard features:

Workflow functionality is accessible from action list and doc search buttons in the upper-left corner of the screen.
A Message of the Day is displayed on the top of the screen.
The current user is displayed on the upper right corner of the screen.
A Provide Feedback link on the upper right corner of the screen allows anyone to report bugs, issues, and suggestions.

Message of the Day

All three menu tabs include the Message of the Day at the top of the screen to quickly distribute messages to all KFS users on-line.

Updating the Message of the Day: If no message of the day is defined in the system, the Message of the Day area is not displayed on the screen. To define the message of the day, initiate the Message of the Day e-doc from the Administration menu tab.

Standard Data Entry, Selection, Action, and Navigation Tools

Online forms within this web-based software application allow you to enter and select information and to perform actions and navigate, both within and outside the system. The following table briefly outlines the basic tools.
Basic KFS tools

Element	KFS Reference / Description
	box (a.k.a. edit box, text box, or entry field): A rectangular box in which you can type text. If the box already contains text, you can select that default text or delete it and type new text. Use a keyboard to type or clipboard to paste text and numbers into the field.
	check box (a.k.a. selection box): A square box that is selected or cleared to turn on or off an option. More than one check box can be selected. Use a mouse to click within the box to place a check mark symbol to indicate the option is selected.
	option (a.k.a. radio button, option button): A round button used to select one of a group of mutually exclusive options. Use a mouse to click within the circle. The dot symbol indicates that the option is selected.
	list (a.k.a. drop-down menu, combo box, or list box): A box with an arrow indicating a list that drops (expands) downward for viewing (may expand upward to take advantage of available screen real estate). Click the down arrow icon to list menu options, and then click the text to highlight and select an option.
	button (a.k.a. command button, action button): A rectangular button with a text label that indicates the action to be performed. Use a mouse to click the button to initiate the action.
http://www.kuali.org	Link (external file or Web page hyperlink): Use a mouse to click on the underlined text (usually blue in color) to navigate to a different Web page or system within the same Web browser (may open a new pop-up window).
	Link: An internal hyperlink to a different place on the current page, a different screen within the current application, or a related system. Use your mouse to click on the underlined text to cause the desired information to appear.

Logging on and off the KFS

When you select an item on a menu tab for the first time in a session, the KFS asks for your user ID and password. The KFS performs user authentication and authorization to restrict access to business transactions, according to your institution's prevailing practices.

After you have logged on, you are not asked to logon again until you logoff from the system by closing the browser.
If your institution opts to integrate the user authentication with the campus authentication system, the logon sequence may differ.
To log off from the KFS, simply close the Web browser by clicking the standard browser's Close button located in the upper right corner.