The 2011 joint TrulinX and Tribute user's group meeting was held last week at the Gaylord Opryland hotel in Nashville, TN. The meeting brought in 134 attendees from 66 companies. We are happy that so many of you find value in attending the annual meeting.

On Sunday evening, Tribute and TrulinX customers were welcomed with a reception on the bank of the indoor river that flowed through the hotel.

We officially began the User's Group meeting on Monday with a welcome from Tim Reynolds and a short discussion of cloud computing. Next, Craig Dunn and Victoria Basham of United Parcel Service enlightened us on the services UPS offers for the domestic and international supply chain and methods we can use to lower costs on inbound and outbound freight. Kirt Chronister of 3Delta Systems (3DSI) helped us understand the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standards (PCI DSS) and the importance of compliance with these standards when processing credit cards. Brian Kazmierczak of Rubber Tree Systems wrapped up the speeches with an overview of their new Customer Portal. On Monday afternoon, Tim updated us with the yearly "State of Tribute" address at the President's Forum.

As always we enjoyed some informative breakout sessions. TrulinX and Tribute had some separate breakouts, while others were combined and relevant to all users. These included presentations on credit card processing, sales order expediting, A/P and G/L troubleshooting, report generators/queries, new features, and "tips and tricks". Users also participated in roundtable discussions on subjects such as A/R and collections, belting, credit card processing, and "going green". The sessions were well attended and hopefully everyone left with new knowledge about Tribute and TrulinX to take home to their businesses.

We also send a big "thank you" to Rubber Tree Systems as our Platinum Sponsor and generous sponsor of our teambuilding event (otherwise known as "beer pong tournament"). We also send huge thanks to MRH Technologies (Tour de Force), and WarehouseTWO for sponsorship of the meeting, plus Qantel Technologies, Enlighten.Net and Parker Hannifin Corporation who also attended the meeting. All of these vendors provide very important products and services and we hope to see them at the 2012 meeting.

Of course, our meeting was not all work with no play! On Monday evening, 17 attendees traveled to downtown Nashville to take a ghost tour. Although no one reported seeing any phantoms, they enjoyed other sights like the Capitol building, President Polk's tomb, Printer's Alley, and Ryman Auditorium. On Tuesday evening we enjoyed the President's Dinner, which was a Tennessee Smokehouse Barbeque. Everyone savored the great food and music and some folks even got up on stage to perform with the band! It was a wonderful opportunity to have fun and network as a big combined group.

Several new officers and committee members were also elected at the meeting. The current members are:

Tribute

President: Chuck Pharaoh (Valley Rubber & Gasket Co., Inc.)

Vice-President: Sybille Hamilton (Seals Unlimited)

Secretary: Brian Teddlie (Wilson Company)

Membership Chairperson: Marcie Harper (Flow Dynamics & Automation, Inc.)

Program Review member: Maria Panza (Progressive Hydraulics, Inc.)

Program Review member: Tim Pritchard (Zemarc Corporation)

Program Review member: Ed Murphy (The Hope Group)

Program Review member: Janie Vasu (IMS Company)

Program Review member: Kirk Downey (Hyspeco, Inc.)

Program Review member: Howard Sweet (Alt) (Dale L. Prentice Co.)

Program Review member: Monty Sikes (Alt) (Epperson & Co.)

TrulinX

President: Eric Bourg (Connector Specialists)

Vice-President: John Teahan (S.G. Morris Co.)

Recording Secretary: Kris Wagner (BMS Burns)

PPAB member: Sam Berndt (Hart Industries)

PPAB member: Kevin Hogarth (Neff Power)

PPAB member: Jason Gonzalez (Indiana Fluid Power)

PPAB member: Susan Curley (Integra Companies)

PPAB member: Kevin Cutts (Hydraulic & Pneumatic Sales, Inc.)

PPAB member: Walt Rodgers (Cline Hose & Hydraulics, LLC.)

PPAB member: Brian Pesick (HyQuip, Inc.)

The week ended with a day of intense work by the TrulinX PPAB and the Tribute Program Review Committee. Members review and rank the TrulinX and Tribute open project lists, which helps determine the direction for future software development.

Next year's conference will take place in Cleveland, with the date yet to be determined. We look forward to another great meeting in 2012!