Abandon ACL and Others?

For the past few years, I’ve been outspoken about auditors that 1) don’t do much data analysis, OR 2) rely only on tools like ACL, IDEA, Arbutus, and the like to do their data analysis.

In this post, I’m going to provide some reasons auditors should not rely on only on these tools. I’ve dealt with this before, but I want to look at it from some different angles.

In this post, I’m speaking only to auditors, as they alone are called to audit the technology and processes their companies use.

In this post, when I mention ‘ACL+’, I am referring to ACL, IDEA, Arbutus, and any other tool that typically only auditors use. I’m also including ACL ‘Robotics’ in this list.

In this post, I’m going to step on people’s toes, but my readers should be used to that by now.

My Python Journey, Part 3

In my first Python post, I described the first steps of my python journey.

In my second Python post, I shared my thoughts about whether auditors could learn programming and Python (yes).

In this third post of the series, I want to describe how my audit management has supported my Python journey (spoiler: poorly).

My Python Journey, Part 2

In my previous Python post, I described the first steps of my python journey.

In this post, I want to respond to Grant’s comments that he left here re: auditors getting into programming, and specifically python.

[For my readers who don’t know, Grant is the founder, President and Chief Architect of Arbutus Software Inc, which specializes in audit analytics (he usually doesn’t mention that he was involved in writing the first versions of ACL too).

So his words have experience to back them up, and while I’m flattered he pops in here and there to comment on my little blog, I don’t hesitate to disagree with him occasionally .]

My Favorite ACL Tricks

Here’s a couple of my favorite ACL tricks & treats that I use frequently to get me through the day a little faster and a little less frustrated.

These tricks are the kind that they don’t teach you in class or in tutorials (at least I’ve never learned any of them there; maybe I was in the bathroom during that session); I either figured them out on my own or had someone say, “Let me show you something.”

---

The Command Line

When I train someone in ACL, the command line is one of the first bonus items to which I draw their attention. The command line allows you to run individual ACL commands without using the ACL menu or scripts.

To open the command line: in the menu bar, click Window, Command Line. This will appear:

You can run most ACL commands from the command line, such as OPEN a table, ASSIGN a variable value, and lots more (the commands can be entered in lower/upper/camel case, but I use uppercase in this post to help them stand out).

My 2 most frequently used command are listed below.

DISPLAY – list the fields in a table, along with their start position, length, and more.

To run this command, 1) open the table you want to run this command against, and 2) enter the command in yellow in the command line, and press Enter.

Note that the last line shows you a computed field and the formula behind it.

DISPLAY VARIABLES – list all currently active variables, their type/format, and their values.

To run the following command, just enter it in the command line, and press Enter.

Note that user-defined variables (v_record and v_table) are shown, along with system variables (OUTPUTFOLDER and WRITE1). If you’re not familiar with ACL system variables, look them up in the ACL help file (it will be worth your time).

Note that 2 of the variables are character (C) type and 2 are numeric (N).

This command is extremely helpful when you are troubleshooting variables.

Bonus: Instead of DISPLAY, you can type DIS; instead of DISPLAY VARIABLES, you can type DIS VAR. Much shorter!

Bonus #2: Another useful use of the command line is to enter variable values. For example, if you have a NOTIFY command at the end of a script that will send an email if v_Run_Notify = “Y”, you can enter v_Run_Notify = “N” in the command line and press Enter to change the variable value and prevent the NOTIFY command from running while you test changes to your script.

Open a Table You Can’t Find

Sometimes I can’t find a table because I don’t remember (or know) which ACL folder it is hiding in (the folder in your project, not a Windows folder on your hard drive).

If you know the name of the table, you can just type OPEN <tablename> and press Enter (where <tablename> is the name of the table you want to open). When I don’t remember the table name or I’m too lazy to type it out, I copy the name from the ACL log or a script that uses it, and copy it to the command line.

When the table opens, you can then see what folder the table was hiding in (the folder is not shown in screenshot below).

Clear the Command Line

When you use the command line a lot, you have to clear it before entering another command. Instead of backspacing and deleting the text, or highlighting and deleting the text, just click the X at the far right.

Likewise, instead of pressing Enter after entering a command, you can click the checkmark.

Table History

When you’re working on a big project that contains many different tables, sometimes it’s hard to remember how that table was created. Or you haven’t opened the ACL project in a while, or you have to troubleshoot or review a project someone else created.

So what table(s) were used to create that table, and what filters/joins were used to create it? How many records did the original table contain?

I used to hunt through the ACL log or the scripts to find all that info, but for the most part, it’s all in the table history.

To access a table’s history, 1) open the table you’re interested in, and 2) from the menu bar, select Tools, Table History. You’ll see something like this:

The first line shows the original table (PcardTransactions) and the FILTER used. The second line shows the filtered data (all fields) was extracted to a new table (PCardUSA).

The third line shows number of records in the original table (Input) and the fourth line shows the number of resulting records (Output) in the extracted table.

If a JOIN was used, the table history would list the primary and secondary tables as well as the JOIN command parameters used.

The other nice thing is that you can take a screenshot of the table history and use it for documentation or evidence.

Bonus: Instead of selecting Tools, History from the menu, you can type DIS HIS in the command line, and press ENTER. Same results!

If you have some ACL tricks up your sleeve, let me know.

Another Nail in ACL’s Coffin

Diligent’s acquisition of Galvanize (ACL) is another nail in the ACL analytics coffin.

First, ACL acquired another company and created Galvanize. And we were told governance, risk, and compliance (GRC) would never be the same.

And I told you that ACL analytics would never be the same. In fact, I predicted that this acquisition meant that ACL analytics was dying (when I say ACL analytics, I’m referring to the Windows desktop version that they built the original company on).

For more on this, see ACL Officially Changes Name & Spots  and Is ACL Analytics Dying?

Mack-the-Auditor Gets Audited! Part 3

This is the third of 3 posts; this post describes how I audited the auditors and my perspective on the whole thing.

Read the first post (background) and the second post (audit results).

Mack-the-Auditor Gets Audited! Part 2

This is the second of 3 posts; this post describes the audit, some speed bumps, and the audit results.

Read the first post here, which provides the background on the audit and the audit’s scope.

Mack-the-Auditor Gets Audited! Part 1

Usually, I’m the one doing the auditing, but this time, I (Mack) was the one who was audited.

It was a great experience for me.

Well, sort of. No one likes being audited (ahem). But it gave me a fresh perspective of how others feel when I audit them.

This is the first of 3 posts; this post contains some background info on the project that was audited, and the second one discusses the audit and the results, and in the third post, I describe my perspective on the whole thing, and some takeaways.

ACL Desktop Gone in 5 Years?

Rumors have it that ACL will no longer be available on the desktop (laptop, or other local machine) in 5 years.

That is, according to an ACL user who attended the 2018 ACL Connections conference.

ACL Robotics is NOT Robotics

Contrary to what ACL has been touting as their new ‘robotics’ feature, it is NOT robotics process automation (RPA).

[The ‘robotics’ feature is due out later in 2018. It appears to be ACL’s latest attempt to get you to use their GRC software.]

ACL, via John Verver, defines the term this way in his RPA article: “The idea is a relatively simple one: get computers to perform tasks normally performed by humans, and cut resource and time requirements for many repetitive activities.”

ACL Tip: Be Careful when Renaming Tables

When you need to rename ACL tables, be careful to also rename the associated .fil file also.

Otherwise, you (or your ACL script) might get confused. You might delete the wrong table or .fil file, and create a head-scratching problem.

I know because I confused myself.

5 Things We Need from ACL in 2018

Here’s the 5 things I’m hoping will change in 2018 regarding ACL.

They are all related to each other and feed off each other…

Interesting.

Audit Automation is NOT all Automation

Some Chief Audit Executives (CAEs) and audit managers tend to think that audit automation is a set-it-and-forget-it process. NOT.

In this post, I want to expand on a problem I mentioned in an earlier post , 10 Signs Mgmt Doesn’t Really Support Analytics.

Audit management too often thinks that once a process or an audit is automated, ALL auditor/staff hours previously spent performing that process can be reassigned elsewhere.

That is not the case at all.

Deleting ACL Table Covers A Multitude of Sins

I’m not sure why, but sometimes deleting an ACL table or two covers a multitude of sins, errors, or just plain weird behavior.

No, I don’t get any error messages. That’s the strange part.

I’m talking about strange ACL behavior that you can’t troubleshoot by reviewing the log.

Robotics to Replace ACL, Part 2

Previously I wrote Will Robotics (RPA) Replace ACL?

The short answer is no, and I describe the reasons in that post.

But that doesn’t mean someone won’t try.

Shortly after I wrote my original robotics post, I encountered robotics vs. ACL, part 2.

Will Robotics (RPA) Replace ACL?

In my last post, I described Why Internal Auditors Should Care about Robotic Process Automation.

In this post, I’ll explore whether RPA can replace analytic packages like ACL, IDEA, R, and Power BI.

That might seem like a strange question, but a few managers and a VP have asked me just that recently. Here’s how I’ve answered it.

ACL Import Fails, No Error?

Today I was adding a new table to a scripted ACL project and kept getting an error.

This project automatically opens a folder on the LAN, reads the files in the folder, and loads all of them.

All I did was add one more file to the folder. ACL refused to load that one file.

Syntax error.

WTS?

How to Review Your ACL Log

Whether you script your projects or use menu commands, you need to review your ACL log carefully.

Good analysts review their results and the log as they work in ACL, after they think they are done, and have others review their log before the ACL project is relied upon.

(You can’t imagine the dumb mistakes my team and I found that saved us a lot of embarrassment later.)

#1 Reason for NOT Doing Data Analytics

Do you know the #1 reason auditors don’t do data analytics (DA) much?

It is so simple, so obvious, I hesitated to blog about it. Let me know if you agree.

ACL: Automate Active Directory Downloads

Here’s a way to automate the download of data from Active Directory (AD), specifically group members, into ACL using adfind and the ACL Execute command.

I’ll walk you through it step-by-step.

This was posted before ACL released their own Active Directory driver, which I still haven’t figured out.

Even if you don’t use ACL, you might gain a better understanding of AD and LDAP in general….

ACL Tip: Beware of ORs and ANDs

Whenever you use OR and AND operators in ACL (or other software, for that matter), be careful to ensure that you receive the results that you are looking for.

Assume you have Table1, which contains 100 loan transactions. 10 of those transactions have a loan rate of 5% and 10 transactions have a rate of 6%. The remaining transactions have rates above 10%.

ACL Error: Not all Fields Imported via Script

Recently, I  ran an import script to import a delimited file into ACL, but the last 10 fields were not imported. And I didn’t know it right away, because I received no error message.

In addition (or should I say, in subtraction), the log did not indicate anything was wrong.

You Might be an ACL Freak if…

You might be an Audit Command Language (ACL) freak if more than 2 of the following are true:

• At work, you have a second computer (or virtual machine) just for running ACL.

ACL: How to Add a Conditional Computed Field

In ACL, a conditional computed field (CCF), is basically a regular computed field with some fireworks.

It looks and acts much like a regular computed field, but has some extra parts that do some extra work. Fortunately, the extras are NOT complicated, and after reading this post, you will find that will you use CCFs frequently.

So what’s the difference?

ACL: How to Add Computed Fields via Script

Once you’ve mastered creating computed fields, you’re ready to add computed fields to a table via script. It is easier than it sounds.

If you need some background on computed fields, see my previous posts, What is a Computed Field? and How to Add a Computed Field (manually). Now let’s explore writing a script that adds computed fields to a table.

ACL: Edit Scripts Easily

As soon as you create an ACL script, you often have to add to it or edit it. There’s an easy way to do it.

ACL: How to Create Your Own Scripts

Creating scripts (and editing them) is not as hard as many of you believe them to be.

Sure, it takes practice and time to learn the basics, but YOU can do it.

If you don’t learn scripting, you are NOT using ACL to it’s fullest, nor are you making the best use of your time.

Optimize ACL Scripts

Have you been following the “Optimizing Script Performance” series on the ACL Blog? aclkevin has been offering some great tips.

In case you missed them:

ACL: Add a Custom View to a Table

Adding a custom view to an ACL table comes in handy when you want to 1) change the order of the fields in an ACL table, or 2) view a select number of fields.

You can add a custom view manually or via script. We’ll tackle the script version first.

This post is in response to Les’ question about reordering fields in a table.

ACL tip: Create a File Import Script

Did you know that you can create a script to import a file into ACL? That you can automate loading a table?

I’m talking about the File > New > Table command in ACL, also known as the Data Definition Wizard. Yes, you can create such a script, and I’m going to teach you how!

The good news is that it’s so much easier than you think. The bad news is that it doesn’t APPEAR easy, but it really is, because ACL does the heavy lifting for you. I promise that if you hang in there, you’ll so be a pro. Just try it once, and you’ll be hooked!

Master List of ACL Articles and Tips

To make these posts easier to find (and link to), here’s a list of all the ACL posts on this blog in alphabetical order, and by most popular.
I’ll add other posts as they are written.

Teach Yourself ACL

You can teach yourself how to use Audit Command Language (ACL), the data analytics software from www.highbond.com. ACL is used by internal auditors and others to: