Great Plains

The Great Plains is the broad expanse of flat land, much of it covered in prairie, steppe and grassland, that lies west of the Mississippi River tallgrass prairie states and east of the Rocky Mountains in the United States and Canada. This area covers parts, but not all, of the states of Colorado, Kansas, Montana, Nebraska, New Mexico, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Texas, and Wyoming, and the Canadian provinces of Alberta, Manitoba and Saskatchewan. The region is known for supporting extensive cattle ranching and dry farming.

The Canadian portion of the Plains is known as the Prairies. Some geographers include some territory of northern Mexico in the Plains, but many stop at the Rio Grande.

Usage

The term "Great Plains" is used in the United States to describe a sub-section of the even more vast Interior Plains physiographic division, which covers much of the interior of North America. It also has currency as a region of human geography, referring to the Plains Indians or the Plains States.

Great Plains (band)

Great Plains was a progressive country pop band that formed in 1987. The band comprised Jack Sundrud (currently, as of 2015, of Poco), Russ Pahl, Denny Dadmun-Bixby, Michael Young, and Lex Browning. In their career, they recorded two studio albums and had four singles enter the Billboard country charts. Their highest charting single, "Faster Gun", peaked at No. 41.

Early days

The band began with Jack Sundrud, Russ Pahl, and Michael Young, who were all working in Michael Johnson's ("Bluer Than Blue") backup band. Sundrud was a seasoned professional, having toured with various acts such as Poco, Nicolette Larson, and Allman Brothers guitarist Dickey Betts. Brent Maher was producing Johnson and was looking for a new band to produce. Maher liked the sound of Michael Johnson's backup band. Sundrud was playing bass at the time, so Maher asked Austin Cunningham to join the band in the studio to do some experimentation. The band recorded a few tracks, mostly Cunningham's songs with himself on lead vocals. The band lineup / instrumentation at that time was Austin Cunningham on acoustic guitar and lead vocals; Jack Sundrud on bass and vocals; Russ Pahl on lead guitar, steel guitar and vocals, and Michael Young on drums. After recording a few sessions, Cunningham decided that he wanted to pursue a solo career and left the band. Sundrud then played some of his own songs for producer Maher and his daughter, Dianna, who ran Maher's publishing company, Moraine Music. They liked the songs and signed Sundrud to their publishing company as a songwriter. Maher and the band then recorded more tracks of Jack's material, with Sundrud on lead vocals.

Microsoft Dynamics GP

Microsoft Dynamics GP is a mid-market business accounting software or ERP Software package marketed in North and South America, UK and Ireland, the Middle East, Singapore, Australia and New Zealand. It is used in many additional countries with partner supported localizations. It uses either Microsoft SQL Server 2005, 2008, or 2012 to store data. It is one of four accounting packages acquired by Microsoft that now share the Microsoft Dynamics Business Solutions brand. Dynamics GP is written in a language called Dexterity.

The Dynamics GP product was originally developed by Great Plains Software, an independent company located in Fargo, North Dakota, which was run by Doug Burgum. Dynamics Release 1.0 was released in February 1993. It was one of the first accounting packages in the USA that was designed and written to be multi-user and to run under Windows as 32 bit software. In late 2000, Microsoft announced the purchase of Great Plains Software for $1.1 billion. This acquisition was completed in April 2001.