Suggestions For New Features

[richard]

Welcome to this topic!

We strive at RSR Systems to keep SimplyPats a 'live' product and continously review the software to correct any bugs and add new features. Whilst we dont want to make the product to big and confusing to use, we welcome any suggestions for new features. Obviously some suggestions may take time to program, or be specific to your particular needs, but any commonly asked for features we will endeavour to include them.

From time to time we release free utilities which address specific user needs and these are available on our website.

[richard]

Here are some of the developments that we are working on or considering for the next upgrade release due early May 2008.

1) A new printed certificate to replace or in addition of the existing one which is now looking rather dated! UPDATE - this has already been done and is available as a free download on our website as an additonal custom report.

2) Support for the Martindale MicroPat+ Pat Tester.

3) Upload facility for the Transmille 6080 and 6080 PLUS

4) Export of retest dates to Microsoft Outlook calendar.

These may or may not be included in the next upgrade dependant on complications and time taken to program.

[MET]

Hi, Great program V5.2.8 but a couple of things I've noticed having to manually import all my information from a PAT certificate pad and my Kewtech KT71: There is nowhere to put the class, equipment type, make, model, s/n, voltage, appliance rating or fuse rating, at the moment I have to add it to the "extra notes" section which is very limited in size. Maybe in future versions it would be possible to add these fields and/or make the test fields and charge fields editable to make more use of the space available and adapt the program to individual requirements. Look forward to the additions published for V5.2.9 in this forum.

[richard]

Hi Met, thanks for your post and the kind comments about 5-2-8.

Regarding recording the SN Make and Model etc of the Portable appliances. Unfortunately when we originally set out the design spec for SimplyPats Version 5, we didn’t allow for the addition of more data fields.

It would now involve a huge amount of work to add extra data fields to SimplyPats Version 5 , as we would need to incorporate a new file structure. Having said that I will look at just how much work is involved.

Whilst we have not started development on a successor to Version 5, when we do, we will make sure we get more input so that we can include a lot of extra fields in the data structure.

The free SimplyPats software upgrade 5-2-9 is due out this month (April 2009) and in May we hope to release a value added product which we think many users will find very interesting.... watch this space!

Regards Richard

[MET]

Thanks Richard for taking on board my observations, I'll be downloading V5-2-9 and watching out for the value added product in May!

[Guesty64]

Hello Richard,
I have been reading some of the posts with interest, and I agree with MET, the software that you produce is V. good, I haven't had a single issue in using it, all info goes across well.
As well as the items that MET has mentioned another improvement that we have spoken about on the telephone, would be uploading to the Seaward Supernova.
I remember that you told me that there was difficulty obtaining certain upload codes from Seaward, can a workaround be found? Is it possible that the Members can help in any way?

Regards

John

[richard]

Hi John,

Many thanks for your post, Im glad the forum is proving useful. Thanks also for the comment regarding you haven't had any issues, as Im sure you are aware we are continually developing simplypats and this means whilst we are adding new features and fixing bugs we can occasionally introduce new "undocumented design features".

Regarding adding additonal fields to store extra information about the appliances, We will be definitely be adding fields to store additional characteristics. I would like to do this immediately but unfortunately it means changing the data structure of the SimplyPats data files and this would normally happen during the next major release of the software. Having said this, as I said in reply to the post by Met on the same issue I will look at trying to advance development on this issue. Hope that makes sense.

The upload to the Seaward is an issue that we don't have as much control over. Seaward obviously want to sell their own software and protect their work and investment so understandably are reluctant to provide technical information to a 3rd party software developer such as ourselves. I have, however been working on (when time permits!) the upload to the Seaward Supernova and Europa testers and whilst I dont have a complete solution, may have something that you could beta test if you are interested?

Regards, Richard

[Guesty64]

Hello Richard,
thanks for your reply. Yes I would be interested in testing any Beta program, please could you advise.

Regards

John

[richard]

Hi John,

Thansk for your offer of Beta testing uploading to a Seaward Supernova. I will review the changes we have written, and check how far away we are from testing an upload. Due our lack of technical co operation Im not sure if the solution I have will be as complete as for those PAT testers for which we have received technical co operation, however hopefully it will meet your needs.

Once we have released 5-2-9 due first week of May 2009 we will get on and complete a beta version of 5-3-0 for you to try with this feature. I will ask Carl to email you when we have something ready, however of course, please post on here anytime.

Regards, Richard.

[Guesty64]

Cheers Richard,
I look forward to that. By the way, looking at the time of your post, don't you sleep?

John

[richard]

Hi John

I have just uploaded the latest free upgrade 5-2-9 and hopefully if there are no major issues with this release, I should be able to take a look at the Seaward Supernova, I will give you a shout as soon as I have something concrete.

Re sleep, it's often easier to work late at night when there are less phone calls and distractions, however Im worried that Im becomming nocturnal!

Regards, Richard

[richard]

Hi Met and John

Thought I'd just give an update to this post:

There is nowhere to put the class, equipment type, make, model, s/n, voltage, appliance rating or fuse rating, at the moment I have to add it to the "extra notes" section which is very limited in size.

As you may now be aware in the next upgrade 5-3-0 We have added fields for Fuse Rating, Appliance Serial Number and Class (along with space for RCD and Microwave tests.)

I have had a long read of the recommendations in the latest IEE Code Of Practice and there are several fields that we have decided not to add at this time e.g. Date Purchased, Guarantee Date etc. For most of our users it is not practical to find and record this information.

We have in addition to the extra fields added above added an extra 4 user defineable fields. Whilst these extra fields will now be in our data structure I haven't written the mechanism yet to allow editing and printing of them yet, this is unlikely to be done in version 5-3-0 and so will have to wait for the next upgrade.

Regarding the Make and Model, we have always assumed that these would be joined together in the appliance description as the need to sort or find appliances by their make or model seemed unlikely.

Regards, Richard

[richard]

Just as an update to this thread

Class, Appliance Serial Number and fuse rating are now all stored, editable and printable in SimplyPats Version 6, in addition to RCD and Microwave Test results and links to photographs of indvidual appliances.

There are separate Microwave, RCD and Photo Reports available from the Print Results screen.

The Class App Serial Number and Fuse Rating are now shown on the Single Appliance Per Page report and also in the New Detailed Passes and Fails Report.

Richard