PDA Application – Reference Guide

Table of Contents: 1.

THE APPLICATION .................................................................................................................................... 3

2.

USING THE PDA APPLICATION.............................................................................................................. 3 2.1. 2.3 2.4

3.

LOGGING IN: .................................................................................................................................................3 ROUTE LEGS VIEW: .....................................................................................................................................5 ITEMS VIEW: .................................................................................................................................................7

USING THE EXTERNAL SCANNER OR THE SCANNING FUNCTION OF THE PDA:.................... 10 3.1. 3.2 3.3.

SCENARIO 1: ..............................................................................................................................................10 SCENARIO 2: ..............................................................................................................................................12 SCANNING MULTIPLE UNKNOWN ITEMS: ....................................................................................................12

AlgoPlanner PDA - Reference Guide

Page 2 of 12

1.

The Application

The AlgoPlanner PDA application is designed to work with as little interaction for the driver as possible. In fact – if everything goes as planned, the driver/user doesn’t need to do much more than log on and choose the relevant Day Route. Routes and tasks, including barcodes and other relevant information are automatically updated with short intervals. No matter what screen the user has chosen, the application works the same. When a legal barcode is scanned in the right place, the Item representing that barcode will disappear from the work list, unless the setup dictates otherwise - for instance – prompts for a signature, a picture or a comment. Most of the functions available to the PDA user are set by the Client Administrator. The Default AlgoPlanner PDA application is dependent on the information and setup in the Client Application defined on the main server. To see more about this, please refer to the AlgoPlanner Reference Guide under Settings – Scan Report Code. A general characteristic of the AlgoPlanner PDA application is the driver’s possibility to overwrite. The assumption is that the driver knows what he/she is doing. So – although an error message may occur, the driver can overwrite this in most cases. Such actions will be gathered in the audit trail. The driver can also always execute the route in another sequence than the one suggested. 2.

Using the PDA application

2.1.

Logging in:

This is the default log-in screen:

AlgoPlanner PDA - Reference Guide

Page 3 of 12

Before logging in, select Settings to edit server connection, connect to external Bluetooth scanner if relevant and/or change sound settings:

Click OK to save the settings. 2.2

Day Routes View:

The default screen after logging in shows a list of Day Routes that have been assigned to the logged-in user:

AlgoPlanner PDA - Reference Guide

Page 4 of 12

The application only downloads Day Routes that are Ready, In Progress or Incomplete. The colour bar next to the Day Route indicates the status of the route: green means Ready, cyan means In Progress and grey means Incomplete. On the top right corner of the screen you can see an Internet Connection indicator

and a

GPS indicator that are green when the internet and GPS signals are available and red when the signals are unavailable. 2.3

Route Legs View:

Select a Day Route to see its Stops (or so-called Route Legs View):

On this screen you can see a list of Route Legs in chronological order, with Delivery time (from Earliest Start Time to Latest Till Time, Expected Start Time and Actual End Time displayed. Items/Scanned indicates the total number of items in that Route Leg versus the number of items that have been already scanned. The colour bar indicates the status of the Route Leg: green means OK, yellow means Warning, red means Late, cyan means In Progress, grey means Incomplete and white (or transparent) means Done. By default, only Route Legs that are not Done are shown on the Route Leg view. To see all Route Legs of the Day Route, select Option.

AlgoPlanner PDA - Reference Guide

Page 5 of 12

The Option Menu:

In this Option Menu you have the following functions: 1. Connect Scanner: use this to re-establish connection with the external scanner when the Bluetooth connection between the PDA and the external scanner is cut off. 2. View All: use this to view all Route Legs of the Day Route, including those that are Done. 3. Exit: use this to exit the application. The Route button, will present 2 choices: Start Route and End Route. When you select Start Route or End Route, a status update with corresponding type will be sent to the server.

AlgoPlanner PDA - Reference Guide

Page 6 of 12

2.4

Items View:

Click on a Route Leg to go to the Items View:

On this screen you can see a list of all Items included in the selected Route Leg together with its barcode and weight. The colour bar indicates the Item’s status: green means New, grey means Incomplete and white means Done. By default, only New and Incomplete Items are shown on the Items view. To view all Items, select Option.

AlgoPlanner PDA - Reference Guide

Page 7 of 12

The Option Menu:

The Option Menu on the Items View has the same options as that on the Route Legs View: Connect Scanner, View All (to see all Items including those that are Done), Exit. There is an extra option called View Comment where you can see the comment on the selected Item. The Scan Code button can be used in two ways: 1. You can select an Item, and then press Scan Code: this is considered as a manual scan, the application will send a status update of this Item with the default action relevant to the Item’s task. 2. Select Scan Code without selecting an Item will lead you to this Scan Report Code view:

AlgoPlanner PDA - Reference Guide

Page 8 of 12

On this view you can scan a barcode or manually enter a barcode in the textbox, choose an action from the Action list and select Send. Below is the Action list view when you select Action:

Manual scan function is useful when you do not have an external scanner or a scanning function ready in the PDA, but when you do, the scanning process could be performed differently - as follows:

AlgoPlanner PDA - Reference Guide

Page 9 of 12

3.

Using the external scanner or the scanning function of the PDA:

Initially, you have to log on the PDA application and choose a Route. You can then start scanning from either the Route Legs View or the Items View or the Scan Report Code view. When you scan a barcode, there are 2 possible scenarios: 3.1.

Scenario 1:

If the barcode belongs to a New Item on the Day Route and the barcode is scanned within an accepted buffer distance from the geo-coded location of the Route Leg, the Item is then considered successfully scanned and a status update will be sent to the server to update the status of the Item. Depending on the Setting from the Web application, you can be prompted to enter a comment/ recipient/ sender or to sign on the PDA or take a picture of the package. Note that you have to fill in these forms and select Send before scanning the next barcode; or select “X” to close the forms and dismiss the latest scan. The Comment/ Recipient / Sender form: The textbox can be filled with the keyboard, or by scanning an encoded text with the scanner.

AlgoPlanner PDA - Reference Guide

Page 10 of 12

The Signature form:

The Take Picture form: you take a picture by pressing the camera button on the side of the PDA and the form will be closed once the picture is taken.

AlgoPlanner PDA - Reference Guide

Page 11 of 12

3.2

Scenario 2:

If the barcode does not belong to any item on the Route; or the barcode belongs to an item that has already been scanned; or the barcode is scanned out of range, an error report will appear:

If this happens because you scan a wrong barcode by mistake, you can dismiss the scan by scanning a different barcode. Otherwise, you can select the action you wish to associate with this barcode and a status update for it will be sent to the server. Again, depending on the Setting from the web application – See Settings – Scan Report Code, you may be prompted to enter a comment/recipient/sender or to sign on the PDA before sending the status update. 3.3.

Scanning multiple unknown Items:

On the Unknown Barcode form you can see a checkbox “Allow multi-scanning unknown items”. This function is applied when you have a list of items that are not included in your Day Route but need to be scanned, and you do not want to be prompted for an action every time you scan an unknown barcode. By checking the textbox you will only have to choose the action in connection with the first scan and hereafter you can continue scanning all unknown items after that without being “disturbed”. This function will switch off automatically when a known Item is scanned.

AlgoPlanner PDA - Reference Guide

Page 12 of 12