My dream would be to scan items from the Job Traveler and ID badge to clock in and out of Jobs and Operations.
The standard MES menu contains a lot of pop-ups and is too messy for our simple needs. Having a barcode dump plain text onto a page, when the wrong box is picked would be nightmare for training and implementation.
My only idea is to make new form for Start and End activity, but it would be BPM’s calling methods.
Curious to hear if any of you have a working process with scanners, to simplify this process.
I’m doing a demo with bezlio, sounds like they can customize most things. They have video demo’s on their site. If we proceed i’ll be sure to show it off.
There are posts around here where we’ve automated a barcode clock in with a listener and text parser to code what you need. Obviously this is going to be in classic, but it’s been done.
Seems like more and more, if you want to smooth out processes you have to spend the money for deep customization. The Epicor’s structure makes that possible which is nice.
In our case, we implemented a custom mobile application to handle our issue of tracking labor for continuous production lines, like our powder coating. The application integrates with AzureAD and securely calls to an API sitting on our production network (VPN, or in-facility) instead of directly to Epicor. This API handles the calls to Epicor and application-level actions for the mobile app. Additionally, the employee would sign in further to the device by entering their ID.
We used BarTender to create tags that contained all of the relevant information in a barcode and integrated that tag into the production process. So, a tag comes by that gets scanned to clock them in and is followed by the same tag that gets scanned again to clock them out. An additional concern in this process is that I needed to manually divide the labor quantity by the number of employees who have already worked on the job, though this is like to be able to be handled in a better way.
That was the first iteration, and the application has matured significantly since then. It started as an Xamarin Forms application that was migrated to MAUI for multiple-platform use. It is now just a Blazor WASM application, with API backing. Tons of development automation as well, especially generation of Epicor interfaces & data.
The best part of rolling our own and not also investing in another platform, and just backfilling is that we get total control of the process, which allows for huge customization possibilities. I know a lot of companies will buy the mobile warehouse app and then create their own to customize specific functions. For us, it was a trade-off to reduce monthly recurring costs, though it adds risk in regard to custom development.
We tried Bezlio, and I will say that the platform is a great for those who do not have development resources themselves. However, it didn’t feel any more mature than our application already was, likely due to development of their infrastructure over Epicor specific features. I also like the idea of using C# for (practically) everything, and you get this with Blazor.
I do think that the entire team at Bezlio is awesome as well, we just didn’t feel the platform was ready for our specific use-cases. Their stuff does come with a lot of pre-built packages, so you don’t have to worry about developing, with Bezlio also offering development support at a decent standard rate.
I did mention that in-house development comes with the caveat of risk, as well as mentioning that Bezlio’s platform is perfect for non-developers who still need custom processes.
I’m just one guy, though. With having been a consultant, I don’t like utilizing consultants; I like replacing them and I know many feel the same way with regards to maintaining in-house talent. Benefits to each scenario, certainly.
