Its great to work in isolation sometimes… but not on this one, when it comes to opinions, cost and usability of MES shopfloor data capture. We are going to record time at 250ish resources, so will need to consider this level of device/cost as you can imagine the boards itchy about that (and rightfully so). Our operations are sometimes minutes/hours, to stock and to order, so MES usage is there to enable the workqueue to function appropriately and we use get requests to pick to the next available job - it works, but our hardware/mes inputs a bit clunky
We are working towards ISO Cyber secure too so it’s creating its own challenges with open kiosks logging in, etc, however… I hope the network of pro’s out there will have some advice and some steering direction based on experience.
Hardware - What are people using out there?
We started at tablets (Painful to use) and now thinking IoT Thin Clients, keyboard, mice monitors.
Logging in - How how how!
Basic or IDP, how do you handle logging in + the password reset side of it all…
We are thinking you login as the machine(employee record) and see its workqueue on MES, as we have operators that can use multiple machines.
any fancy clock card scanning anyone is doing to get into the system?
Also logging into EKWW, same issue as MES, how? and use of licences? we have tonnes of MES licences but not Kinetic… how do we work around that?
Paperwork/Drawings
We are using ECM, how do we get drawings to print, has anyone done anything where they can get attachments to print or advise a way of doing it?
We don’t intend to use job travellers as our drawings tell the operator what to do, the product labelling will do the talking, and the jobs pull method and get requests move what we need where we need it
Label Printers
We are using bartender, we obviously want to auto print labels based on reported quantities, has anyone had any luck getting this to all work “seamlessly” we seem to be getting server dropouts, autoprint sounds a tonne more complex from our IT team than “ticking a box”.
Scanners/EKWW
Anyone got any experience on customising (hiding menus, fields, auto filling fields) on the device from barcodes?
Also user permissions and how to handle multiple profiles for the devices with unique settings.
If there is anything you can add to help guide us on this journey it would be super appreciated
For some of the specific questions: Hardware - Epicor (as an application) does not function well without a keyboard UNLESS you’ve customized your screens and inputs. Therefore, yup, tablets are painful. Thin clients (with or without barcode wands) are probably most common. Logging In - I was an IT guy before jumping over to the dark side of consulting, but I (thankfully) missed the explosion in security need that came in the late 90s-early '00s. That said, you need two “logins” for a MES (DC) session… first to open the program and second for each employee that enters a transaction. I would argue that the first login can be generic and shared, and its security in the Epicor User Account Security Maintenance program is limited to only what items can be run from the MES/DC environment. At the Employee program, indicate which “tabs” the employee has access to. There are differing opinions on this. As far as employee login goes, you can use a barcode wand on the stations and have the employee’s clock ID barcoded on their badge… not fancy but effective. Paperwork - With ECM you can do A LOT… but SOMETHING has to be printed from the job. Maybe you customize the traveler so that it’s only a single page, but link all the other appropriate drawings so they print with it. Label Printers - there is a TON of people here who can talk intelligently about them. I am not one of that group. Scanners/EKW - again, not well experienced on this part. But others are!
I can answer your questions regarding Scanners/EKW (Some of the many old names are EKWW, EMWW, EMW, Wireless Warehouse).
Without “customizing” the app, just using configurations, you can use out of box settings to configure security rolls based on the employee type. These are configured in epicor through the MES Menu Security page. There are three segments, look for the one EMWW.
Your profiles are going to be based on the employee who logs into the device. All of the favorites, security, menu access and employee specific settings are stored in a UD table. When you log in with an employee ID the system will capture the settings from the UD table.
Recently Biscit introduced Scope Settings so certain settings may be enabled at a company, site, warehouse team or employee level.
As far as auto filling fields, EKW is compatible with BPMs so that could be one option.