Happy New Year Everyone! Does anyone know what time is displayed on MES machines? Is it the local Windows time for that computer or is it the server time? If it is the local Windows time, can it be configured to display the server time?
We have some workers who clock out the nanosecond the shift ends, and if the time in the local machine drifts, they are clocking out early! We would like to have all of the MES machines using the server time to stop this issue, but we cannot find out how to do that. Any suggestions would be appreciated!
We run all our MES stations on a RDP server so the time displayed exactly matches the server time. Our service provider wrote a script so the stations running Windows 10 home automatically logon and boot into the terminal server.
One another note, We had a number of people who complained that the clock on the MES did not match the bells in our facilities. People would clock out 30 seconds or a minute early from the server because the older bell systems we use had no concept of NTP. We found a small $200 box that replaced the old system and now the bells match exactly the MES time.
If people are interested I will pass on the manufacturer. I looked at building one using a raspberry pie but if a box existed it did not seem to be worth the time to develop.
Another option would be to use the grace periods. They are in the company configuration, [Modules][Production][Data collection] tab. You can set grace periods there for early and late.
We bought the Netbell 2 from Linortek (www.linortek.com). This one supports two different relays but each relay can have something like 100 times the bells can rings as well as duration. There are larger units that support more relays. We have been live since mid December without problem.
RE: Brandon’s comment on the grace period. When we were doing extensive testing on 10.1.400 before we went live in May 2017 we found the grace would work for before the shift but not after. We created a ticket and it appears this is now fixed in 10.2. I suspect there are others that have this working so I would be interested in confirmation so I can figure out what conditions are breaking this for us.
As another point, if your bells are 2 minutes early then depending on the grace period as a solution can add up. (Had our HR manager do the math for me!) For some reason people will know they can clock in late and clock out early without penalty.
