BarTender History Explorer

BarTender 9.1
History Explorer
June 2007-September 2008

A Product by
Seagull Scientific, Inc

Erik Ralston

Commercial Label Printing

Labels include information such as
barcodes, text, pictures, and RFID
Industries include: shipping, retail,
manufacturing, and pharmaceuticals
Users need solutions of scale; often
have many printers with few servers

Erik Ralston BarTender History Explorer
Software Engineer Seagull Scientific, Inc

Commercial Label Printing

Print Server

Requests


BarTender System 8.1

Print Server

Requests


Requirements for
BarTender 9.0

Perform all duties of a log file
Collect label data during prints
Store data to an SQL database
Reproduce previously printed labels
Provide tools for auditing print
activities
Make it easy


Technologies

C#
.NET 2.0
.NET Remoting
ADO.NET
WinForms
Microsoft SQL Server 2005
Full & Express Edition


BarTender System 9.0

User Audits

Collect
SQL Label Data
Database

Use Data to
Reproduce
Labels
Print Server

Quick Questions?

Seagull Scientifics' core products
provide automation and printing
Modern enterprises want robust data
security and detailed tracking
Customers also want reliability and
savings offered by reprinting


How does the user
interact?

?
System Service SQL
Database

Print Server

Role as Software Engineer

Design and develop user-interface
Implement .NET Remoting client and
client data access
Define schema required for reading
from SQL database
Optimize database performance
Document application for verification
by Quality Assurance

History Explorer

GM Format Sample from SeagullScientific.com

History Explorer
Requirements

Navigate through print jobs and
messages sent from applications
Filter, sort, and search
Provide preview of labels
Support reprint of logged labels
Deliver low-latency data access


BarTender Print Jobs

Provide complete history of labels
printed by BarTender application
Show originating computer and
printer, plus all unique job data
Link messages and job status
received during printing to each job
Enable users to easily find labels
Present an interface for label reprint

Application Messages

Provide history of messages
All message dialogs and some
background messages
Display information such as
originating application and computer,
plus message text


How do users understand
all this data?
Don’t overwhelm
Prioritize information
Build on proven concepts:
Microsoft Outlook
SQL Management Studio


Convert Data into
Information


How do users investigate
related information?

Be context-driven
Allow users to select level of detail
Show related data in close proximity
Status received from spooler
Messages received from BarTender


Grid-Within-Grid


Selected Details Pane


Overview Report


How do users identify
labels they have printed?

Text alone is not sufficient
Labels tend to all look the same
Dynamic information is often in a
barcode or a small amount of text


Labels Objects & Preview


How do users find
information efficiently?

‘When’ often easier than ‘What’
Offer many methods
Focus on the common, but allow for
the uncommon


Filtering By Column


Filtering by Time Span


Filtering by View


Filtering by Custom Criteria


Expert Filtering


How do users locate
specific labels?

Jobs can contain hundreds of labels
Filtering is not strong enough
Labels possess arbitrary information
in the form of “label objects”
Text often in the form of numbers
Barcodes with a “human-readable” value


Don’t filter…


Search!


How do users reprint?

Users need flexibility to reprint
All labels in a job
All labels on a page
Individual labels


Reprint By Job or Label


Summary

BarTender 9.1 added data collection
to commercial label printing suite
My primary role was developing the
History Explorer application
History Explorer was used to present
database information to users
With easy-to-use filtering and searching
Supporting reprint of jobs and labels


Thank You


Questions?


BarTender History Explorer

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