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Short Line Data Systems Inc. – ROCS Update November 2007 Website: www.sdsrocs.com Greetings: A chill is in the air, finally. It’s been a very warm spring, summer, and early fall, but finally it has started to look like fall should. The weather aside, we just returned from the last ASLRRA regional meeting of the season in Myrtle Beach, and we are getting ready to go to New Orleans for the Safety and Operations conference at the end of the month. Travelling aside, we have been working on the new widescreen monitor compatible screens in ROCSTM, revisions to ROCS and the Rating DBTM, and the interface software portion of TRACCURATETM , which we are calling ROCSScanTM . So let’s get on with the update and all of the current SDS news. ASLRRA Regional Meetings As mentioned above, the ASLRRA regional meetings have come to an end. Kudos to the ASLRRA staff and the planning committees on creating first class programs, each with enough of a flair unique to each of the geographic regions. Congratulations to Jalene Forbis on her election to Pacific Region VP, and Tony Reck on his election to Southern Region VP. Both are true leaders in their regions and will serve in their roles with distinction. ROCS V10-11 Updates We have been plugging along with the upgrades to ROCS Version 10, and are getting close to defining what will be the initial release of Version 11. The work done this month has focused on revised screens that can be used on both standard and widescreen monitors, and some automatic housekeeping functions. The new screens have been created for the Main Menu, Freight Office, EDI, and Car Hire areas, and we are still working on a revision to Customer Status. The revised screens are a little different in their layout than the original ones, but anyone who has been using the system for a while should be able to adapt pretty quickly to the new ones. The housekeeping revisions have focused on cleaning up some of the things that were in he system when it was first written. Many times, when we were trying to get something to work the way that we wanted it to we used code that worked, but didn’t accomplish the task in the most efficient manner. What we have been doing is going back into the bowels of the system, and started rebuilding those parts of the system for better efficiencies. In many cases, we have been able to limit the database growth that takes place every time you add and delete records from the system (this has to do with the automatic save feature that AccessTM has that prevents data loss in extreme circumstances). We are combining these changes with changes we are making in the communications section of the system to improve the efficiency of the system. Rating DB We have been doing a lot of work on the Rating DB for the Housatonic, and plan to deploy the system with the Seminole Gulf in the next week or two. We have added an automatic rate code setting function, and have improved the data import from the ROCS feature in the system to update the movement data once the car record has been added to the system, or if payment is received prior to receiving the transportation waybill, a manually added record to the Rating DB. The payments screen will have a subtotal feature to allow the user to compute the total fuel surcharge received, which should matche the settlement received box that is currently on the screen. The other new feature that is just about complete is the import of the CSX electronic settlement report. It will be rolled out to both the HRRC and the SGLR in the next month or so for testing. TRACCURATE and ROCSScan Our hardware partners Short Line Technologies are progressing with the initial production of the SLT-100 scanner, and the hardware will be submitted for FCC certification shortly. We are progressing with writing ROCSScan, and will have the first version complete in a couple of weeks. For those of you who are familiar with our other products, you will be comfortable with this new product. In next month’s update we will have more information about ROCSScan, TRACCURATE, and as soon as they are ready, we will put screen captures up on the website. SDS Website If you have looked at the SDS website recently, you will have seen that we have been a little remiss about updating it. We will have updates up in the next few days, including new screen captures, updates, projects in progress, and versions available. Our apologies for falling behind, and we will do a better job in the future . ASLRRA/AAR Safety & Operations Conference We will have a tabletop display at the ASLRRA/AAR Safety & Operations conference in New Orleans November 28-30. All of our products will be available for demonstration, including TRACCURATE, and if anyone would like to arrange a private demonstration of our products, please let us know, and we’ll set some time aside for you.
Well, that is all for now. We will be back in December with our annual “where in the world did Steve go this year” update and all the news about our products. Stay safe, Steven Friedland President |
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