Paul Wakeford

What this page does

There may be differences in appearances due to operating system changes over the years but they will be visual only..

This page takes you through:

• Opening Activity and Getting Started
• Learning the interface
• Doing the study
• Use other programs during the study

There is a small Job File created in the Activity Sampling Process Book which serves as the data for this example. There is no JobPad equivalent in Activity sampling.

Like Timedex most people straight into it - it is simple to use particularly for regular Windows users who can get the hang of things quickly. It shares a look and feel with Timedex in most respects but there are differences that are there to cope with the different data capture needs.

Select the Job/Process

Get to the Job selection screen and select a job. Here we will select "Shelf Stack Sample".

There is a search option on this screen for those projects where a complex set of jobs is required across many sites and departments.

It was our intention to add a small help file (on the menu bar) but this did not materialise at the time - the revised version will have access to such a facility.

In the File menu you can "Manage Users" which means add, delete and set user passwords. There is also a way to change the rating scale and it provides left and right handed user options.

The exit option only works in the start up sequence on the Job Selection screen.

The Notes Pages

These allow you to make comprehensive notes about the sample you are about to take.

The keyboard pops up automatically. Switch between the two notes pages with the blue coloured "More>" and "<Back" hypertexts.

Get these notes right now, do all your edits through the sample and all you have to do is Bluetooth the data to the base machine - the rest is up to the project manager.

There are 4 editable fields - they are shown and can be edited in the new TDX analysis program.

• Sample Number; enter a number/name for the study. This becomes the file name. There is an upper limit of 255 characters but you should not normally exceed 25 or 30 for easy of reading and identity.
• Description; amide length of text to describe what is being studied.
• Part or Ref No; useful for part numbers in manufacturing.
• Op/Subject; person being studied, or team, or machine.

The check box (ticked by default) adds your study name/number entered makes that name part of the filename. The filename when saved is prefixed by "Sample - " and suffixed by the date/time of the sample. If you don't enter a name you, will be advised - you can go ahead with the study with the box unticked and the sample will be named with the date and time only. Useful for quick checks where you don't need to have masses of detail.

Again there are 4 editable fields.

• Site; if yours is a multi-site organisation
• Department; speaks for itself
• Section/Cell; a sub division of department
• Equipment Ref; machine number description (or trailer/truck etc) .

Press Next from either widow to get started.

Top third of the screen is for the observation listing. The title bar shows that you have; Observation Number, Operative, and Activty (short) Description.

The "summary" bar below the listing area is actually the current observation line. Editable areas are

• Activity Number (second field along the bar)
• Rating (third field)

Below the current bar are the subsidiary fields:

• Operator
• Area
• Qty

The Numeric keypad is for typing in known activity numbers and quantities to the quantity field. The Notes field has to be entered from the general keypad (activated from the bottom bar).

The keypad to the right is the rating pad.

If you don't know the element and its number, don't worry about scrabbling through that list of activities. There is a pop up element list, Just press the small icon to the right of the Help menu on the bottom bar. You can see the main description along with its number.

Select your element (tap it), tap the Use Element button and it is put straight on to the study. Easy as that.

So, you have two methods of getting element onto the sample.

Quantities are entered as you go. A useful technique when you don't know the quantity until after the breakpoint (ie you need to read a counter positioned inconveniently for the normal viewing of the activity) is to use "Back Edit" and enter the quantity after the breakpoint.

In Use

Under Way

Selection of people (or subjects) is from the drop down box (see the Area example below) but if you know the number - here it is (1) - all you have to do is tap the field to make it focussed (it doesn't have to be highlighted in this case) and tap in the number on the keypad. For instance tapping in "1" without the brackets will give you Dave;but if you kept going and typed "11", whoever was number 11 would come up - if you added another "1" to get "111" and that had a person's name, then that name would go in. You can have up to 999 operatives but that is pushing it! A hundred or so is perfectly feasible on a wide area low frequency sample. That is if you, or the project manager have properly structured the list to make finding people less stressful.

The above also applies to areas.

Note that there is no count down clock, rather you would use the clock on the title bar to set your round starts as you would traditionally. There may be some form of indicator in a future version.

There isn't a "not seen" facility; this will be rectified on a later version. However if you invoke the "Big View" (tap the down facing triangle at the top right of the screen) you get a clear view of what has been captured - and it is very clear.

Note tat you can see that Tom has been entered twice - you could wait and do it on the PC but why when you can Back Edit it.

When you want to back to normal view and entry tap the now, upward facing triangle on the top right of the screen.

Right, correct the error, and while there perhaps make a note about the conditions.

In back edit you can edit:

• The Activity
• The Person
• The Area
• The Quantity
• and notes

Entries put right - easy.

The Big View is a useful tool for scanning up and down for obvious and correctable errors to save time editing at the end of the shift.

Actually - get it all done if you can, and if the study notes that entered before the start are OK then just Bluetooth it to the base machine and that's it!

End the sample

Return to the top

To finish the study, press the red button and you'll get this message.

Press Yes