Manufacturing processes are often made to attack a specific challenge. You may have some general use equipment, but if you're producing a truly useful and groundbreaking process, you likely have some customized technology and policies in place. Since your software is often part of the production process, make sure that you voice your opinion and make requests for features that can change the way your software works for you. A few examples can help you get into the mindset of how to ask for changes to your software. Your imagination and the programming team's abilities are the only limits.
What Can Production Software Do?
For manufacturing industries, automation and monitoring are key. In order to get the most out of your process, you need to get as much information as possible. For example, consider the chemical processes in a food product manufacturer's line.
Some ingredients need to be at a specific temperature. They also need to be moved to other parts of the process at a specific time, produced and packaged at a specific volume. Production software can be used to monitor the information if you have the specific instruments to measure available.
For temperatures, digital thermometers exist that can be connected to a computer. When the information is recorded by the digital thermometer, the software programmer can write code that brings the temperature information into your software.
To measure the time it takes for product to move from one place to the other, a number of measurements can be made. You could start a timer when worker sends ingredients down a line to the time that the next worker receives the ingredients. For automated processes, you could install lids on hinges, pressure gauges or anything that notifies the passage of product. The start and stop times can be recorded and sent to the software.
Basically, any information that is based on time or can be measured can be put into software. The difficulty comes from refining the measurement to the smallest unit as possible. Going into milliseconds or micrograms, for example, may be very difficult to design into the physical equipment. Once that measurement is possible, recording it in software is the easy part.
Why Would Programmers Make Such Changes?
In a world of software that is bought from the shelf or an online store, many people are satisfied to just buy what's available. What you need to realize is that much of the software available came from demand.
You may not be able to bend the ear of the biggest software companies in the world without a sizable bank account to make a product just for you, but programmers are looking for your work. Individual teams in large software engineering firms and smaller firms alike are ready to take your project and make something work.
It could be an entirely new project or a plugin for their existing product. It all depends on the level of customization you're willing to request. Contact a manufacturing production software professional to begin planning your changes.
Talk to experts like JobPack for more information.
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