Nowadays, no computer system is an island. The role of an IT company is not merely to provide a good core product, but also to offer solutions to issues of “interoperability”; the ability of software and hardware on multiple machines from multiple vendors to communicate. As information technology permeates throughout a timber business’ operations, the need for communication between systems becomes more and more important.
In the case of Hoppings Softwood Products, the issue was to maximise the potential of a new Tallybeam machine from Systek Control Systems. This measures each piece of timber as it leaves the mill and counts the quantity of each of the lengths. It then drives the packing machine and produces pack labels.
Our task was to integrate the PC-based Systek software with Hoppings’ Ten-25 UniSTRIP system, which runs on a Unix server. The key issue was to share file information to keep stock control records up to date with stock which had been machined. UniSTRIP now takes the daily mill production data from Systek and uses it to update production orders and amend finished stock
quantities of those products.
“The Systek interface allows us to transfer information into UniSTRIP stock control much more quickly and accurately than manual entry,” said Hoppings’ company
secretary David King.
Taken in connection with the pack labels produced by UniSTRIP from the receipt of imported contracts and landed stock from UK suppliers, Hoppings can now ascertain what is in each pack, and fulfil customers’ demand for packs with specific length requirements.
The next step for Hoppings is to use new Swedish and Finnish standards for XML document exchange to streamline the process further. Mr King believes that the XML interface will create a seamless process so that shippers’ files will “end up as goods in stock, with labels produced to Hoppings’ specification”.
