Seek for advice against my new maintenance system.

Hi all vbforum professional members,

I need help and suggestion against my new system. I would like to create a distribution of machine map in my system. Whenever any new machine add in to the system, the map will display the location and position of machine. When the existing machine breakdown(indicate by production supervisor by data key in) the map will alert the maintenance coordinator by the flash on the map where the machine located.
I wish to get better idea which better than my current idea cause i'm still new in vs 2003.

My current Idea is.. :- using shape indicate every machines by drawing arcs. When the user insert a new machine. the form will denoted user to point out the location of machine. Furthermore, when machine were breakdown, supervisor have to change the status of machine to 'BD'. The distribution of machine map will refresh the database of breakdown list by timer ( Maybe 1 sec or more ) . When system detected breakdown machine the map will display it with red colour shape with flash.


It is a good method ?
Some pro here can give me some idea ?
If this method is executable, how can i coding it with best way ?

Thanks anyone here who help me :-) :thumb: :)

Can someone give me an advice ? or the content of my thread hard to understand ?

So sort of a network systems monitoring program.

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Furthermore, when machine were breakdown, supervisor have to change the status of machine to 'BD'.

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Wouldnt that be relying on them to go and update the status manually via the program? Perhaps some other simplified way would be better. How do they get the notification that the system is down? Maybe have the users that are having issues report it by designating their system is down in your program?

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Wouldnt that be relying on them to go and update the status manually via the program? Perhaps some other simplified way would be better. How do they get the notification that the system is down? Maybe have the users that are having issues report it by designating their system is down in your program?

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Thanks sir replied my question..

Yes it will rely by user ( department supervisor ) to update the status manual, because we can't link up the program with the machine. Every department of my company contains own computer in each department. When the machine notified is breaking down the department head will update the status of machine inside database to 'breakdown'. Sir, do you have any more simple way or more effective way to overcome this method ?


Thanks sir "-)

If the computers are on the network then they could rbe running a limited version of your app so the user can report their own system as having an issue unless its a bad problem, then they would have the supervison update the status. It just depends on the type of issue but at least it may take some of the burden off the supers.

Or you can have a "keep alive" sigonal that will be transmitted from each stations app and if it fails to transmists then you know there is a problem. It could test every 1 or 5 minutes depending on the network and its trafic load.

Just try to think of the user and what issues they would have trying to report that the system is having an issue.

If its not user friendly then they wont use it.

Thanks sir,

Sir the breakdown issue depend on machine, how can i send signal to system indicate that one of the machine was breaking down. Sir, may u give me some tips ? using Rs232 ?

If they are on the network then you can have your program send a signal via winsock, email, or other notification depending on your scenerio.

Thanks sir,
These machines didn't connected to network, only computer are connecting. May you explain the main function of winsock, i quite unsimilar to this component. Thanks for you for giving me extra cognitive :-)

Well if they are not comnnected to the network then how are they communicating with each other, if at all?

Check out our Network Programming forum's FAQ for some winsock examples.