• Why replace paper logbooks?
• Network Options
• How this approach meets the challenges
• Getting Started

Why replace Paper Logbooks?

Many corporations are recognizing the benefits of moving away from paper based logs. Operators, supervisors and managers no longer have the tedious daily battle with traceability, locating key information, communicating plant status etc. In particular, electronic logs provide key personnel with up to the minute information on their office screens.

The benefits of going to an Electronic Logbook have been described in more detail in another technical paper.

While the benefits of moving a single site to electronic logbooks are huge, the benefits of moving a whole corporation to electronic logs are enormous.

This document maps out an implementation strategy which will provide a simple, flexible, multi-site electronic logbook with minimal effort, minimal cost and minimal ongoing overhead.

Network Options

Typically, on an industrial site, there may be 5, 10 or more people who need access to the control room logs to efficiently do their jobs. This means, for a 10 site system for example, there are 50, 100 or more people requiring access to the logs.

Web based electronic logbooks enable the efficient distribution of this information to all the users without having to load any software whatsoever onto each end-user's computer. I.e. the logs are available via the users' web browser (e.g. Internet Explorer or Firefox).

There are three variations of web server architecture for multiple sites:

1. Site Web Servers: A web server is located at each site. This server maintains the logs for the users on that site.

2. Corporate Web Server: A single server maintains the logbook for all the sites. This is a preferable approach since the software need only be loaded into a single computer and the facility is immediately available to all the users on all the sites. Applications like St James Software's jLogbook are quite capable of handling all the sites and still catering for the special needs of each site. Additionally, the IT staff will only be required to maintain a single system and that system will probably be located in their offices.

3. Hosted Web Server: The software is hosted on a third party machine. Under contract, the third party (for example, St James Software) provides the Logbook to all the sites. The advantage of this approach is that the end user is not required to provide any computer skills at all and the maintenance, upgrades, etc. are all handled by the third party . Additionally, the software can be moved across to a corporate machine (option 2 above) at any time without any cost penalties.

How this approach meets the challenges

Implementation is Simple: Since there is only a single computer to configure for all the sites, this procedure can be carried out quickly.

.. and the Ongoing Upkeep is minimal: Also, since there is only a single computer to maintain and this computer is located conveniently near the IT personnel. If the hosted system is chosen, then the end user is not required to do any ongoing maintenance whatsoever.

Satisfies the special needs of each Site: Every site in the corporate network will be different. For example, site A may have three turbines and site B may only have two turbines. If users on site A need to select the turbine number from an equipment list, then they should only have to choose from the three turbines on their site. jLogbook will only present the options to the operator that are relevant for that site.

Configuration of the different options for the sites can be via a fill-in-the-blanks process or via a spreadsheet.

Provides Access to ALL the Users: Web based systems like jLogbook are quite capable of providing information to several hundred users simultaneously and efficiently. Anyone (who is authorized), who has an Intranet connection can get access to the Logbook data in real-time.

Additionally, Shift Reports or Critical Log Information can be automatically emailed to the respective personnel.

Provides a multi-site Overview: Head office personnel may want information from many of the sites and may even want the information combined in a single report so they can do analyses on multiple sites. Since the data is held in a relational database, this information can be easily retrieved.

... at a low hardware/software cost: Only a single server (usually a Windows Server or Linux machine) is required. The corporate database (Oracle, SQL Server or MySQL) can be used for the logs. jLogbook licenses are concurrent. I.e. Licenses need to be purchased only for the number of users connected at any one time.

Getting Started

To simplify the process of getting started, St James Software provides a configuration facility at no charge.

The customer is only required to email St James Software a spreadsheet which must contain the details of all the sites. For example, what equipment, users and special requirements are located at each site. St James Software then use this data to make available a live, working system at a secure site which the end user can trial.

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