This section gives a high-level overview of some of the projects we have recently completed. It is by no means comprehensive and exists mainly to give the reader a sense of our breadth of experience.
Mentoring
and the Software Process
Interfacing to External Packages
Imaging
Publishing
Manufacturing / Fault Tolerance
Bar Coding / Serialized Inventory
Traditional Inventory
Messaging and Active Content
Marketing Based Databases
Mentoring and the Software
Process 
In more than one location, our assistance has been used to help refine the internal
development process. We have experience using traditional systems development
life cycle methodologies - but more to the point, our help is often used to
help implement basic communication flows and feedback loops where none currently
exist.
Technology is changing at a breakneck pace and it is often very hard to keep
current with all the development tools while at the same time maintaining a
stable, reliable development environment. Both testing and documentation phases
often get cut during the normal course of development; we have helped clients
to "get back on track" in terms of their development efforts.
Interfacing to External
Packages
Many of the applications developed have been of the order entry style. However,
even in the cases where invoices were generated directly from the system, a
link to the firms accounting package was desired to effectively manage A/R.
Quickbooks has been used in three such applications, which requires the use
of a very strict, double-entry style input format.
Along similar lines, extract programs have been written for Medicare submission
to a state-approved reimbursement agency for electronic reimbursement. Likewise,
we have experience with submitting data to clinical trials, both at the state
and national level.
Imaging
Wrote custom applet that would support drag-and-drop images from retail PaperPort
application and categorize into appropriate location in database. This system
then patches into the order entry application, allowing users to view the supporting
payment information attached to a given transaction.
Constructed ODBC-based search engine interface for software vendor; back end
repository was image-based.
Publishing
Developed cross-platform workflow solution for publishing house involving Adobe
Acrobat. Solution goes across all departments, from art production to order
entry to accounting. Allows for mockups and proofs to be viewed from any desktop
and routed (along with pricing information) to a fax server for delivery to
the client.
Manufacturing / Fault
Tolerance
Constructed plan-floor control system using VB and assorted libraries. Both
facilities produce a combined output of over 500,000 yards of fabric a week,
and run 24 hours a day / 6 days a week. Programs control "kettles"
and "jets" used in the dyeing of fabric; currently there are 42 kettles
and 10 jets being controlled by 18 PC's. All PC's report information back to
the network to a central reporting module. Production is directly tied to the
stability of these machines, so fault-tolerant programming methods were explicitly
required.
Our team has been acknowledged by the hardware manufacturer as the only group
in the U.S. to successfully do this. Additionally, interfaces have been written
to commercial-grade pH monitors to create a monitoring and control system to
keep acidity levels within acceptable standards.
Other projects involve pulling water level signals directly from analog input
boards to determine water levels, and the creation of an ozone control program
to properly calibrate the output of a custom-made ozone generator.
In similar fashion, a custom module was designed that would sample an analog
output from a spectrophotomer and store that sample as a baseline for a given
chemical. Other samples would then be recorded and stored in a database. These
would then be charted graphically against the baseline to show in-tolerance
and out-of-tolerance measures for evaluating chemicals.
Bar Coding / Serialized
Inventory
Successfully enhanced a fulfillment house's order system to accept input from
infrared scanners. This was part of a larger inventory system that would very
accurately track numbered inventory as it passed through their in-house distribution
and sales system.
Inventories were maintained for the warehouse, distribution center, and any
of 84 locations in the field.
Traditional Inventory
Created a traditional accounting based inventory system for a multi-site food
retailer. Inventory is maintained in a central location as part of a master
list. This inventory listing can then be propagated to all sites (15) via the
Internet, where it will be downloaded to the individual sites as part of their
daily operations. The field sites use this list not only to enter beginning
and closing inventory amounts, but also to order daily supplies and foodstuffs
from their internal warehouse / commissary.
Designed a similar system for a multi-site restaurant, but this involved direct
dialup via RAS and extracting data from a commercial POS system. This data was
then rolled up into a repository for daily analysis.
Messaging
and Active Content
The public folders of MS Exchange are often an overlooked and underutilized
resource. We have completed projects involving dynamically changing content
to alert users to potential Accounts Receivable or Customer Service situations
that are not desirable. This can be done with through a graphical representation
(a change in color or representation) or through a more proactive message-based
alert system.
Marketing Based Databases
Augmented a custom-designed repository for a local management consulting firm.
The company had created a tool that allowed the user to dynamically create a
survey with questions drawn from a central database. This survey would then
be exported to a commercial desktop publishing system and sent out to the survey
population. A database structure would then be created behind the scenes to
act as a repository for the incoming data. A dynamically configured data entry
screen would then be presented to the user, reflecting the survey layout.
Project was very advanced, in that all questionnaires and surveys had multiple
versions. The questions themselves not only supported validation, restrictions,
and lookup sets, but also supported skip patterns ("if question 4 is >
10, then do not allow the input of questions 11 - 15"). The final part
of the project was a compilation module that would perform tabulation and calculation
for all results, and then dump these same results back into a format that could
be used by the publishing tool - then end result which was sold to the public.
Multi-user issues and speed in general had brought the project to a halt. After
modifications to the program and the database, performance improvements along
the lines of 8 hours to 10 minutes were not unheard of.
Many commercial legacy databases have been "mined" for marketing data
and then repackaged for presentation. A major insurance provider requested that
data be extracted from an AS/400 system and brought in to a user module that
would allow for massaging and further input. Then end result was output directly
to a commercial color laser, bound, and then sent to members. It was used as
a sales tool throughout the northeast.
A similar system was constructed to give feedback to providers in the organization
in regards to patient severity and demographics.