New version 6.12 of POS released
Posted: Sun Aug 22, 2004 11:24 pm
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New features in POS version 6.12
STOCK TABLE MENU
First a recap, the following feature has been part of the POS program from the beginning…
Not a "Touch Screen"
Some registers can use a "touch screen" feature where stock items are displayed on the screen and you ring them up by touching them on the screen. This of course requires a special touch sensitive monitor and special software to determine where the screen has been touched.
This Cash Register program will not do this, but it will do something almost as good and will not require special equipment to do it.
If your register uses a stock table, then when the program asks you for a stock number during a sale, you can ring up any of the first 20 items in your stock table just
by pressing one of the letter keys, A to T. A = 1st item, B = 2nd item, and so on. If you don't remember the first 20 items then just press [F1] first to display the first page of the stock table and then press the letter. See below.
In the second column is listed the letter key that you need to ring up a particular item. If when the stock table is displayed you press [PAGE DOWN] you will display the second page of the stock table and may use the letter keys to ring up anything on the second page. When any stock table page is displayed the letter keys will ring up an item from that page. If you do not display the stock table the letter keys will always ring up an item from the first page.
So which of your items should be the first 20 items in your stock table? The most popular items in your store or the hardest ones to ring up should be there. In my key shop the first 20 items in the stock table are the common keys and the little key rings. Because the little key rings are too small to put a price sticker / barcode on, and it is a lot easier to just press "M" rather that look up the stock number and then type in 254154 to ring up a 7/8" split ring.
Now the new part…
Groups
“Not a touch screen” can be enhanced further. When you press [F1] in a sale to display the stock table is it possible to first display a “menu” of similar items and then choose which section of the stock table you want to display next.
By using the GROUPS feature you can have the program display a menu of up to 20 'groups' like....
A. BREAKFAST ENTREE
B. LUNCH ENTREE
C. DINNER ENTREE
D. DRINKS
E. DESSERTS
If you then press 'D' a list of drinks will appear...
A. LARGE COLA
B. MEDIUM COLA
C. SMALL COLA
D. LARGE DIET COLA
E. MEDIUM DIET COLA
If you then press 'C' a SMALL COLA will be rung into the sale. If the item you want is not on the displayed page you can [PAGE DOWN] through DRINKS until you find the one you want. Up to 20 items per page.
You can even set it up so that this method is the default way of entering items into a sale rather than entering in stock numbers. This means that you can find and enter hundreds of different items into a sale by pressing only 2 keys on the keyboard, the first key to select the group and the second key to select the item.
For the program to actually do this you MUST arrange your stock table with all the items from the same group together. For example you would list all BREAKFAST ENTREES on lines 1 to 100, all LUNCH ENTREES on lines 101 to 200, etc. You can use any line to start a group that you want to. However during a sale the program will always begin displaying a group with a line that follows this formula "n X 20 + 1" in other words, lines 1, 21, 41, 61, 81, etc. would be at the top of the screen. If you have many items in your groups it is best to spread the start lines out like 1, 81, 161, 241 etc. Put the most popular items in a group at the beginning of the group, or use alphabetical order, or any order that makes sense to you.
To set up GROUPS go to the “Stock table” feature in the POSCONFG.EXE program. At the bottom of the screen it will say [F6] = Groups. Press [F6].
PRICE CHECK
If you are running networked cash registers you can place additional computers out on your sales floor that customers may use to check prices and quantities in stock on items you stock
To do this, connect additional computers to your network and run the program file LOOKUP.EXE. You must enter into the program the network PATH to the global folder on your server that holds your shared data files. It will be the exact same PATH that you entered into the “Network” feature of the POSCONFG.EXE program to set up each register to run over the network.
When you created your register you had to give your register a filename. You must also enter this filename into the LOOKUP.EXE program.
If you enter a password then the customers will not be able to exit this program or access its settings. When the program is actually looking up items press [ESC] to go to the program’s menu. If you have entered a password then you will have to enter it before you can leave the “Price check” screen.
You may enter up to 3 pages of instructions for your customers to follow to use this program to look up items. I do not know what computer equipment you will be providing so it is up to you to write the instructions. Will you be running this on a laptop or desktop computer? Will you be providing a scanner? Make sure you tell them to press [ENTER] after typing in a stock number. Tell them how to find the stock number on your items. Are you using price stickers with the stock numbers on them or are you using the barcode numbers as you stock numbers?
You may use the 3 pages of instructions to write really long detailed instructions or you can use each page to write instructions in different languages. For example use page #1 for instructions in English, page #2 for instructions in Spanish, and page #3 for instructions in Polish. Make sure that you tell the customers to press either [PAGE UP] or [PAGE DOWN] to access other pages. Of course if the other pages have instructions in different languages you would want to post that information on the current page in the language of the other pages like from the English page you would print…
[PAGE UP] = Instrucciones en Español [PAGE DOWN] = Instrukcja po Polsku
When entering instructions you can enter accented characters by first pressing [F3] to display the “Alternate character set.” Each character will have a 3 digit number to its left. To actually type in an alternate character hold down [ALT], use the numeric keypad on the right of your keyboard to type in the 3 digit code, and then when you release the [ALT] key the alternate character will appear in your text.
Once you have entered the required information you may select to “1. Go to the lookup screen.” Now customers can type in stock numbers to check on prices and quantities in stock.
New features in POS version 6.12
STOCK TABLE MENU
First a recap, the following feature has been part of the POS program from the beginning…
Not a "Touch Screen"
Some registers can use a "touch screen" feature where stock items are displayed on the screen and you ring them up by touching them on the screen. This of course requires a special touch sensitive monitor and special software to determine where the screen has been touched.
This Cash Register program will not do this, but it will do something almost as good and will not require special equipment to do it.
If your register uses a stock table, then when the program asks you for a stock number during a sale, you can ring up any of the first 20 items in your stock table just
by pressing one of the letter keys, A to T. A = 1st item, B = 2nd item, and so on. If you don't remember the first 20 items then just press [F1] first to display the first page of the stock table and then press the letter. See below.
In the second column is listed the letter key that you need to ring up a particular item. If when the stock table is displayed you press [PAGE DOWN] you will display the second page of the stock table and may use the letter keys to ring up anything on the second page. When any stock table page is displayed the letter keys will ring up an item from that page. If you do not display the stock table the letter keys will always ring up an item from the first page.
So which of your items should be the first 20 items in your stock table? The most popular items in your store or the hardest ones to ring up should be there. In my key shop the first 20 items in the stock table are the common keys and the little key rings. Because the little key rings are too small to put a price sticker / barcode on, and it is a lot easier to just press "M" rather that look up the stock number and then type in 254154 to ring up a 7/8" split ring.
Now the new part…
Groups
“Not a touch screen” can be enhanced further. When you press [F1] in a sale to display the stock table is it possible to first display a “menu” of similar items and then choose which section of the stock table you want to display next.
By using the GROUPS feature you can have the program display a menu of up to 20 'groups' like....
A. BREAKFAST ENTREE
B. LUNCH ENTREE
C. DINNER ENTREE
D. DRINKS
E. DESSERTS
If you then press 'D' a list of drinks will appear...
A. LARGE COLA
B. MEDIUM COLA
C. SMALL COLA
D. LARGE DIET COLA
E. MEDIUM DIET COLA
If you then press 'C' a SMALL COLA will be rung into the sale. If the item you want is not on the displayed page you can [PAGE DOWN] through DRINKS until you find the one you want. Up to 20 items per page.
You can even set it up so that this method is the default way of entering items into a sale rather than entering in stock numbers. This means that you can find and enter hundreds of different items into a sale by pressing only 2 keys on the keyboard, the first key to select the group and the second key to select the item.
For the program to actually do this you MUST arrange your stock table with all the items from the same group together. For example you would list all BREAKFAST ENTREES on lines 1 to 100, all LUNCH ENTREES on lines 101 to 200, etc. You can use any line to start a group that you want to. However during a sale the program will always begin displaying a group with a line that follows this formula "n X 20 + 1" in other words, lines 1, 21, 41, 61, 81, etc. would be at the top of the screen. If you have many items in your groups it is best to spread the start lines out like 1, 81, 161, 241 etc. Put the most popular items in a group at the beginning of the group, or use alphabetical order, or any order that makes sense to you.
To set up GROUPS go to the “Stock table” feature in the POSCONFG.EXE program. At the bottom of the screen it will say [F6] = Groups. Press [F6].
PRICE CHECK
If you are running networked cash registers you can place additional computers out on your sales floor that customers may use to check prices and quantities in stock on items you stock
To do this, connect additional computers to your network and run the program file LOOKUP.EXE. You must enter into the program the network PATH to the global folder on your server that holds your shared data files. It will be the exact same PATH that you entered into the “Network” feature of the POSCONFG.EXE program to set up each register to run over the network.
When you created your register you had to give your register a filename. You must also enter this filename into the LOOKUP.EXE program.
If you enter a password then the customers will not be able to exit this program or access its settings. When the program is actually looking up items press [ESC] to go to the program’s menu. If you have entered a password then you will have to enter it before you can leave the “Price check” screen.
You may enter up to 3 pages of instructions for your customers to follow to use this program to look up items. I do not know what computer equipment you will be providing so it is up to you to write the instructions. Will you be running this on a laptop or desktop computer? Will you be providing a scanner? Make sure you tell them to press [ENTER] after typing in a stock number. Tell them how to find the stock number on your items. Are you using price stickers with the stock numbers on them or are you using the barcode numbers as you stock numbers?
You may use the 3 pages of instructions to write really long detailed instructions or you can use each page to write instructions in different languages. For example use page #1 for instructions in English, page #2 for instructions in Spanish, and page #3 for instructions in Polish. Make sure that you tell the customers to press either [PAGE UP] or [PAGE DOWN] to access other pages. Of course if the other pages have instructions in different languages you would want to post that information on the current page in the language of the other pages like from the English page you would print…
[PAGE UP] = Instrucciones en Español [PAGE DOWN] = Instrukcja po Polsku
When entering instructions you can enter accented characters by first pressing [F3] to display the “Alternate character set.” Each character will have a 3 digit number to its left. To actually type in an alternate character hold down [ALT], use the numeric keypad on the right of your keyboard to type in the 3 digit code, and then when you release the [ALT] key the alternate character will appear in your text.
Once you have entered the required information you may select to “1. Go to the lookup screen.” Now customers can type in stock numbers to check on prices and quantities in stock.