Your time is important too – Part II
Yeah, I know it’s a dirty trick. While I try not to watch much TV, I have seen some shows that just before they have the big reveal they go to commercial. I realized when writing this that I am now a contributing member to this added drama.
As I mentioned yesterday, we have some big items to reveal in the Analysis Functions of SMS Advanced in V10.0. I’m using this post to show the big changes we have put into the Equation Based Analysis tool. This tool is commonly used for creating prescriptions for items such as fertilizer, seed and crop protection products. It has a wealth of other uses as well, but I’ll focus today on the changes we have made in v10.0 to the Equation Editor.
We felt like we had a lot of unused screen real estate, so we started by making all the dialogs larger. This allows us to provide more descriptions as well as cut down on some of the screens needed to create the functions. The Equation Editor dialog (see below) has now been condensed so that you can see all the items on the main screen. Now you can add variables, constants, comments and math functions all from the same dialog.
We have added two wizard options (see above, Range Wizard & Logic Wizard buttons) to assist you in creating the equations. The Logic Wizard helps you to build “if/then” statements; this means you don’t have to know how to structure the equation. You simply put in the variables and the values, and the wizard does the rest. We also added the Range Wizard for range-based equations. So if you have a equation that is based on pH from 5.0 – 5.5 and 5.5 –6.0, you only need to put in the value range numbers and the result desired, and your equation is ready to go.
Last but certainly not least, we have added the ability to generate multiple prescriptions (or datasets) in one function. For example, if you routinely create a prescription for MAP, and Potash, and Lime for your data, you used to have to have three separate functions saved. You can now have them combined into one function. If you use the function for one field, you will receive a prescription for each product desired. This also means that if you have prompts (such as yield goals) the same yield goal can be used in each function, which cuts down on potential entry errors. Combine this with our ability to run with our Multiple Fields option (previously known as Run Batch), you can have all your prescriptions created for your fields with minimal effort.
Along with several other improvements, we have increased the speed in order to process equations faster – what used to take minutes now only takes seconds. We hope that all the improvements are beneficial for you and make you more productive during times of the year when you need it the most.