Hi – I think it would be useful if the Batch Prefix (adding when creating a new batch) could be defaulted to the Beer Code (added when a new beer is entered into the system). We use the same nomenclature/value for both. This would eliminate someone who is creating the batch from having to remember what the beer code is. I have to imagine that the Batch Prefix is usually the same for each distinct beer and that the batch number varies.
And on a related note, could numerals be allowed in both? As it stands, batch prefix does not allow for any numbers. I’m pretty sure Beer Code is the same. I don’t see the logic in limiting these fields to just letters.
Thanks for the suggestion. I’m sure we could look at the batch prefix defaulting to the beer code, but there are some complications to this.
As you mention, the batch prefix must be letters only; however, the beer code can have numbers as well. The reason the batch prefix must be letters only is to allow Breww to easily split it up into the two components, which is required in some situations. For example, if you had a batch code of ABC123, we can currently always know that ABC is the prefix and 123 is the number. If you could have numbers in the batch code, then you could have a prefix of ABC1 and if the batch code was ABC123, we wouldn’t be able to know if ABC was the prefix, if it was ABC1, or even ABC12 (with a number of just 3). This limitation is currently in Breww for good reasons, and so changing this would be a significant task (it’s doable, but it’s not just a case of removing a restriction). For this reason, having the batch prefix match the beer code would require the beer code to be letters only, which isn’t currently a restriction.
There is also the consideration that the batch prefix is (currently) entered into the form before the beer so we may need to think about this from a user-experience point of view.
If anyone else would like to see this, leave give this thread a vote with the button in the top-left
You should use a more definitive method or character as a way to parse data such as a ‘-’ which I think would be less error prone and allow alphanumeric entry. Likely a much bigger change though.
Thanks, yes, there are a number of possible ways around this, but as you say, they’re all a much bigger change than just removing the letter-only restriction. We cannot really go forcing a dash to be in the middle of all batch codes, to be honest, as I’m sure many customers wouldn’t want this, and we certainly cannot go changing previous batch codes that will have been printed on labels, etc to add a dash. The existing solution isn’t error-prone, but you’re right that we’d need to find another solution if we were to allow numbers in the prefix
This thread popped up as I was typing a Feature Request, not exactly the same but very close. The way it works right now when creating a batch, the “Beer Code” is, for most users, going to be a prefix that identifies the beer, and then Breww automatically assigns a number which is sequentially one more than the last time that beer code was used, like LAGER1, LAGER2, to give an idea of what iteration of that beer was just brewed. The issue described in this feature request from last month is true for us too, there’s no drop-down etc so the user must simply remember what Beer Code was used last time this beer was brewed, or maintain a list outside of Breww. If the user gets that piece wrong, Breww will start over with a different sequence. I guess I’d suggest somehow standardizing that, either with a drop down pulling data from the Beers, or @christopher-tkach suggested, somehow just assigning that prefix based on existing data rather than having the user select.
