2. Setting up
Everything in this chapter is done once, and most of it is the kind of decision that is cheap now and expensive later. Take an afternoon.
Your company
Each company is a tenant with its own address: yourcompany.foudra.com. Its settings hold three numbering formats — for parts, purchase orders and work orders — and a default currency. The part number format is the important one: {category}-{stock}-{version} with six-digit stock numbers and two-digit versions gives 902-000123-00. Decide this before entering a single part, because the part number is what every other record points at.
People and roles
Add users from Users (admin). Give each the least role that lets them do their job — see the roles table. A useful default: everyone who touches stock is an operator; whoever decides what to buy and make is a planner; one or two admins who can approve orders and manage users. Buttons the role does not allow are hidden, and the server enforces the rule regardless of what a browser sends.
Categories
The first segment of every part number. Decide the scheme now: it is baked into numbers and should not change once parts exist. Two conventions that work:
- Sections for grouping —
S100 Components,S300 Manufactured— which hold no parts, and numeric categories under them —902 Electronics,310 Welded subassemblies— which do. - A category per kind of thing, not per product. Fasteners are a category whether they go into boats or bikes.
Stock numbers are allocated per category, so 000001 exists in every category. Set a default part type on each category and New part pre-fills it. See Categories.
Locations
Where stock physically is. Nest them — WH1 › WH1-A › WH1-A-03 — as deep as you will actually use; stock is counted at the location named, and an on-hand figure is always per location. Then add the virtual ones that exist for the books:
| Location | Kind | For |
|---|---|---|
GOODS-IN |
virtual | Received, not yet put away |
QC |
virtual | Awaiting inspection, or going back to a supplier |
WIP-… |
virtual | On the bench, per area |
SCRAP |
virtual | Written off, but you want to see it |
You will use fewer than you think. Start with a warehouse, a couple of areas, goods-in and scrap. See Locations.
Units and money
Quantities carry four decimal places: 2.5 metres of tube and 0.012 kg of filament are fine. Money is never a float. Standard costs are in the company currency; a purchase order is in the supplier's currency with a rate frozen onto the order — you will meet this in purchasing.
Next: your parts.