This is a presentation of a textiles ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) system that I wrote. It shows what a single professional programmer can do. Analysis, Design, UX Design, Database Design, Programming, Testing, Implementation, Training, Maintenance, Iteratively and using Agile, before Agile was invented.

1. ODAcc Textile Factory System
By: My Power Station
Presentation by: David Lipschitz
21st April 2017
The ODACC system is open sourced, and is
designed and mostly written by David Lipschitz.

2. Objectives of Presentation
• Open Source
• Help you with your programming
• Start a discussion
• Help get an understanding of the
complexities of Textile & Factory Software

3. Textile Processes Computerised
• Stock Control
• Stock Tracking, Lot # Tracking
• Warehouse Management (Bar-coded)
• Sales Order Processing
• Planning
• Multi-Currency Invoicing
• Reporting and Analysis

4. Overall Requirements
• To provide instant information on the status
of all stocks
• to increase sales
• reduce lead-times to the customer
• reduce all stocks and work in progress
• provide order requirements information for
each process
• improve materials management
• historical knowledge

5. Critical Success Factors
• No writing as an objective of the system
• user acceptance
• accurate recording

6. Essential Factory Functions
• Materials Management
• Operations Management
• Planning

7. Experience Gained
• To reduce errors, each process needs its
own unique program
• because of this, a background OLAP (on-
line analytical processing) transaction file
system is required to facilitate an increase in
the speed of reporting

8. Major Problems Solved (1)
• Work in progress management
• Work Breakdown Structures or Bill of
Materials
• “fixed weight” pallets (eg 25 bags of 30kgs each)
• consumption reporting
• ‘onwards in process or return to warehouse’
• materials taken out of the process (factory)
and sent to the dye-house, etc

9. Major Problems Solved (2)
• efficiency calculations
• OLAP reporting and reasons
• refinishing
• returns
• lot number tracking
• ordering and receiving different quantities
• sales orders and despatching different
quantities

10. Major Problems Solved (3)
• measuring what happened, eg to a warp
• demand planning based on orders, stock on
hand, estimated despatch date
• planning using a pull system (orders create
activity)
• planning without using MRP
• heuristic planning
• multiple warps or wefts per piece

11. Major Problems Solved (4)
• multiple products per warp
• multiple finishes per warp
• cutting a fabric into pieces & tracking
• bar code printing using serial
communications(different printers programmed)
• scanning using keyboard wedge devices and
Psion Workabouts(remote scanning).

12. Performance Improvements (1)
• If end of month stock take is required, it
takes one day with scanners and is 100%
accurate due to systems and processes used
• stock take reporting
– before production management system:
spreadsheets were used: took 2 weeks (~70%
accuracy)
– after system, took 3 days
– after OLAP, takes 3 hours (100% accuracy)

13. Performance Improvements (2)
• accurate consumption reports
• exact stock: 2 central problems solved
– if the system says the stock is in the warehouse,
it is!
– if the system says we haven’t got the stock, we
haven’t got it!
• fast picking(housekeeping means we know where the stock is)
• limited writing leads to recording, accuracy
and speed improvements

14. Performance Improvements (3)
• From order to despatch time took between 2 and 6
weeks on average before the ODAcc system.
Although stock was kept, it was difficult to track
and in many cases products were only made when
an order was received
• after implementation of the ODAcc system, 80%
of despatches are done the same day as the order
or on the estimated despatch date given to the
customer when the order is received.

15. Performance Improvements (4)
• soon after going live with the picking
program, we received a very large order at
10am and despatched it the same day
• orders leave the warehouse on estimated
despatch dates
• many differing kinds of reports can now be
produced which couldn’t be done before, eg
average sales per month, suggested
minimum stock requirements

16. Performance Improvements (5)
• planning took 2 to 3 days and was done
manually once per week. Any orders
received would have to wait until the next
plan was done
• planning now takes 2 to 3 hours and can be
done as often as required. Mixes can be
changed quickly and differing scenarios can
be looked at.

17. “Factory Dictionary”
• As part of the training of users and the
development of the system, a dictionary of
terms showing the jargon of the factory was
created. This “factory dictionary” or
nomenclature facilitates a common ground
in order to accommodate clear and precise
communication between users, management
and developers.

18. Factory Dictionary Examples
• Delivery: of goods from supplier
• Despatch: of goods to customer
• Receipt: of SKU from factory to warehouse
or to computer system if WIP
• Issue: of SKU from warehouse to factory
• Fibre Classification: Flock, Carded, Drawn,
Blended
• Weaving (required to weave), Woven,
Finished, Piece, Slit

19. Textile Factory Material Flow

20. Bar Code System Fabric (1)

21. Bar Code System Fabric (2)

22. Bar Code System Fabric (3)

23. Bar Code System Fabric (4)

24. Bar Code System Fabric (5)

25. Bar Code System Raw Materials

26. Systems Written
• Spinning factory
• weaving factory incl. sales order processing,
picking, palletising, despatching
• multi-currency (export) invoicing
• loom loading planning
• spinning planning
• administration & audit system incl. pricing
• user privilege manager

27. System Menus
• The following nine screens show the system
menus:

28. Spinning Menus’ Slide Show

29. Weaving Menus’ Slide Show

30. Multi-Currency Invoicing

31. Loom Loading Planning

32. Spinning Planning

33. Administration & Audit System

34. User Privilege Manager

35. Computerised Processes (1)
• Deliveries:
– order goods
– receive goods
– bar-code and warehouse (put-away) goods
– manage returns to suppliers
– manage issues and receipts from sub-
contractors (e.g. dye houses)

36. Computerised Processes (2)
• Deliveries (continued):
– manage discrepancies between ordered and
received quantities
– allow multiple deliveries for an order
– manage breakdown of totals
• total delivery
• pallet totals
• box / carton / bale totals

37. Computerised Processes (3)
• Warehouse To/From Spinning Factory:
– issue to factory (to any stage of production!)
– receive from factory (at any stage of production!)
– create fibre lot numbers
– create yarn lot numbers
– issue raw materials and yarn to factory
– receive raw materials, processed raw materials
and yarn from factory

38. Computerised Processes (4)
• Warehouse To/From Spinning Factory (cont.):
– issue yarn to be processed, eg into fancy yarn
or warps
– bill of materials and consumption management
– WIP Management
– waste management
– issue and receive yarn for assembly, twisting,
warping preparation, warping, beaming

39. Computerised Processes (5)
• Spinning Factory To Customer Despatches:
– yarn despatches
• Spinning to Weaving Factory Despatches:
– yarn despatches for weft yarn
– warp yarn despatches for warp yarn
• At Weaving Factory:
– deliveries of weft yarn
– deliveries of warps (incl warp lot numbers and warp
statistics)

40. Computerised Processes (6)
• Weaving Production:
– weaving (fabric planned to weave)
– woven (entered per greige (unfinished) per day)
– finished (multiple per greige)
– cut / slit (multiple per finish)

41. Computerised Processes (7)
• Despatching:
– sales order processing
– picking
– palletising
– despatching
– invoicing
– multi-currency invoicing

42. Computerised Processes (8)
• Loom Loading Planning
– planning per loom
– drag and drop planning
– planning based on order dates, stocks,
minimum stock requirements
– automatic checking that warps run on correct
looms and reeds
– automatic checking that weft jobs run on
correct warp jobs
– report on warp and weft yarn required

43. Computerised Processes (9)
• Spinning Planning
– planning per group of spinning machines
– automatic checking that correct jobs run on
correct machine groups
– report on fibre and other bill of materials
requirements

44. Textile System Costs
• all the systems are available excluding or
including source code
• separate module quotes available on request
• implementation assistance is available
• programming is available
• maintenance contracts can be arranged

45. Consultancy
• David Lipschitz is available on a
consultancy basis to help with:
– implementation
– problem solving
– stock control, tracking and accuracy projects
– reporting, OLAP & data mining
– other textile factory and stock control computer
problems

46. Knowledge Transfer
• In all our projects we will:
– 1) transfer knowledge from ourselves to you (our
clients);
– 2) create processes and systems that allow you to work
without us;
– 3) when writing software, write it so that it is:
maintainable, expandable, understandable;
– 4) when training you, ensure that each individual has a
foundation in place so that you can "work without
getting stuck”.

47. Technical Section
• Entity Relationship Diagrams (ERD’s)
• Database Structure (DDL)
• Forms
• Reports
• Source Code

48. Database ERD’s
• Raw materials, purchasing and spinning
factory ERD (Entity Relationship Diagram)
• weaving factory system ERD
• despatch ERD
• planning ERD
• These will be published

49. Database Structure (DDL)
• DDL (database definition language)
including tables, triggers, stored procedures,
exceptions, primary keys, foreign keys,
views, generators and any other database
components: will be published

50. Database Statistics

51. System Forms
• Approximately 197 forms in the
applications will be published free of charge

52. List of Reports
• There are ~ 308 ReportSmith® reports in
the applications
• the list of reports will be published
• report source code will be published

53. Source Code
• The source code is available and will be
found on GitHub

54. Demonstrations
• System demonstrations can be provided and
online demonstrations will be created
• If you wish us to do a presentation at your
site, the following terms apply:
– payment of disbursements, eg travel,
accommodation
– payment of a daily rate

55. System Development Steps
• Analyse requirements
• choose hardware, operating system,
network infrastructure, database,
programming tools
• design processes
• write system
• implement system
• maintain system

56. Maintenance Requirements
• “The system must have a zero maintenance
requirement on a monthly basis as there will
be no technical computer people on hand.
This means that the chosen system must
manage itself, that the software must be bug
free and at the same time easy to maintain.”
- David Lipschitz, 1995

57. System Implementation (1)
– System implementation deals with getting the
system going
• overall parameters: factory name; invoicing
companies
• currencies
• users
• week numbers
• working hours

58. System Implementation (2)
• product categories
• units of measurement and units of receipt of
goods
• terms
• agents
• departments
• suppliers
• customers

59. System Implementation (3)
• raw material products
• OLAP system work in progress control
accounts and reporting groups
• prices: stock; standard; various sales types

60. System Implementation (4)
• Yarn Maintenance
– efficiency groups
– yarn kind (eg: basic, colour, fancy, etc)
– yarn structure (tex / count, twist)
– yarn colour
– yarn type (kind + structure + twist + colour = type)
– yarn bill of materials

61. System Implementation (5)
• Loom Maintenance
– loom type (incl: tappet, dobby, jaquard)
– loom specification (specification for each loom)
– warp type (incl: reed, length, ends, yarn types)
– warp colour (colours for each warp type)

62. System Implementation (6)
• Fabric Maintenance
– fabric width
– fabric structure (incl warp type, greige & finished lengths)
– structure on type (looms each fabric runs on)
– finish types
– stock minima (incl automatic calc or manual override)
– quality types

63. System Implementation (7)
• enter all orders
• enter all raw materials received from
suppliers
• enter all materials received from factory
• enter all yarns
• enter all warp and weaving work in progress
• enter all fabrics

64. David Lipschitz
BSc (Honours), MBA, Textile Certificate,
Reiki Master, Tai Chi Instructor,
NABCEP PV Associate
• analysed & designed all aspects of the textile
system from purchasing through bar-coded
warehouse management, production management,
sales order processing, picking and despatching
• Programmed a substantial part of the system
relying on contractors for components and the
visual loom loading system

65. My Power Station and ODAcc
• Distinctive competency (strengths that set the
organisation apart from its competitors):
– ODAcc designed specifically for textile
companies
– we understand textiles inside out from both user
and development points of view
– we own the whole system, and it is open source
– ideal: system should be available 100% of the
time; downtime only required for planned
maintenance or hardware failure

66. Separate (Live) Databases
• Spinning
• Weaving
• Planning

67. ODACC
Textile Factory System
My Power Station was formerly
called Orbital Decisions