Hi...I've been looking for a model train inventory app for my android galaxy s 4g phone. Currently I use a PC based program Called "Yard Office" to manage my rolling stock and locomotives. And have the same problem as others...carrying around printed list of what I "have", to the train shows I attend. An android app would be great and something I would certainly buy. The "Yard Office Model Railroad Inventory Software" "www.musicmixradio.com/yardoffice/" seems to have all the features I've looked for. It also allows you to customize and create fields and incorporate pics into the descriptions of your pieces. An app should be able to be synced between the phone app and the PC. My phone has a 32G SD card installed, so being able to save the pics of the stock to the SD Card would be great. Good luck, hope you come up with something.
Stephen...Toronto, Ontario
Stephen - Welcome to trains.com!
Darren (BLHS & CRRM Lifetime Member)
Delaware and Hudson Virtual Museum (DHVM), Railroad Adventures (RRAdventures)
My Blog
A switchlist app might be cool, but to be real, you want hardcopy switch lists. Can smart phones drive printers? Unless everyone participating in the operating session has a smart phone running the switchlist app, you need hardcopy.
A truly successful switchlist app would address the setup problem. Down at the club, before each operating session, we needed a small crew to go around the layout and spot cars, by car reporting mark, at each spur, siding, and yard track. That used up an entire evening before each op session. Then the computer generated switchlists could work. A switch list that says "Move box car BM45657 from yard track 8 to G.Willikers Machine Co siding" only works if car BM45657 is standing on yard track 8 when the op session begins.
I might actually make use of a units conversion app in the shop. It would quickly answer such questions as "What size wire (sized in thousands of an inch) represents a 2" pipe in HO" Or "What size planking does 1/16" scribed sheet wood represent in HO?" For extra credit the app would understand sizes given in American Wire Gauge, as well as inches or millimeters. It would gracefully handle dimensions given as decimals, fractions, feet and inches, metric, and miles. For even more credit the app would have a copper wire table built into it, and be able figure ohms given wire gauge and length.
I wouldn't bother with a rolling stock inventory app. I use Excel, I have Excel, I've used Excel for years and know it well, Excel is extremely powerful, fully able to solve any rolling stock inventory problem.
David Starr www.newsnorthwoods.blogspot.com
Thanks Darren.... Appreciate the welcome.
Some Smartphones can send to printers. Apple ones can, and HP printers can accept the connection. A switchlist though would be better on a tablet-size device, no need to print it then, and you could do things like tap and drag a car around ont he screen as you switch them.
I repeat my idea, that "any day now" I will get workign on, and that is to interface with the PC inventory program I already use so instead of having a thick bundle of paper printouts of my inventory to take to train shows, I can just use my tablet to quickly check if I already have an item I see, and if not, add it to the inventory right there when I buy it. When I get home - sync to the PC and everythign is up to date. Does bring something else in mind, I've been looking at goign directly from database to database, but there are plenty of portable apps that can handle Excel files, and I can import/export Excel from the Access-based inventory program...might make it way easier.
--Randy
Modeling the Reading Railroad in the 1950's
Visit my web site at www.readingeastpenn.com for construction updates, DCC Info, and more.
I have been wanting to put up my update on my app for some time now, but have had the time. I am basically building a data base which will contain data for all the industries on the layout, and then one for the data of all of the cars on the layout.
For the industries I am collecting data like Industry Name, Location, Product Type, Car Types, Industry type, No. of Tracks, No. of Cars and Cars per session.
For the Cars I am collection; Reporting Number, Content, Capacity, Is Full, Is on RIP, Destination and Current Location.
From this I plan to create the switchlist with the press of a button. As smartphones are most common the Switchlist display screen will be able to scroll both side to side and up and down, so that you can move left to right to see all of the data fields and the font size will still be large enough to read on the phone. I also plan on making it so that once the list is generated it would be up to the engineer to then input the reporting numbers of the cars added to the train, but the car slot/row will be able to be moved up or down to put it into the correct order.
As cars are dropped off and picked up the list will be able to be edited accordingly. All of the cars after they are entered into the data base will be able to be viewed in a list which will scroll up and down and new cars will be able to be added to this list be pressing an add button, or existing cars will be able to be edited if needed.
I plan on making it so that initial input will be able to be done on a computer and then uploaded to the device.
I only have a couple of weeks left in my class and my progress has not been as good as I had hoped, due to issues with the program used to build the app. I have found that it is not as intuitive as some similar application development tools are, such as Visual Basic. Even if i don't have a completely working app by the end of the class I will continue to work on it so I can get a fully working first version out to anybody who would be interested to be a beta tester for me.
If anyone has any questions or suggestions, it is not to late to voice your ideas, especially if you feel that there needs to be more data for either the industries or the rolling stock or both.
Thanks for the comments.
Is there anything available to build a touch screen control panel using an ipad and dcc controlled turnout motors?
Bill
What about an app to controls trains on a DCC system.
bagal Is there anything available to build a touch screen control panel using an ipad and dcc controlled turnout motors? Bill
Already available as part of JMRI.
Bryan B What about an app to controls trains on a DCC system.
Also already available as part of JMRI.
I'm up for Beta testing!
:-)
please contact me.
Regards M Graff.
Swedish Custom painter and model maker. My Website:
My Railroad
My Youtube:
Graff´s channel
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steinjr Scale speed calculator - enter how many cars and what length cars you want to use for checking, press or click something when first car arrive at some point, second press or click when last of the given number of cars pass the point, calculate scale speed.
Scale speed calculator - enter how many cars and what length cars you want to use for checking, press or click something when first car arrive at some point, second press or click when last of the given number of cars pass the point, calculate scale speed.
Stein, actually, on the iOS platform (that sounds funny...), there already are apps for:
ModelSpeed - press once to start timer, then as the loco/car passes a 10 inch from starting mark, press again. The one I have, allows you to change the scale, length covered, and what unit of measurement is used.
Scale Calc - input original/prototype dimension and output scale length (you can enter the bottom of the fraction, e.g., 87.100, etc.)
Also, Dallas Model Works has online programs (and if you made something in an app, that would be more useful for me/my needs) for a random/'hotbox detector', and train inventory.
Also, for those using Macs, Filemaker.com has an iOS app for their Bento database program (which is less complicated than their Filemaker product), which I use to keep my inventory list with me when visiting LHS'es, train shows, etc. The Bento mobile version can be synced using WiFi between one's Mac and the iPhone/iPad/iPodTouch.
You also could search most mobile app stores with MRR-related words, like railroad, 'model railroad', etc. (Hobby may be too general, and give you quilting and other non-MRR apps) to see what apps are out there.
Hope that helps you some.
Jim in Cape G.
JimRCGMO [ steinjr: Scale speed calculator - enter how many cars and what length cars you want to use for checking, press or click something when first car arrive at some point, second press or click when last of the given number of cars pass the point, calculate scale speed. Stein, actually, on the iOS platform (that sounds funny...), there already are apps for: ModelSpeed - press once to start timer, then as the loco/car passes a 10 inch from starting mark, press again. The one I have, allows you to change the scale, length covered, and what unit of measurement is used. Scale Calc - input original/prototype dimension and output scale length (you can enter the bottom of the fraction, e.g., 87.100, etc.) Also, Dallas Model Works has online programs (and if you made something in an app, that would be more useful for me/my needs) for a random/'hotbox detector', and train inventory. Also, for those using Macs, Filemaker.com has an iOS app for their Bento database program (which is less complicated than their Filemaker product), which I use to keep my inventory list with me when visiting LHS'es, train shows, etc. The Bento mobile version can be synced using WiFi between one's Mac and the iPhone/iPad/iPodTouch. You also could search most mobile app stores with MRR-related words, like railroad, 'model railroad', etc. (Hobby may be too general, and give you quilting and other non-MRR apps) to see what apps are out there. Hope that helps you some.
steinjr: Scale speed calculator - enter how many cars and what length cars you want to use for checking, press or click something when first car arrive at some point, second press or click when last of the given number of cars pass the point, calculate scale speed.
Nah. I don't need any of this stuff - I can do simple 4th grade math in my head (and have a calculator on my phone to back me up when I feel lazy), and I have a memory (and a couple of fairly small layouts), so I know what I own and what I look for when shopping for stuff.
These were just suggestions for simple apps the OP could program for his first phone app project in class, instead of starting with a switch-list generator, while knowing next to nothing about either MR ops or programming phone apps.
But these suggestions may very well be useful for some of the other readers.
Smile, Stein