A Labour of Love

Ten years on, and TaskMaster is still not finished? Well, it’s all a question of evolution. I have recently changed the format of equipment Control Numbers to improve usability. For example, from ECG-A-01 to ECG-01-001, to increase types from 26 to 99 possibilities, and instances of each type from 99 to 999. Good-bye, then, to Chacko Zard’s original format dating back to 1990.

At present, TM .exe runs only in a late DOS environment (ie, DOS with extended memory etc.). It gives “too many files open” messages if run in a Windows “DOS box”. Now I have to re-visit TaskMaster source code once again to get it to run readily in a “modern environment”. This will mean revision of the LoadFile procedure in FTM.prg and drastic changes in all forms. But it can be done, and it will prolong the usefulness of the original DOS version of TaskMaster.

This all came up again recently when I was emailed by an engineer studying the concept of “Risk-Centred Maintenance”. I sent him a zipped copy of TaskMaster by email attachment, as it contains an implementation of some of the risk-centred maintenance principles, including automatic PM interval adjustment etc.

Once all this has been hacked, I will need to update the Windows version of TaskMaster (written in Visual FoxPro) also. A true labour of love.

The TaskMaster Saga

TaskMaster is the name given to a medical equipment maintenance management system project developed over the years by the Greybeard. Initially DOS-based, a Windows version is available for those who insist on following the herd. These days, the DOS version is used mainly for prototyping and demonstrative purposes.

The concepts used in TaskMaster have continued to evolve and unfold on-and-off at various times and places since 1975, when a much younger Greybeard first worked as a biomedical engineer. Since those days he has endeavoured to organize and improve every workshop he has worked in - tried to “do something simple rather than do nothing complicated”.

Firstly, thanks are due to Boboy Legara for introducing dBASE, Alex Barcelona for enthusing about Fox, and Chacko Zard for the original Control Number idea. This was back in 1990 when a system was quickly developed (in dBASE IV) for use on an equipment maintenance contract with the Saudi Ministry of Health. This early effort was later refined a little at Al-Baha, as time permitted, and became known as “WorkMaster”. Although this was a vast improvement on the original, visually at least, it was not taken further as Greybeard “left” the company shortly afterwards!

During 1992, whilst working in North London, the Greybearded one put together a simple and easy-to-use system using WAMPUM, a shareware menu-driven database program. This was called WTM (for WAMPUM TaskMaster), and showed what could be done for only £ 79 (...plus development time). It actually worked well and founded the principles later developed further in TaskMaster (thanks from this period are due to Tony Grimmett. His system was the basis of the simple “Job Status details” feature found within the TaskMaster "Jobs" screen form).

Back in Saudi Arabia in 1993, an improved version of WorkMaster (visually cleaner, with dBASE IV pop-up menus) was put to good use on an O&M contract at another MOH hospital, this time at Unayzah. This was improved further when version 2 of dBASE IV became available at Al-Khobar. From 1995, the style of the program was completely reviewed and was re-written in FoxPro 2.5. The best features from the two earlier styles were combined and to mark this major change.

A paper by Capuano and Koritko, published in the Jan/Feb 1996 issue of “Biomedical Instrumentation and Technology”, described a practical approach to PM activity based upon need and perceived risk of failure (rather than the traditional date-oriented method, which is often wasteful of time and resources). In October 1997, then, the Greybeard incorporated this approach into TaskMaster. Thanks are due to these two Canadian Biomedical Engineers for their contribution.

TaskMaster aims to be simple, robust, intuitive and as practical as it can be. It tries to do the job without fuss or frills. As Theodore Roosevelt once said, “do what you can, with what you have, where you are!” Most of the coding for TaskMaster 1.0 was done in FoxPro 2.5 for DOS. FoxPro 2.6 was used since it became available in the desert in late 1996, and an excellent tool it has been! TaskMaster was declared substantially "finished" at Al-Khobar on 5 August 1996, although a “final” intense session took place during Ramadan (January) 1997. At this stage, it was estimated to have been the result of at least 1,000 hours of coding.

Notwithstanding the above, development of TaskMaster has proceeded occasionally as a “labour of love” and in an ad-hoc manner. The present program hand probably represents its final form as Microsoft has chosen not to continue developing FoxPro for the DOS platform. Greybeard has also carried out TaskMaster experiments in various issues of Visual FoxPro (ie, a Windows implementation) and dBASE 5 for DOS.

This DOS version of the program is offered as “freeware” (or “cheapware” if further involvement is required of the Greybeard, who remains very flexible regarding the availability of source code and re-coding for special projects - everything being negotiable in the normal Saudi way!) He declares that it was TaskMaster (and his other programming projects) that kept him sane during his ten long years of exile in the Magic Kingdom. So TaskMaster has proved its value, if only for that!

TaskMaster 1.0 is the work of the Greybeard, who can be contacted by email at mailto:medelis@hotmail.co.uk

The Windows version of the TaskMaster Jobs Records form. Note that the earlier Control Number format is being used.

This is a test!

Coding in the desert (Al-Hasa 2003). Looks like TaskMaster on the left-hand screen.

Just a Thought

Does the bee reminisce about wonderful honey from days gone by?

Discuss!

There are two kinds of people in the world - people who annoy me and people I haven't met yet!

Individual Declaration of Independence

This "Draft Manifesto" (or something like it) was doing the rounds a few years ago (it's not bad):-

1) Avoid eating anything that comes in a packet.
2) Avoid buying anything that comes in a box.
3) Avoid owning anything that uses "disposable" batteries.
4) Avoid using a car (...walk, bike, or take a bus!).
5) Avoid flying. Jet aircraft are extremely polluting in every sense.
6) Grow your own vegetables, or better still, learn how to farm!
7) Avoid money transactions - use barter! Support the "alternative economy".
8) Refuse to become a victim (...by living life on your own terms).
9) Avoid having a bank account or "credit" cards.
10) Avoid taxation.
11) "Work" as little as possible, as much as necessary.

Justice for the People!

Believe in cold and unemotional justice. Believe in the humbling of the guilty by due process of the law.

"Do as be done by. The rest is commentary" ... meaning that an entire body of law (... beginning with the Ten Commandments) can be summarised in these five words.

"Live and let live" is as good a mantra as any.

The Will to Survive is Strong

The older you get, the more it seems that the name of the game is to survive as best you can. But, when all else fails, it’s best to break life down into simple tasks and do them one at a time. That's the basics:-

Drinking and eating
Sleeping
Visiting the bathroom

When things are really getting you down, take things from one cup of tea to the next!

It doesn't make sense to live and work in the UK – we’re better off living in a place where the pace and cost of living is more to our taste (…not to mention the weather!).

So what do we want to do? ... :-

Live quietly on our own terms.
Life out our life in peace, ease and comfort, working on the computer, on-line to the rest of the world.
Attain and preserve inner peace and outer freedom.

The Muse is Good News

Sometimes I can search for the muse and find it. Other times I may as well switch off the machine and go to kip! The muse is the poet's inspiration. In Greek and Roman mythology, these were the nine goddesses who inspired creative people to produce work of quality. Poetry, music, writing and other forms of art. Now we can add great hardware and software hacks.

I find that I can sometimes attract one of the nine upon rising from my slumber and, if free of other commitments (which is usually the snag, and one of the reasons that I really need to attain freedom of time), can then really hit the groove to the extent that I have to "find a place to stop" in order to service the biosystem (ie, for bodily needs like a cup of tea and a sandwich, and visiting the bathroom).

However, I have to be careful, for once interrupted I sometimes "loose the muse" and then that's it for the rest of the day. But sometimes if I'm lucky, and really being smiled down upon, I am given a second chance to pick one of them up after coming back from a run - then the problem becomes finding time to take a shower!

Keep It Simple!

For our purposes, the well-known mothers' scold "Just don't just sit there - do something!" might be better turned into "just don't do something - sit there!"

Look after Number One! The secret of contentment is stripping away all the non-essentials and getting down to the basics in life. Thank the Master (God, or whichever imaginary omnipotent you prefer) for every morning that your head rises from the pillow and endeavour to enjoy every day whatever you are doing. It's the little things that really matter. Sometimes less really is more. Just go for it and do as you please.

Not only take the time to sniff the roses, but enjoy the summer one flower at a time! Alos, take a cue from the migrating birds and winter in a warm place if you possibly can.

Simplify your life (and I mean drastically). You are better off without possessions (remember John Lennon's "Imagine"). In actual fact, possessions are a nuisance and it's very true that when you have nothing you have nothing to loose! I remember the anguish I felt in Saudi Arabia about what to do with all my stuff. And this was after years of what others would regard as very frugal living. And at least two major clear-outs in the years before that. At the end I either threw out or gave away many of the "indispensable" things that I had been ready to bin, but then put back again, over and over again. A complete waste of sleeping-time!

Get down to the absolute basics in terms of clothes and other personal gear. Live like a soldier. Limit yourself to two bags. Get your toolkits down to the most efficient minimum. Yes, I know it's a challenge. Rationalise your computer stuff. Throw the rest out or give it away!