Re: [WebERP-developers] POS

[Phil D. <ph...@lo...>]

I see it the same...

In a full retail management system - POS integrated to accounting back 
end - there is linker software that manages the queued transactions from 
the separate POS's to ensure that not a single transaction is lost and 
the network can be lost at any time or be over 9600bps and still result 
in all transactions from the POS getting back to the core.

So a new customer added at the POS must get back to webERP and there 
could be many POS's in operation all adding customers. The way to do 
this is to call Tim's add customer function through XMLRPC - this needs 
to be done from the java code of OpenBravoPOS.... if the network link is 
down and the function to the webERP API is not successful the change 
needs to be logged. Perhaps the easier way is to log all the changes 
using java to a local file and then run a PHP process against the file 
to the webERP API to do the updates.

Similarly sales made at the POS should be logged to perhaps the same 
file and processed in the same way through the webERP API... I am not 
sure if there is yet an API function to process a sale directly creating 
the order etc ... I could do this bit if needed.

I am surprised that sales are allowed without a product number?? The 
local POS stock would need to be maintained and if now unique identifier 
for stock exists I am not sure how effective the stock management in the 
local POS would be!

In a full retail management system you can see the stock at each POS 
throughout the country for a given item this would be data fed back from 
webERP and is of course changing constantly as sales are made at each POS.

If only half the job is done with the integration then we accept that 
the solution will never be ideal. Goals need to at least start to aim high.

We need someone who can write java to log transactions sales returns, 
receipts of stock, stock adjustments etc performed through the POS to a 
file recording a transaction id, the item code, the quantity, the 
date/time, the customer (if any specified). The file would also allow 
changes to customers or additions and deletions of customers to be 
logged as transactions
We can then run a PHP script on the file and process the transactions in 
webERP...

What about price changes, stock takes and stock adjustments in webERP 
.... we would need these to come down to the POS too. We would need some 
process on the webERP end to manage transactions against the POS stock 
location to be sent back to the POS. Also stock master changes and bar 
codes etc to be sent down to the POS.

It is not actually as easy as it sounds.

Phil


Janvl wrote:
> I see it like this:
>
> The producttable in POS is a copy of that in the ERP,
> so if you add a new product it must be done in the ERP and a sync must be
> done with the POS
>
> The customertable in POS is a copy of that in the ERP,
> so if you add a new customer it must be done in the ERP and a sync must be
> done with the POS
>
> Sales made in the POS WITH an productnumber will be brought to the ERP in
> batches, or through a transaction
>
> Sales made in the POS WITHOUT a productnumber must be treated different, not
> yet sure how
>
> Sales made on a customername must somehow be linked to the customers in ERP
>
> Stock will be maintained in the ERP, with the POS you can sell even with no
> stock available,
> so the inventory is better done inside the ERP.
>
>
> I once had a system in the hospital I used to work that used a
> "virtual-printer" to send 
> transaction-records to a system for X-ray results, sent to general
> practitioners. The POS has 
> the ability to define the output of certain events, so maybe this would be
> an option.
>
> Working in realtime would be nice but we must consider if the work to be
> done and the benefits to gain are in balance.
>
> Kind regards,
> Jan
>