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Fairport News

Historical FTI news articles and PRESS RELEASES
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JUNE 2010
Fairport News
Email: mail@fairport.com.au T: 08 93675814 F: 08 93675823	PO Box 1046 South Perth Western Australia
IN THIS ISSUE Welcome Roger’s Ramblings Staff Matters Henry’s News What’s New? Dealer News  In Closing
Welcome
Welcome to all our new and existing clients and especially those of you reading the Fairport News for the first time!    We’re having a very dry (less than a third of the average) and cold June here in Perth, Western Australia.  Let's hope things are better where you are. <<TOP>>
Roger's Ramblings
This newsletter’s mainly dominated by a wrap-up of events keeping Henry, our man in the US, occupied. The past 3 months have kept the Fairport development team busy on some long awaited enhancements to PAM and Max Pro. We have also made a start on another the long awaited process, the re-writing of the Pocket PAM suite of software. We have had quite a lot of new and renewed interest in Pocket PAM in recent months, so I think our timing for this rewrite is good. Unfortunately, often other jobs take precedence over thisone, so it is impossible to predict when it will be ready for release ... so stay tuned for more news later in the year. (Hopefully this year!). Please take time to read the “What’s New” section of the newsletter. Note that latest version of the PAM (desktop) versions (as opposed to the “hosted” or “Enterprise” versions) have a new option on the Help menu ... Remote Support. This lets us connect to your computer over the internet for support purposes. It works well and more often than not saves time and stress for all concerned. As Colin and I are doing the bulk of the support these days, we are enjoying the oppotunity to talk to clients, both old and new, again after a few years of filling other types of roles. I am very appreciative of the number of you who regularly rejoin the “Fairport Club” and support our cause. We look forward to continuing doing our best at giving you value for your support doallars. As this newsletter goes out, we are having people overseas doing translations to enable PAM to operate in Spanish and Portuguese. Our newest distributors are located in Mendoza, Argentina (welcome aboard to Hernan Santiago and his team) and in the very near future, we’ll be setting up PAM Enterprise for some clients operating in Brazil. The multi-language system we’re using also enables us to offer our clients in the US special US-English spelling and terminology on their screens. <<TOP>>
Staff Matters
Mikhail, our mapping guru, has returned to Russia for a couple of months to soak up some Siberian Summer and wait for his new Russian passport to be issued. He is working on more enhancements to the Precision Data Processor. Due out soon are some drawing tools and data statistics from your hand drawn polygons. Colin recently returned from another trip to Canada and the US. He did some training and installing and presenting ... this time getting down into Florida. Henry will fill you in on all the goings on over there. <<TOP>>
Henry's news from the US
Welcome from the Western Mountain region of North Carolina, Fairport’s office base here in the US as the mercury climbs to another unseasonable sweltering and humid 100°F day. It has been a very busy 12 months establishing the Fairport brand here traversing from one side to the other of this large and diverse market. Being Perth born and raised and now settled in the US it has been both a cultural and eye opening experience to say the least. Our initial focus here in the US has been in the fruit, vegetable, vine and citrus markets from Pacific Northwest in Washington State the largest  apple growing area, to the Midwest and Northeast encompassing Michigan, New York, Pennsylvania and Florida one of the largest citrus regions in the world. In that time we have had the opportunity to meet with some of the largest and most advanced operations in the fruit, vine and citrus industries. It is at times difficult to comprehend the sheer magnitude of some of these operations coming from Australia, where a potato grower in Washington State singly produces 200,000 tons of crop annually enough to feed 4 million people, one of the largest apple growers in the world that singlehandedly produces 21 million boxes of apple and 25% of the entire US cherry crop, to the large orange groves of Florida where spraying for mosquito control is done with a C130 transport and not a tractor! However, as large and diverse as this country is and with its advancements in technology after an exhaustive schedule of meetings, demonstrations, shows and functions we can say that our PAM suite of products is truly world class and is quickly being recognized as the most comprehensive platform offered by anyone else here in the US. Our aim inevitably will be to have it set as the industry benchmark. The programs functionality, ease of use and linked database with mapping are amongst the many accolades bestowed upon us to date. Growers are quickly beginning to realize that you need more than just spreadsheets and bits of paper lying around to manage today’s diverse business concerns. The growing requirements of global trade with GLOBAL and EURO GAP have placed added burden on growers to keep accurate records. Along the way we have made incremental changes to our software to cater for the US market some of which will be passed on to other users. During the past twelve months we have also formed many new alliances with industry and academia alike in a continuing quest to keep abreast of the latest developments in agriculture that will enhance what we already have. One such alliance is with the Greenbook Group to provide chemical database and label access to our US customers. Unlike Australia where this is provided by the APVMA, here in the US this is carried out by a number of individual companies. This will allow potential customers to access the Greenbook database from within PAM. Colin Booth has made five treks across the pond to date to meet with potential customers and help with many of the demonstrations. His help, knowledge and guidance have proved invaluable although we found he is not a fan of the snow. In ensuing months we will also be test driving some of the latest handheld technology available as more and more customers especially here in the US begin to embrace wireless technology and use the  growing 3G framework. At present we are testing a new small X70 tablet from Korean manufacturer Viliv that has set a new benchmark in price going below US$1,000. Tablet is around half the size of a sheet of A4 paper. We will have a write up in the next issue. As this newsletter goes to press we are in the final stages of negotiations with a number of very large citrus operations in Florida and we hope to bring you some additional details in future newsletters. <<TOP>>
What's New
PAM QA+ -has had the following new features added in the past 3 months: Inventory Settings :  We have been tweaking and re-tweaking the inventory system for several years. In recent versions we have made what will hopefully be the last changes needed to make this part of PAM work to everyone’s taste. If you have not yet done so, please visit the Configuration / Customise your PAM / Inventory settings tab and set the system up to your liking. Some people have told us they just want to record batch numbers and locations at the time of purchasing stock. If that all you require, tick the first Batch Number check box and leave the rest of the options off. Version 6.8.7 included fixes to the calculated stock on hand in reports and the inventory Stock Taker that now brings the options on the customize screen in line with the reports. PAM will ignore batch numbers and locations in the calculation of stock on hand if that’s what you have chosen on the customize inventory settings tab. Version 6.8.8 is due out very soon. Seed Dressings at Planting: The new Seed Dressings system had some teething troubles in the first two or three versions after it was first released. As of Version 6.8.8  all reported issues have been resolved. (Finally) Spray Order Report : The Spray Order Reports (with Best Management Practice options) has been enhanced so that you can now set up the various BMP options on a special new form ... To be remembered by PAM for future reports. Converted Activity Plans: As of version 6.8.8, once you convert a plan to an actual record, the original plan number is displayed on the “actual”. This enables you to easily refer back to the plan if required. Paddock Recommendation Reports: There has been a general overhaul performed on the recommendation reports at the request of the Richard May & the Landmark team in Cummins South Australia. Individual Animals – Sales & Purchases - Prices and Weights: You can now import Weight and $/Head Price when using the "Select Animals"   "From CSV" option in Sales and Purchases. By importing the weights and prices at the beginning of the process, PAM automatically calculates the average weights and prices for the mobs. The CSV file importer has been enhanced to cater for some badly formatted CSV files that we have had sent to us from time to time. Livestock: Various enhancements have been added and fixed in the livestock section... Livestock Units now displayed alongside Tallies when using the Alter mob Attributes activity. Crutching tallies can now be optionally omitted from the mob Wool Summary report. PAM Mapping & gpMapper – Layer Group Statistics & Duplicate Layer   Check out the Right Mouse menu on the Layers List ... New options Duplicate Layer Layer group statistics The Fairport Web Site – In case you missed this infomration in the alst Fairport News ... recently we changed the Home page on the web site, giving it a bit of a face lift. We’ve created a special Fairport Club member’s only section for software upgrades. To get to the upgrades page you’ll need to log in using your current email address and a number, known here as the FCM (Fairport Club Membership) Number. To see how this works, click on the Upgrades link on the Home page... The instructions are all there. The Downloads page has had an overhaul: a new login password system has been set up. Passwords can be obtained (as before) by filling out a form with contact details. A few other cosmetic changes have been made and there’ll be more changes coming in due course. <<TOP>>
Dealer News
Ag-IT has been be representing Fairport at the Primex Field day in Casino on 17-19 June. Thanks to those who dropped in. We will be sending out a request for training form for our Queensland clients soon ... so please keep an eye out for that. All courses will be Farmready subsidised. Courses are flexible and can be tailored to suit the requirements of the attendees.   If you are in need of training for your PAM software, please let us know. Paul Olsen Ag IT Ph/Fax: (07) 3802 1458 Mobile: 0419 727 086 Sales & Support: 1800 658 998 email: paul@agit.com.au <<TOP>>
Booth Technology will be at Dowerin Field Day 2010 25th and 26th August. For those of you who were not aware, we run weekly PAM training courses. We have Farmready approved courses for PAM and Precision Farming. Please contact Don on 93988707 or don@boothtech.com.au to register interest. <<TOP>>
VIC, TAS, SA, & Southern NSW PAM Training is now a FarmReady approved course.  Full funding for the course plus travel if required is available to approved participants. To be eligible for the FarmReady Reimbursement Grant, you need to be either a:  primary producer immediate family member of a primary producer member of the management team of a primary production enterprise or Indigenous land manager Full details about the grant are available at www.farmready.gov.au If you would like to run a course in your region please don’t hesitate to contact me. To register your interest for a training session in your area please use the online form at www.farmtek.com.au or www.fairport.com.au. Joanne Richardson, FarmTek Australia ~ 1300 553 446 www.farmtek.com.au <<TOP>>
The season has started favourably, with crops in the ground and up in most cases. Some areas have missed some of the major falls of rain, and are still looking for a good general rain to get some moisture banked for the spring. Hopefully the winter will bring some wetter conditions; we have certainly got the cold winter weather at the moment, which at least, has slowed the mice and locust activity down. Capitis Accounting Solutions have developed some on-line training courses for PAM products, which are also registered under the FarmReady program and fully subsidised . If you are interested in getting some more training from the comfort of your own office, please feel free to contact us at any stage, and we will keep you informed on the next lot of training dates. Unfortunately, we will not be able to make it to the Mallee Field Days this year due to some staff unavailability, but we will still be happy to help and assist any queries that you may have, and if you are ever in Horsham, feel free to drop in for a chat and a coffee. Paul Drendel & the team at Capitis Accounting Solutions.   35 McLachlan Street Horsham  VIC  3400 p  5381 1655 f  5382 6238 m  0427 373656 e  paul.drendel@capitis.com.au <<TOP>>
In Closing
Until September... Farewell from the Fairport Team <<TOP>>

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