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O'Neill
2nd May 2002, 06:14
Any suggestions for quality management software?

Rogier
2nd May 2002, 07:27
well if you can fiddle around a bit with Excel and Access then it's actually quite easy to make it yourself.

Amphinon
2nd May 2002, 15:49
I also would agree!

I checked out dojo management software a couple of times. There are not that many so I started working on my own in Access. Now I am in the process of integrating it with the web.

I will allow user interfaces to log their workouts and chart their improvement.

Senjojutsu
2nd May 2002, 23:25
Being the Chief Technologist of my dojo I did extensive research on this matter last year.

Gawd I sound like some Juko Kai grandmaster :laugh:


My two software finalists were:

MAS

http://www.kickboxing.com/mas/ (http://)

... and Pastors Helpmate (now ChurchHelpmate)

http://www.helpmate.net (http://)

Each one has its own set of good features, both interfaces are built over a MS Access database.

MAS has a barcode attendance module and an optional Inventory/POS module.

With Pastors Helpmate you could buy the key option to do your own custom progamming - in addition the base package had several customizable fields. I do not much about ChurchHelpmate - which was just introduced.
I never knew keeping track of your flock (and their contributions) was so involved.

Neither package is cheap, several hundreds of dollars each.

There are canned "wizards" within MS Access that may meet your needs.
Excel may be the best for non-programmers.

kukisamuharu
3rd May 2002, 15:19
I have been looking into dojo software over the last couple of months, so this thread is definitely of interest. Our dojo experienced a significant growth spurt in the early part of this year. The paper system is becoming a little much.

With regards to using Excel/Access, any advice on how to get started with these. I have taken a couple of books out of the local library on Excel and, to put it midly, they put me to sleep. Any suggestions on books or online resources that will provide information relevant to building this kind of database?

Thank you.

Joseph Svinth
3rd May 2002, 21:04
The easiest way to learn Excel/Access/FoxPro is to view the programs as interactive computer games rather than as Work, and simply play with them.

That said, start small, as Excel sometimes gets cranky when you start asking it to sort thousands of names and dozens of fields.

Nonetheless, in your final product, you may need dozens of fields, and over time you may have thousands of names. So as you play with the programs, think about everything that you might now (or in future) want to track, and then include a separate field (block, column, whatever you personally call it) that allows you to sort by that information. (Sort by field is very important for statistical analysis and answering supervisors' inane questions.)

For the purposes of an MA class, some fields you should probably include are:

Unique identifier (you may have several Bob Smiths in your class over the years, and phone number doesn't work because you may have siblings)
Last name
First name
Middle initial
Prefix/Suffix (Jr., III, etc.)
Male/Female
Date of birth
Residence address
Street
City
State/province
Zip/postal code
Mailing address
Street/PO Box
City
State/province
Zip/postal code
Home telephone(including area code)
Work telephone (including area code)
Message telephone (including area code)
E-mail address
Date joined
Next of kin/emergency notification name and address #1
Next of kin/emergency telephone
Next of kin/emergency notification name and address #2 (remember, lots of divorced/separated parents out there)
Next of kin/emergency telephone #1
Next of kin/emergency telephone #2
Medical concerns
Last date all information verified (this needs to be done at least semi-annually, as somebody moved, changed phones, etc.)

Training data (Date promoted, etc. If you keep really detailed records, then you'd need 10+ fields for rank alone, just so you can keep track of all of them.)

Financial data (Date payment received, EFT authorized, contract data, whatever)

To repeat, include fields for everything that you're presently tracking on paper.

Is building and maintaining such a program a lot of work? Yes. Is it worth it for a dozen students? No. Is it necessary for properly administering a school of 25-50 students? Maybe, but paper often works just as well. But for the organization with 350 people, an annual turnover of 40%, and no fulltime clerk, it is absolutely vital.

kenshorin
8th May 2002, 09:02
Originally posted by Joseph Svinth
That said, start small, as Excel sometimes gets cranky when you start asking it to sort thousands of names and dozens of fields.

Is building and maintaining such a program a lot of work? Yes. Is it worth it for a dozen students? No. Is it necessary for properly administering a school of 25-50 students? Maybe, but paper often works just as well. But for the organization with 350 people, an annual turnover of 40%, and no fulltime clerk, it is absolutely vital.

Even though its a lot of work initially, it may save you time in the long run. Like Mr. Svinth said, dealing with small amounts of data is a heluva lot easier than dealing with thousands. If your dojo is small now, but you have the intention of growing, don't wait until you have 200 students to finally start making this software. Build it now, and as students come in and go it will start paying its dividends. By the time you hit 200 students, you've probably seen at least two times that leave. If you wait, you could have 600 individual records now waiting to be transferred over, and old data being transferred isn't as reliable as data entered in the first place.

Jeff Reach
10th May 2002, 17:32
I happen to use Assistant Instructor and I have found it to be one of the best Dojo Management Software packages as we teach many different arts.

You can learn more about it and download an evaluation copy at www.assistantinstructor.com

Shitoryu Dude
13th May 2002, 23:32
Quickbooks Pro - costs about $100 last time I checked. Does just about everything a small business needs.

:beer:

George Ledyard
15th May 2002, 08:48
Originally posted by Jeff Reach
I happen to use Assistant Instructor and I have found it to be one of the best Dojo Management Software packages as we teach many different arts.

You can learn more about it and download an evaluation copy at www.assistantinstructor.com

Looks like it covers all of the essentials. It's their price that is excellent. At that price I wouldn't bother doing an Excel or Access program of my own. I would spend far more time than it would be worth to duplicate what I could get from them.

Jeff Reach
15th May 2002, 16:57
That was my thought...also the programmer is accessible and has been extremely helpful as I have worked through issues on my end of the program. For example, my networked crashed and my files got corrupted. Rather than have to re-enter 2 years worth of data he took my corrupted files and fixed them. NOW THAT is customer service!

It gets 5 Stars in my book.

Jason Carrier
20th May 2002, 15:30
I bought one for my Sensei call Assitant Instructor, It has a lot of nice bell and things, I think it was a while ago that I got it from the American Jujutsu Homepage.

Ron Rompen
29th May 2002, 20:18
Is there a market for a dojo management/tracking software package in the $200/$300 range?

My sensei has just finished developing a spreadsheet package for tracking the appropriate info at our dojo, and is thinking of having it professionally modified (as an HTML or JAVA page) and sold.

If you think that you would be interested, please email me separately from this forum, and I will put your name on the list for a followup if/when she makes her decision.


rompen@rogers.com