Lets Web Enable Supply Chain Software

HTML is the most efficient interface language ever designed (especially when enhanced with some Java and Adobe add-ins). However, too many supply chain vendors have not made their interface web enabled.

Bad Interface Design

We work in supply chain systems. What we cannot figure out is why the interfaces for supply chain systems so greatly lag what the web has to offer. The major vendors in supply chain such as SAP, i2, and Oracle have a long way to go before anyone logs into the supply chain areas of their system and actually enjoys it.

One Example of Great Interface Design

One example that we use a lot is Arena Solutions. Arena produces BOM management software, and their user interface is extremely easy to use. We wrote an article on it in this blog and post.

http://spplan.wordpress.com/2008/12/12/arena-solutions-and-where-used-view/

The Arena interface is even better than it looks in the screenshots, because the screenshots cannot explain how well and seamlessly the interface allows the user to transition from view to view and in fact how the software promotes a logical and effective user workflow.

100% Web

We have seen a number of interfaces in our supply chain career, and most of them are no match for well designed websites. A first principle should to be design all interfaces in HTML. There are a huge number of standards created by organizations such as the W3C which have honed the interface code through the years. Furthermore, as supply chain becomes increasingly cross enterprise, thick clients are a liability and will increasingly interfere with adding value. We discuss this trend in this post.

http://fourthpartylogistics.wordpress.com/2009/05/23/fourth-party-logistics-providers/

In SAP, there is a separation between their thick client – and their “portal” which is web based? Why, go ahead and port everything over to HTML and lets move on. There is also no reason for the configuration area to have a non-HTML interface. MCA Solutions, provides an HTML front-end for its configuration and it works great, and MCA has tons of parameters that can be configured, so application complexity is no excuse.

A vendor with probably the most open and web enabled software we have seen is GoMobileIQ. Read about them in this post.

http://supplychaininnovation.wordpress.com/2009/06/07/google-maps-and-gomobileiq-for-vehicle-routing/

Browser Tools

When a company creates an interface in a non HTML language, it must develop its own tools and external navigation. For companies that code their interface in HTML, the user can take advantage of the functionality in their browser to do things like:

• Create Bookmarks
• Open and Manage Multiple Tabs
• Reopen Windows Automatically After Closing or a Crash

All of these capabilities come standard in the top browsers (Opera, Firefox, Safari). Opera actually has a filter for open tabs, which is simply fantastic. We cover this in this blog and post.

http://infoknowledge.wordpress.com/2009/05/26/opera-tab-window-filter/

Plus, people are used to using these browsers so they are comfortable with them. In any case, the supply chain vendors have no chance of ever catching up with this functionality because it is not what they do. (Firefox has so many plug-ins that is essentially becoming its own mini application staging area.) However, they allow their users to access all this functionality, by simply coding interfaces in HTML.

Linking

Another advantage is the hyperlink. A web based interface creates a link for every connection to the server, as when web browsing. This link can be forwarded to other users for collaboration purposes. This is easier to manage, store and retrieve than a transaction code or other methods. Tim Berners Lee began talking about this over 10 years ago. Will supply chain vendors soon catch up with where Tim was in the 1990s?

Lack of Original Thinking

This is evident as software companies continue to follow the old way of doing things. This “pre-internet” approach to software implementation is demonstrated in articles, that you have to read between the lines to see the bias. In this article about the Boeing Dreamliner, the author is discussing the difficulties regarding sending large amounts of design data back and forth.

“Where we and Boeing got a bit nervous was that a lot of the transactions come with big payloads of technical data,” says Peter Scott, Exostar’s vice president of marketing and corporate development. “It could easily get to terabytes of data that we must archive, back up, and provide disaster recovery for. That was a very real challenge.”

http://www.managingautomation.com/magread.aspx?Content_Id=164056&page=4

However the question is not asked “why is this data being sent back and forth in the first place.” Why can’t technical drawings be manipulated online, and kept at a central repository. Why are each of these companies keeping their own version of intermediate design and technical documents?

Conclusion

Supply chain software is behind the curve and continues to turn out ineffective and simply unpleasant interfaces. However, companies like Arena and MCA are better than many of their competitors, in part because their interface is web based. Other companies should get the message and either make the transition, or make the transition faster than they are. We have seen first-hand how poor interface design is reducing the success of supply chain implementations. There is no reason for this to continue to be the case.