What's New - Updates on the Latest Features of Clearly Inventory

New Features & Updates

From time to time Clearly Inventory will push out updates for its online inventory management software.  Below you'll find a list of these changes.  We also post information on minor changes and updates on our Blog.

An Example how to use the Status Transaction in Clearly Inventory.

An Item's Status now appears on both the Grid and Item Method for inventory transactions.  This allows users to quickly see, and update, the status of items in stock.  This is a great way to keep track of what's currently available for use or sale and what's been reserved for another purpose.

Click the "Update" button to update the status of a specific quantity of items.  In this example, we're going to update 65 items as "Sold".

The Update Status Transaction color is Purple to help reinforce the transaction type to users.  

Select the quantity of items that you'd like to update the status for.  In this case, we're going to update 65 ea. to the status of "Sold". 

If an item does not have a Status, no value will be displayed in the transaction or view tables.  Any items without a status are assumed to be available for any use.  In this case, the items we are updating as 'Sold' do not currently have a status.

To apply the new status, simply select the desired value from the drop down list.  All available status assignments are set in a drop down list to ensure consistency.  (As of now, these terms are fixed and cannot be modified.) 

You can create custom transaction fields for Status Updates, just like other transactions.  This is perfect for capturing important information that relates to the status change.  

Now, 65 items have been updated as 'Sold' and the remainder do not have any Status.  

When more items need to have their status updated, you can click the button that appears in the appropriate record. 

The 'Status' column now appears in many of the inventory and transaction history views.  You can filter and sort by the status column to find all the items with a given status.

Here we see that some items have a status of 'Sold', 'In Transit', and 'For Production'.

Changes to the Layout and Style to be Posted on July 15th, 2012

On July 15th, we are launching a new version of Clearly Inventory with improvements to the navigation and appearance of the application.  Here's the important points:

• The functions and features of the application have not changed.  There are no new functions with this update, and we have not taken away any previous functions. (The custom site terms will be temporarily unavailable while we work on that module, but it will be back up shortly.)

• The tab structure of the navigation remains, but the sub-navigation has been re-organized.  The URL's of the application are the same, so if you have bookmarked pages in the app, these will still work.  For more on the navigational changes see below.

Examples of Layout and Style Changes on the "Item Transaction" Page.

The logo area is smaller, and the tabs have been moved up to make for more room in the main area of the application.

Each page is clearly titled.

The links that used to appear at the top of the page have now been consolidated into a new "hello menu" that drops down to display standard and custom links. If you had custom links at the top of the app, they will appear here.

Breadcrumbs now appear directly below the page title. This should improve awareness of your location within the app, and make it much easier to navigate.

We've made the buttons look more like, well, buttons, and we've labeled them so that their function is clear. We found that many users, especially international users, were confused by the symbols used throughout the application. For those of you who prefer icons to words, we will be introducing different button sets in the future.

We've tried to clear up points of confusion with users that came up over and over. One of those issues was with the symbols used to indicate the 'last change'. By clicking on the date you can still view this information, but it won't confuse or clutter the interface under the new design.

The Sub Navigation is now Grouped into Standardized Menus Throughout the App

All of the views of "Current Inventory" are now grouped together under the "Current Inventory" Menu.

All of the Transaction History and Historical views are grouped under the "Transaction History" menu.

Features Posted on December 30th, 2011

Data Type and Validation of Custom Item and Transaction Fields

Now you can use date pickers, drop down menus, check boxes, and enforce number and currency values and formats for both Custom Item Fields, and Custom Transaction Fields. Click here to learn more.

Custom Views

Now you can create your own custom views of current inventory data tables, as well as inventory transactions history tables. You can select the fields and order, create a title, describe your view, and set which users can access it. Learn more here.

"Grid View" Transaction Method

View your entire stock list, and perform transactions directly at the record level. This is destined to become the new favored method of performing individual inventory transactions. Click here for more details.

Culture Settings

You can now apply global culture settings to the date, number, and currency formats. Learn more here.

New API

We've made the API easier to use, and we now return JSON as well as SOAP! (I have no idea what that means - but anyone helping you code with the API will probably love it!) Learn more here

Improved (but a little slower) Data Uploading

Many data tables are now processed "server side". This will end the "time out" of large files, and allow us to perform data integrity checking before the files are processed. Also, you can get an export of any uploads that cause an error, while good records are loaded. Everything you need to know about the new process can be found here.