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In order to use the inventory features of ShowSim, you must first setup an inventory database containing the details of all the products you have available. Creating this database can be a rather time consuming task up front, but the power and efficiency gained from this investment will pay for itself quickly. Not only does working from an inventory help speed up show construction by eliminating data entry, it allows you to take advantage of the inventory management features such as tracking stock quantities, product re-order alerts, cost analysis and even cost tracking in real time as you build your show. The extra details that can be assigned to each effect in an inventory database also allows more useful reports, such as the safety report that is only possible when shows are created from an inventory.
An inventory is simply a listing of effects that have additional data mapped to them, such as prefire time, size, cost, manufacturer etc. A product ID is then assigned to each inventory item so that it can be identified when used in shows and reports. When inventory items are placed in a show, the data assigned to them is used to auto-fill the appropriate parameters, such as shell size, prefire time, effect type etc. The show also maintains a reference to the inventory data for each item, making it possible to compile cost data, safety reports and subtract the show contents from inventory each time the show is fired.
Working from an inventory where the selling price of each effect is specified also allows you to see a running price summary of your show as you build it. The “Total Product” cost displayed in the main button bar will update each time you add, remove or change an inventory effect in your show, which helps you keep from exceeding a set budget.
Getting Started
ShowSim installs with two inventory groups already created: a “Default Stock” group which is empty,
and a “Demo Stock” group which has all the effects used in the Musical Demo show. Either of these groups may be deleted or
renamed if desired, but it is recommended that you leave the Demo Stock in
place while you are exploring the features of ShowSim.
The task of setting up a full inventory can be ominous if starting from scratch. However, if you already have an inventory setup in another scripting application, then a lot of work can be saved by importing this directly. ShowSim supports a variety of common inventory database formats used in other applications. If the format of your inventory is not supported, then you can contact ShowSim to have a new import filter developed for your specific file format.
While importing an existing inventory database will save a lot of work, there is still the task of mapping each inventory item to the corresponding effect used by the simulator when firing it. ShowSim attempts to do this mapping based on effect names, colors and descriptions used in your database. However, due to the extreme variety of names and abbreviations used for firework effects, the auto-mapping seldom chooses the appropriate effect. In the end, you have to go down the list and test each item that was imported, replacing the effects as necessary.
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