Hmmm ! I wonder whether I with Revolution ? Forms processing

Bill bill at bluewatermaritime.com
Wed Apr 12 12:46:56 EDT 2006


Warning: The following "on topic discussion" of the use of Revolution will
appear to also be a political discourse but it is really an impassioned view
of someone (me) who is very happy to have the Revolution program to use in
an effort to work with the vast elephant that the U.S. Government has become
(at least the "Homeland Security Component"). If you are German you may
recognize some of this stuff that was borrowed from 1940's Germany.

I extensively send in filled-out forms but have found that the forms
(homeland security) are completely un-intuitive full of ambiguities and
carry over data from one to the next in a hodge-podge manner. So I designed
a completely different interface for gathering the data (it saves to
SQLlite) and then with a simple update button the new data (or old data
depending on what you ask for) fills out all the forms (I've had better
results with PNG files at 200 dpi) and you print them as needed.

As our government (or maybe not your government if you live in one of the
more advanced countries) gradually tries to computerize this process the
SQLlite database and RunRev comes in real handy because the various branches
of the government use completely different methods of gathering data.

As follows (and remember each of these completely different branches of the
U.S. Government will answer the phone "Homeland Security" and then you have
to ask them which one they are:

1. The U.S. Coast Guard -- they are the most advanced and use very simple
XML data collection which can be sent via SOAP or using Altuit's browser
thing and the U.S. Coast Guard web interface. Of course, and this is a
common theme, there is also a Microsoft Program you can run to interface --
in this case a CPU hog called "InfoPath"

2. U.S. Customs import division. No here is where they have some really
old-time computer guys. They use something called "Edifact" which is the
most convoluted data tagging system ever imagined and such a dinasuar it
should be just thrown-out (like that will ever happen). And-- to really make
it impossible they only allow interface with a Custom (and also ancient)
modem protocol that requires expensive slow hardware and an expensive
special phone line and expensive computer support and expensive (you the
idea). Luckily there are many enterprising souls who will (for a fee) accept
your data in tab-deliminated format (and others).

3. The U.S. Census Bureau (you didn't know but I bet you suspected that they
were a part of homeland security) export division of U.S. Customs. They
accept data in a special version of "Edifact" that they made up. But luckily
they have a web site entry system that Altuit's program can work with. And
the Microsoft theme again -- they have a free Window's program that was
built with Access that will also send data to it. Of course the Access
database is completely closed to any kind of access.

4. U.S. Agriculture. (The will answer the phone "Homeland Security so don't
be surprised). They want their forms in triplicate on NCR paper so good
luck.

5. U.S. Immigration. They want their forms and their computer data both. And
don't make any mistakes as their boot comes down with a $25K fine.
Immigration forms are printed on all kinds of non-standard paper sizes with
multiple copies. Also they do not sell or give you the forms you have to buy
them through other outlets. At least their crew and pax forms are on normal
sized paper (the cruise ship industry forced this on them). Their data
collection (and a very smart choice they made) is gotten from the XML data
that the Coast Guard collects. They also force you to turn in forms that
they have stamped later so forget storing it as data-- must be paper copies
(although it is the same data that you must by law send via XML so figure
that one for me).

6. The port authorities. Ah -- finally some friendly folks who realize it is
all about commerce and free trade (and usually it is managed by some
efficient multi-national company). Their data is collected with web site
input that RunRev can handle easily with Altuit's plug-in.

7. The state and local governments. All bets are off here. Some copy the
U.S. Customs method of gathering data and others make you go to their office
and submit paper. Real room for improvement here.

I am sure that other governments have much simpler systems that RunRev can
work with too...

Comments welcome. Maybe I should start a blog about homeland security?


On 4/12/06 6:36 AM, "Francis Nugent Dixon" <effendi at wanadoo.fr> wrote:

> Hi from Paris,
> 
> I have dozens of forms to fill in, and I'd like to scan an
> original to a .jpg file, display it in a Rev card overlaid
> with predefined fields which I can fill in, and then save
> the updated form to a .jpg file again. Has anybody done
> anything like this ? I admit that I haven't yet tried to do
> it, but I'd like to know if it's possible before putting
> "pen to paper" !
> 
> Thanks for any light on the subject  .....
> 
> -Francis
> 
> "Nothing should ever be done for the first time !"
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> use-revolution mailing list
> use-revolution at lists.runrev.com
> Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription
> preferences:
> http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution

            |    |    |
           )_)  )_)  )_)
          )___))___))___)\
         )____)____)_____)\\
       _____|____|____|____\\\__
-------\                   /--------- http://www.bluewatermaritime.com
 ^^^^^ ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  ^^^^      ^^^^     ^^^    ^^
       ^^^^      ^^^

24 hour cell: (787) 378-6190
fax: (787) 809-8426

Blue Water Maritime
P.O. Box 91
Puerto Real, PR 00740






More information about the use-livecode mailing list