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Hi pooh pooh,
I think the GUI of Diplomat is good, but could be better.
What I would like to see, (probably because we are a small company and often have the controller taking bookings on his own), is a single screen with bookings, despatch, and map all in one like it is on DataMaster. Then, I would like Allocated Jobs to stay on screen until the car has cleared. But then, I am just fussy.
I would also like to see a less complex pricing structure, where, if the job is not pre-priced, the controller can just enter the price adjacent to the job.
In this way, one would not have to keep jumping from screen to screen.
However, the bigger companies perhaps would not like this, as it means more on screen all the time, and then they would have to keep scrolling up and down.
Because we have no more than perhaps 30 jobs current with about 20 bookings ahaed, it would be ideal for us, but if you have 100 cars, it would bugger you up.
The other problem, is that with DataMaster scheme, although all is on screen at once (apart from allocated), the screen is actually more than one window, and thus more than one program running concurently, so, if you move the cursor with the mouse, and try and enter something when its not theretically in the right bit of program, then the whole issue crashes.
I suppose its horses for courses, innit.
Diplomat isnt as cumbersome as Auriga, and has a better GUI, but I still think DataMasters idea is best. However, Diplomat is on a forward roll that personally speaking, I don't think Datamaster will keep up with.
Diplomat's interface/comms protocol or whatever you call it, is far and away better than anything I have ever seen, or even heard of. It is really really radical yet it isnt. It opens up so many fields for future exploration, that it really could eclipse Auriga and most of the others in the not to distant future.
I'm only stating an opinion here, so dont take what I say as being necessarily fact (you'd need to ask Diplomat for the full SP), but I think the TCP?IPP comms or whatever you call it, really pushes horizons.
Not only does it seem like it will allow both Data and GPS to mix and match, G3 comms to call a cab and then get a text message back from the computer confirming the cab, but will eventually get rid of the concept of zones, by using a complicated (to say the least) algorythm that does not pick up the car based purely on the zone, but based upon the "actual" GPS location of the car, which, having seen it working, can already pick-up on the cars direction of travel.
Thus, it will not only pick the closest car on a far more accurate basis than before, but can even be programmed to pick up the cars direction and allocate appropriately.
Think, for example, of cars on a rank in a one way system. It can deselect certain cars, so that U-turns are not needed and so on. The easoest car to the job then becomes possible, rather than the closest, as the crow flies.
Then, when you add the street level routing engine they are presently developing, coupled to the multi-platform interface, the sky truly is the limit.
I have even been in one office running Diplomat, where the controller even is really a glorified telephonist, and is not even "allowed" to control.
The saleman demonstrated a number of things to us, but the things I noticed that he didnt tell us about, were the things which were clearly "just around the corner" and which lead me to believe that short of a major catastrophe, or my not being aware of things that others have in the pipeline, then Diplomat will soon be the market leader.
The whole nature of what they are doing excites me.
I am sure someone from Diplomat will correct anything if what I have said above is not true.
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There is Significant Unmet Demand for my Opinion.
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