I'll also vote for Access. If you have an Access wizard around, you should
be able to build a decently capable system that should migrate to your long
term solution fairly well, provided that you do some planning. If you know
what the long term solution will be, get a basic table structure from them
-- how they label and format each field. That way, you can build the
temporary database to fairly closely match.

You'll want them to build you a decent box data entry screen and a set of
canned reports

A couple key considerations for physical systems are:

1) How files relate to the container / box. This is important from a
labeling and logic standpoint. You don't want the system to treat each file
as if it were a box. The files should be related to a container.
2) How locations are tracked by the system -- a typical scheme could be:
Room, Aisle, Row, Shelf, Position. If you set that up well to start, you
can have consistent tracking and not have to re-scan every box later on.
3) The bar code format. Most systems will handle a simple Code 39 bar code,
but some differentiate locations from containers with certain characters in
the bar code. If you can get that formatted properly, even if you don't use
the bar coding, you're ahead of the game down the road.
4) If you have different sized boxes, decide on a standard convention for
identifying each box size. A box of size "A" is a standard records box,
Size "B" is a letter width Bankers Box, etc. In the records center that I
operated, we would designate each shelf for a certain type of box -- and we
would tell the system that the capacity of the shelf was 20 boxes of type A
or 10 boxes of type B or whatever. This is helpful when doing inventories
and when trying to determine how much more space you have available.

Eons ago (@1993), I implemented a physical records tracking system and had
to reprint barcode labels for 35,000 boxes. We had quotes in the tens of
thousands of dollars to print custom box and location labels. Instead, we
used Avery LabelPro, the MailMerge functionality of Word, and a LaserJet to
print the labels. It was my time, a couple toner cartridges and about $400
worth of labels to generate.


Patrick Cunningham, FAI

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