Priority Mailing
EDI Application
About the Company
Priority Mailing, a leading design, print and mailing company based in Salisbury were established in 1989 due to a lack of mailing services in the local area. Since their launch, Priority have gone from strength to strength, with a digital printing department launched in 2003, a third and fourth Sitma Line added to their production and since 2009 they have both improved their technology with the purchase of four paper envelope enclosing machines and also became ISO 14001 certified.
Priority contacted Solweb in 2012 to develop a new application that would combine and improve upon the functionality of both of their applications.
Requirements Overview
Priority needed one application that did the job of two; the new application needed to allow the user to manipulate files after importing, changing the exported file type and even format data.
Due to Priority receiving data from their customers, the application had to be flexible and accept multiple file types and formats, merge multiple files together and while merging, merge fields that have separate names.
In order to generate the bulk mailing and printing documents required by their machines, Priority utilised two outdated and clunky command-line applications. It was obvious that if demand was to increase further, their old system would simply slow them down and create a bottleneck.
Custom Software Development
Integrated Systems Allow Your Business To Run More Efficiently
Solution
Solweb developed an intuitive desktop application that allows the user to import comma, tabbed, fixed length or user specified delimited files and, in keeping with their need to be flexible, it detects whether or not the file was encoded using ASCII, UTF8 or WIN1252. For fixed length fields, the user of the application can specify the expected length of fields and provide the column names before import.
After being imported, the application shows the contents of the file within a clear and interactive grid. The user can then manipulate the data by either combining other files, specify column headings for the export and adding padding to fields using user specified characters.
They are also able to remove any blank fields, merge columns but also specify columns that should not be modified. Understanding that this is for a machine, the EDI allows the user to add sequential numbering and a custom end of batch indicator.
Once the user is happy with their modifications, the application will export the data in a file format that the user would expect and to a location that they would specify.
Outcome
The application has been designed and developed to be a robust tool that is used at the heart of their data transfer system. The application is a core tool when creating files for their machines and thus, is used regularly by Priority. The application is so intrinsic to their system, that Priority have returned to Solweb for further additions to the application to improve both its usefulness and futureproof its design.
