MeLuDI 1.5.0 User Manual

3 Case registration

3.1 Wizard: Create label file for a number of new cases

1. Open MeLuDI start (index) page.
2. Click link for wizard "Create label file for a number of new cases".

Figure 3.1. Label generation wizard step 1.

The label generation wizard differs from most wizards in that it only has one step, and the usual buttons are exchanged for a "Preview" and a "Download" button (the wizard does not store the generated data in the database).

3.1.1 Input fields

1. Number of cases (required, default: 1). Enter the number of cases you want labels generated for.
2. Max number of tubes/case (menu, default: 1).
3. Start case name (required). The serial number of the suggested name is found by adding 1 to the largest case number, for which labels have been downloaded (in theory, see more information below regarding exceptions). If no stored largest case label number is found, the largest case number of stored case items is used. The suggested name may be overwritten by the user, but it must adhere to the allowed prefix and number of digits configured for case names for the project.
4. Extracts from first specimen only (check box, default depends on project configuration). If checked, labels for extracts are generated for the first specimen only, otherwise for all specimens. The default setting may be changed, if desired.

3.1.2 Buttons

1. Clicking the "Preview" button displays the generated label data in the web form.
2. Clicking the "Download" button opens a dialog for downloading a file to use with the label printer. This also updates the stored information on the largest case number, for which labels have been downloaded.

3.1.3 Storage of largest case number, for which labels have been downloaded

Background: Originally, the suggest start case number was the largest case number of stored case items. However, one often wanted to print labels for a batch of case numbers in advance. If a new batch of labels was created before all cases in the previous batch had been registered, the generated sets of label numbers might overlap. In order to decrease this risk, it was decided to instead store the largest case number for a downloaded batch of labels (preview does not affect this), and use that to determine the next start case number.

Problems may arise, if one needs to generate new labels for lower case numbers, since the stored "largest" case number would the be re-set to a smaller value. The recommended routine is then to generate an extra "bogus" label file afterwards for only one case, where one sets the start case name to have a number which is one less than the start case name before the extra labels were generated. After this file is downloaded, the stored largest case number will be the same as before the extra low-number labels were generated.