Automated Order Tracking for 3D Print Farms

Navigating the complexities of a growing 3D print farm? Meet AutoFarm^3D™'s innovative solution: an integrated order management system with a real-time order completion calendar. This isn't just a scheduling tool – it's a comprehensive approach to managing your entire print farm, designed to streamline operations, enhance productivity, and boost customer satisfaction.

Table of Contents:

1. Why Traditional 3D Printing Order Management Falls Short
2. AutoFarm^3D's Solution: Integration Meets Automation
3. AutoFarm^3D Order Management
4. The Order Calendar In Action
5. Summing It Up

Why Traditional 3D Printing Order Management Falls Short

Managing a bustling print farm means juggling numerous orders, each with specific requirements like print size, colour, and quantity. Traditional methods rely heavily on manual inputs – from scheduling jobs in printer queues to adjusting for unexpected changes like printer malfunctions or urgent orders. This manual approach is time-consuming, error-prone, and can lead to delays and customer dissatisfaction.

AutoFarm^3D's Solution: Integration Meets Automation

AutoFarm^3D revolutionizes this process by combining integration with automation.

It integrates with each of your printers, consistently communicating with, and receiving communication from them. For example, when AutoFarm^3D sends a job to a printer, it receives communication back confirming that the printer accepted the job. It also integrates at the print farm level, actually pulling information from each printer together to utilize the whole farm’s capacity.

If that’s too abstract, think of it this way: when you run errands, you have two options.

1. Start with the first store on your list, go there, return home, then go to the next store. Repeat until all errands are done.
   
2. Look at all the stores you need to visit and plan the most efficient route, grouping stores that are near each other together, and returning home when all your errands are done.

Now, you may be thinking “obviously everyone does the second,” but that’s not how most 3D printer software works. Most 3D printer software treats each printer and print job as its own entity, much like how the first scenario treats each errand as its own trip. AutoFarm^3D, however, operates like the second example, viewing all print jobs and printers together so that it can figure out the most efficient way to run your print farm as a whole. This is print farm integration.

The integrated nature of AutoFarm^3D allows it to automate a number of tasks that an operator would have to otherwise do, such as sending a print job to the best suited printer and balancing the load to maximize your farm’s uptime. With integration and automation, not only does AutoFarm^3D know the most efficient way to run your farm, it is actually able to act on it.

AutoFarm^3D Order Management

Now that we’ve covered the basics, let's take a look at the order management system. It allows you to manage and track orders across your farm by setting up a work order which contains the print jobs associated with that order.

From there, it takes care of the following:

• Smart Print Queue Management: Once you enter an order, AutoFarm^3D intelligently organizes and prioritizes print jobs based on various factors like deadlines, printer availability, and job complexity.
• Real-time Order Tracking: Monitor the status, estimated completion times, and overall progress of each job and order.
• Integrated Order Completion Calendar: Displays a comprehensive view of all orders and their expected completion times, updated in real time.
• Future Integration with Direct2Print: For seamless e-commerce integration, sign up for our Direct2Print™ waitlist.

All job information feeds back into its parent order, so you can see the status, estimated completion date(s) & time(s), and progress for each job as well as the overall order. From here, a real-time completion calendar is produced for your orders, one that’s fully integrated with your print farm and automatically updates when things change.

Let’s go through some scenarios to see how it works in practice.

The Order Calendar In Action

Scenario: You run an e-commerce store that sells 22 different 3D printed products that receives 15-30 orders daily. That’s 100 new prints to schedule each day!

Scenario 1: Manual Order Management, No AutoFarm^3D

Every day you:

1. Look at new orders.
2. Enter orders into the order tracking system.
3. Break each order into print jobs with the specified quantity, colour, material, etc.
4. Update the printer schedule:
      a. See which printer(s) are available.
     b. Identify which available printer(s) match the requirement(s) of the first job (colour, material, etc.).
      c. Add that job to the printer schedule.
      d. Repeat until all 100 print jobs are scheduled.
5. Add files to printer queues.
6. Update the order tracking system:
      a. Figure out estimated order completion date based on when the last print in the order will be done printing.
      b. Add estimated completion date to order.
            i. If order is late, go back to the drawing board, otherwise continue.
      c. Add order to the calendar using estimated completion date.
7. Repeat process from step 4 when delays (e.g., printer down, print fail, etc.) occur.

After a lot of manual work, you think you know what should be ready to pack and ship each day, but the second anything changes, it takes more rework to tell if any orders are running late. Solving the issue is time-consuming and informing customers in time becomes very difficult, especially with new orders coming in every hour.

Scenario 2: AutoFarm^3D (No Order Management)

Every day you:

1. Look at new orders.
2. Enter orders into the order tracking system.
3. Break each order into print jobs with the specified quantity, colour, material, etc.
4. Add jobs to the central print queue.
5. Update the order tracking system:
      a. Look at job completion dates. Figure out when the whole order will be done.
      b. Add estimated completion date to order tracking.
            i. If order is late, drag & drop jobs to be higher in the queue, otherwise continue.
      c. Add order to the calendar using estimated completion date.
6. Repeat step 5 when delays (e.g., printer down, print fail, etc.) occur.

You know with some certainty what will be ready to pack and ship each day but must continue manually updating your schedule to see if any orders are running late, reducing the speed at which you can solve the issue or inform customers.

Scenario 3: AutoFarm^3D + Order Management & Calendar

Every day you:

1. Look at new orders.
2. Enter orders into AutoFarm^3D.
      a. Add print jobs with the specified quantity, colour, material, etc.
3. Send order to the central queue.
4. Check estimated completion date. Late orders have a red estimated completion date.
      a. Drag & drop late jobs to be higher in the queue.
5. View order calendar as needed to see when orders will be ready to pack and ship.

You know exactly what will be ready to pack and ship each day and can easily see if any orders are behind schedule, allowing you to take necessary precautions like reordering jobs in the queue or informing customers of any delays.

BONUS: Scenario 4: AutoFarm^3D + Direct2Print

Direct2Print sets up orders in AutoFarm^3D.

Every day you:

1. Review orders and send them to the queue.
2. Check the order calendar. Late orders are red.
      a. Flag late orders as high priority (AutoFarm^3D will prioritize them in the queue).
3. View order calendar as needed to see when orders will be ready to pack and ship.

You know exactly what will be ready to pack and ship each day and instantly know if any orders are behind schedule, allowing you to take necessary precautions like flagging certain jobs/orders as high priority or informing customers of any delays.

‍Interested in Direct2Print? Join our waitlist to be the first to get it.

Summing It Up

Our order completion calendar was designed to make your life as an operator and business owner easier by giving you a bird’s eye view of every orders’ estimated completion date & time. It integrates directly with your farm and the rest of AutoFarm^3D to reflect what is actually going on in the moment, rather than what was planned to happen, and automatically updates the second anything changes. It’s only able to do this because it sits atop a base of farm-wide integration and automation, rather than relying on manual inputs that can be time-consuming for operators and may create delays in itself.

This feature is the first of many that are designed to streamline not just your farm operations, but your entire business, so that you can make this year your most productive, successful, and profitable year yet. We can’t wait to hear what you think! Try AutoFarm^3D free today and let us know how the order calendar changes your operation.

Until then, happy printing!