Just wondering how some of you fellas organize your scope files, if you have a database program or just use folders.

At the moment mine are a mess.

Any ideas for a system I can use?

I use folders starting with the manufacture as the name. ie BMW, Mercedes, etc...  Then I have another set of folders in those that are named by the models.  And since I mostly deal with BMWs, I break those down a little further actually.  I use 3 Series, 5 Series, X Series, etc... inside the BMW folder and then in those I have the generation of each one, 3 Series would have E30, E36, E46.  I only go that far with the BMWs bc I have so many of them.  They could be broken down by engine also, but each model can have a couple different engines sometimes, but I keep those details in the file.

HTH

Hey Cam,

I have pretty much the same set up as Scott does.
I have started recently adding to each file name date captured and job number also.

Here is a few pictures of how mine is set out.

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Camo wrote on Jul 10^th, 2013 at 3:56am:

Just wondering how some of you fellas organize your scope files, if you have a database program or just use folders. At the moment mine are a mess. Any ideas for a system I can use?

Here is a post from the past I still use this and works great on searching.

http://www.autonerdz.com/cgi/yabb2/YaBB.pl?num=1226127007/8#1

i will try the folders setup

looks pretty good and simple

Thanks :)

Anthony Lamb wrote on Jul 10^th, 2013 at 5:59am:

I have started recently adding to each file name date captured and job number also.

Thats a practice I have done also.
Indexing the saved file to a specific invoice (RO) then helps to confirm more exactly the vehicle make & model, engine and systems details etc. This is very helpful given the huge variety of systems and changes within vehicle models.

It would be nice if the pico software could act like a database, in that it could search for any info you had saved inside each file.  If you typed the RO number somewhere and saved it, then being able to search for it would be awesome.  Or any other keywords.  I'm sure that would be a huge undertaking, but it would be awesome if you knew you had a file somewhere, but couldn't seem to find it.

BMW Scott wrote on Sep 7^th, 2013 at 4:57am:

It would be nice if the pico software could act like a database

I know windows you can search for files like that if you know the RO number, it would be a good feature to have it in pico scope.

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BMW Scott wrote on Sep 7^th, 2013 at 4:57am:

It would be nice if the pico software could act like a database, in that it could search for any info you had saved inside each file.  If you typed the RO number somewhere and saved it, then being able to search for it would be awesome.  Or any other keywords.  I'm sure that would be a huge undertaking, but it would be awesome if you knew you had a file somewhere, but couldn't seem to find it.

Scott

When you click on FILE top left and then OPEN, windows has a search bar top right you can direct windows to search in your master pico file folder for any combination like date vehicle or component.

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Believe it or not my Bosch FSA720 scope does have quite a good data base function for saving and retrieving files.
See screen shot of interface attached.

But typical of Bosch, once the file is opened not much can be done with the file other than it be laid over new captures.

Pico software clearly hoses all over Bosch for user
friendliness & functionality !!

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Anthony Lamb wrote on Sep 7^th, 2013 at 5:16am:

I know windows you can search for files like that if you know the RO number

Mick wrote on Sep 7^th, 2013 at 5:36am:

When you click on FILE top left and then OPEN, windows has a search bar top right you can direct windows to search in your master pico file folder for any combination like date vehicle or component

I hadn't really thought of using windows search function that way and will start doing that, but it's still only going to search for key words in the file name.  That is definitely better than nothing at all.  But how awesome would it be if you could search for any info that you have saved inside the notes and details.  The ability to cross reference files that you may not be thinking of right off the top of your head.  Let's say you have detailed notes inside the file and you know you had a capture with the same type of fault code, but couldn't remember which one it was.  Well a database that could search the details of the file itself would prove pretty useful.  Who knows, maybe someone from Pico will read this and think it's a great idea too!

Thanks for the windows search suggestions guys!  I'll keep that in mind while naming my files.