I started looking for a replacement for my uGrokit app with a search for ‘simple database apps for the iphone’. The first hit that came back was iDatabase on the app store, and when I looked at that, the app store also suggested Collections Database, easyAsPieDB Database, Formbook, HanDBase Database Manager, and Memento Database. After doing a bit of netsurfing to find out as much as I could about them, I decided that Memento Database would be worth a try, so I downloaded it and imported the first 5 records, then the next 5 and then the next 20. At that point I decided this was probably going to work for me, and loaded up the other 120 or so records. This wasn’t a particularly scientific process, but I suspect its fairly typical of the way apps are selected from the huge number that are available. I had no desire to do detailed analyses for days and days: I just wanted something that works.

The key characteristics that made me decide to go with Memento Database (MD) were the ability to:

• create and edit fields at will, and to easily reorder them using finger movements;
• import data in csv format;
• search across all fields very easily and quickly;
• take photos from within the app;
• export records in CSV format;
• just have a local copy at no cost.

Interestingly, the one thing I’ve found really difficult about MD is trying to ascertain if I can really use it for free, or if at some moment my iPhone/mobile account is going to get charged. The problem is that the current ‘Free’ plan I’m on is limited to 100Mb storage, but it’s not clear if that 100Mb is for cloud storage or not. For now, I’m assuming it must be for cloud storage because the iPhone says that this app is taking up 4.67 Gb of which 4.63 Gb is being taken up by Documents and Data. I don’t understand this sizing as it works out at over 29Mb for each of the 155 records – very strange. Anyway, I shall continue to use the app locally and will keep my fingers crossed that it doesn’t lock me out at some point in the future. If that should happen, I’d have to decide whether to tie myself to the £35 a year charge, or whether to look for a replacement.

The process of getting the data from my uGrokit app into the MD app was particularly tortuous, and demonstrated how important it is to retain collection data in a transferable format. The uGrokit app would, on request, send a list of all the data in the body of an email as in the example shown below:

• Description:                                   Numark TTUSB Turntable with USB interface
• Type:                                             Item
• Item Serial No:                              285
• Container Serial No:                     Not a container
• Position Serial No:                        Not a position
• Item category:                               Hi-fi & video equipment
• Item Owner:                                  Paul
• Item or Container Condition:        Good
• Container this Item or Container is contained in: No container
• Position this Item or Container is placed in:         P4
• Date this record was created:     12/10/2016
• Container security status:           Closed
• Date removed from loft:              (no Date removed from loft)
• EPC:                                           (none)
• image key:                                  2016_10_12_07_00_14_07668572.png

I had to put this material into a spreadsheet and save it in csv format in order to import it to the MD app. I made several different attempts to do so including using Excel’s ‘Get data’ function which I couldn’t understand; and copying and pasting chunks and deleting unwanted material. I ended up just copying and pasting the description and then manually filling in the necessary fields (the ones underlined in the example above). I did this on my laptop in tranches with a small number of records in a spreadsheet to start with and then, as I grew in confidence with the app and the process, I increased the number of records until all 155 had been dealt with. As I did each spreadsheet, I emailed it to myself, picked it up on my  iPhone, saved the file to the iPhone’s file system, and imported it from there into the MD app. As I did each import, I discovered foibles of the import process which I was able to address in subsequent csv spreadsheets. For example, apostrophes in the description text (such as “from Paul’s study”) resulted in the text following it being placed into a new record; so, once I figured that out, I eliminated apostrophes from subsequent spreadsheets.

As I compiled the spreadsheets, I was also able to eliminate items that had been removed from the loft: when I designed the uGrokit database I had included a ‘Date removed from loft’ field rather than opting to simply delete the item concerned, because I wanted to have certainty about what had been there and when it was removed. However, with this new app my priority was to keep the number of records down in case I should surpass a charging threshold, so I elected to eliminate items that were no longer in the loft. For the same reason, I did not include the records (including photos) for each of the 32 Positions in the loft (which had been included in the uGrokit database).

Once all the records in the last uGrokit email had been included, I then had to manually create entries in a final csv spreadsheet for the 24 new items that had been added after the last uGrokit email had been sent in January 2023.

Finally, all the spreadsheets were finished and the information imported into the MD app. However, the records from Ugrokit had come with only image file names and not the images themselves, so I then had to go into the loft and take a photo of each of the 155 items. Despite being a laborious exercise, it actually doubled as a useful stock check as well as enabling me to rectify errors in the Position information.

The loft database is now complete and fully operational as a Local ‘Library’ in the MD app. So far, I haven’t been charged anything or been asked to upgrade. The app seems to do everything I need it to – though, of course, time will tell. It has just three flaws that I can see at the moment:

• As already mentioned, the records in the app are taking up a huge amount of storage (some 29Mb each) which I don’t think can be attributed to the photos. I don’t understand this and fear it might have unpredictable implications.
• When entering the Loft ‘Library’ the records are displayed underneath a search bar and a field title bar. However, when you scroll down the records, they scroll up over the field title bar and the search bar and off the top of the screen. It’s not a critical problem – but its not what I would expect.
• Scrolling through the records quickly can be a little hesitant as though the processor is having to work excessively. This is even more pronounced when the photo field of the records is displayed (there is only room for the first 6 fields to be displayed when the iphone is held landscape, so the photos only get displayed if you scroll to the right and then scroll up and down). In fact, not all the photos appear as the records are scrolled through – some of them just have time circles until they appear. Perhaps this issue is simply because I’ve got a relatively old iPhone. However, it doesn’t really concern me because I would rarely scroll through all the records. My useage is almost entirely based around searching for a particular item.

These issues – particularly the first one – are a little disconcerting; but having gone to all the effort to populate my loft database in the MD app, I’m not inclined to do further investigations right now and to potentially have to go through it all again with another app. Instead, I’ll wait and see how things go – and in the meantime export a copy of the MD Loft database, as well as saving a copy of every photo to my iPhone photo library: I’ve learnt my lesson about retaining data in a transferable format. I have retained my old uGrokit loft database on my iPhone: there seems no particular reason to delete it until I have to. However, all additions and changes will be made in the MD app going forward. I’ll report back on how things work out with the new app in a year so.

It’s been over 8 years since I wrote the last entry for this particular journey and started using the uGrokit iPhone app. Since then, the app has worked reliably for me across at least two different iphones and provided easy to access information about the 180 or so objects in our loft. However, a year or so ago, the facility to have a backup email sent listing the contents of the database, stopped; and soon afterwards my local version stopped synching with the remote cloud copy. Investigations revealed that the uGrokit company had been acquired by Turck (a German international supplier of factory and process automation technology) in April 2017, and that the uGrokit app was now EOL (End of Life). I had truly taken my eye off the ball. Turck continues to sell the U Grok smartphone readers but, instead of a ready built app, it provides a software development kit for users to build their own databases.

This is a classic digital preservation problem for collectors using technology to support their activities: you have to keep abreast of the technology or risk losing access to your digital content. It’s demanding enough to have to do this in a commercial enterprise; but for a private individual it is an unwanted responsibility easily brushed under the carpet.

Anyway, I realised that I needed to get on and do something because, although the uGrokit app continued to work OK on my iphone, there is no guarantee that it will stay that way, or that it will work when I upgrade my iPhone; and there is no longer any support operation that I can call on for help. Furthermore, any new entries I make in the app will be locked in the app and not downloadable to another format which can be reused in another system.  For all these reasons I decided it was time to find another iPhone app.

A key starting point was the question about RFID. As can be seen from my previous post in 2016, it had been my intention to try to acquire a uGrokit Reader and to try fitting RFID tags to all my loft objects. Well, I did try to do that but nothing came of it. I couldn’t acquire a reader on loan or second hand, and I couldn’t really justify the full price spend of £395 + VAT. Meanwhile, my uGrokit app was working very nicely. I lost momentum and abandoned the idea. Now, however, I needed to be clear if RFID was going to be on the requirements list for the new system I was going to look for. Interestingly, the answer was quite clear: No!

Over the last 8 years I have come to realise that adding an RFID capability would not improve my loft system for the following reason: the position of each loft item is specified in the database; and each position is about three feet wide and 5 feet deep. Most objects are either fairly large in their own right, or else in a container like a case which is also fairly large: so, it is relatively easy to find an object when you know its position. When I want to find an object, I find its position by looking at the app, and then go into the loft armed with that knowledge. Having an RFID reader to point at the object once I get to the Position wouldn’t really make it any easier.

On top of this fundamental fact that I don’t actually need RFID to control my loft objects, there would be a whole lot of extra work to do to implement an RFID system. RFID tags would have to be bought and attached to each object. The tags can be either active with a power source such as a battery, or passive which reflect energy from the reader. I wouldn’t want to have to supply and keep replacing batteries so I would be using passive tags – UHF (high Frequency) passive tags (which can operate up to about 20 feet) as opposed to HF (Low Frequency) passive tags which only operate up to about 3 feet. The tags come in all shapes, sizes, prices, data storage capacities and ways of attaching them to their objects; so, I would have to undertake a selection exercise or be tied to the tags provided by the card reader supplier. The tags would also have to be programmed to identify the objects they are attached to. Special tags may be required for metal objects; and apparently metal objects (such as the TV arial in my loft) can affect the RFID signal.

Given all these complexities, I’m glad I don’t need to go down the RFID route. My tags are white Strung Tie-On Tags which cost about £3 for 100, and I already know how to tie the knot when I attach them to an object. I programme them by writing the Item Serial No on both sides of the tags with a black felt tip pen.

Back to the list of requirements for my replacement Loft app. These are the things that immediately spring to mind:

• It must operate on an iPhone.
• It must enable me to specify the fields I require
• It must enable me to take photos of objects from within the app
• It should be free or very cheap to use
• It should enable the export of the data to a csv file (for backup or transfer to another system)

With these points in mind, I set about looking for a suitable app. The following post documents how I got on.

The new loft system is now in place with all Items, Containers and Positions recorded in the Grok Discover2 iphone app. Particular advantages of the app over the laptop-based database I used previously, are a) the ipad and iphone are much easier to carry around and use in the loft than the laptop; and b) the ability to take a photo with the iphone, have it seamlessly copied to the ipad, and then to be able to almost immediately pick it up from within the Grok app, made the task of inserting photos into the Grok database vastly easier than when I was using a windows-based database.

However, there were a few areas in which the app lacked functionality which the windows-based database had: a) today’s date can’t be auto-entered into the ‘Date this record created’ field that I had set up; b) the next available Serial No can’t be auto-entered; c) it is not possible to specify that a field should be populated with what was input for that field in the previous record (very useful for a field like ‘Date this record created’); d) the images that are input for each record can only be displayed, even on the ipad, at a maximum size of 3 x 3 cm – and these images, frustratingly, cannot be expanded using the standard ipad two finger screen expansion action (and users should note that photos need to be taken in the iphone ‘square’ mode otherwise the app will truncate the images); e) Only two fields are presented for each of the records selected in a search – annoying if you want to compare the values of another field across all the selected records; f) it is not possible to sort the records selected in a search.

Although these are shortcomings, I’m currently feeling they are a small price to pay for free, ready-built software which has been designed to work seamlessly with the RFID reader. Furthermore, the ability to share it via the Grok cloud, is another huge bonus. The ease with which this can be done was demonstrated last Sunday when I sat across the room from my son-in-law and suggested he search for Grok in the app store; and then, when he had it loaded it, I told him what the username and password were. He started exploring the app and soon found the items we are storing for him and our daughter. This was all accomplished without me moving from my seat or helping him in any other way.

No doubt, I’ll find out more about the utility of the Grok app over the coming months as we take items out of the loft and put new items in. However, the really interesting experience will be when I obtain the Grok reader and attach RFID tags to every item. Watch this space.

In the course of documenting the system in our old house and specifying the requirements for a new system, I did some further investigations on the uGrokit website. There I discovered that they provide a free downloadable smart phone app that is designed to work with the uGrokit RFID Reader. The app has four pre-defined fields (last scanned, image, last scan location, EPC) and can be customised by adding Free Text or Value List fields at will. Images can be photographed using the smart phone’s camera from within the app; and the app can be shared on multiple devices by storing it in the uGrokit cloud service at no cost for “an unspecified time”.

After trying out the app with a few test items, and storing it in the cloud, I have concluded that it will meet my needs for the new system, and furthermore, that I can use it ‘in manual mode’ without RFID tags until such time as I can obtain the uGrokit Reader. Therefore, for an interim period at least I shall continue to use the numbering system I used in the old system. Details of the old system, and a description of the new system are contained in this Specification document. I shall now embark on putting Position Nos in place in the loft and logging Containers and Items in the Discover Grok 2 app on my iphone/ipad.

Like many families with growing children, our loft was a depository for all manner of things. It got fuller and fuller until, at the end of 2004, I OFC’d our loft, and created a digital system to help us manage the contents. Each of the elements were specified as an Item or a Container or a Position, numbered and photographed, and recorded together with their photo in a database. I’d wanted to use RFID technology to tag each element, but costs were too great at that time.

The system served us well in our house until we moved a year ago. Despite having got rid of a lot of stuff in the move, we still have things in our new loft, and, when I went looking for something the other day, I realised that we could still make use of some digital support and that, possibly, RFID costs may have dropped sufficiently as to be within reach of the average householder. Initial investigations on the net revealed at least one RFID solution costing less than £500 – an RFID Reader which plugs into a smart phone, from a US company called U Grok it. The reader costs £359 +VAT, and the tags cost about £16 per hundred. So, this journey is going to be about reflecting on the lessons I learned from my earlier Loft Phase 1 experiment, and defining and implementing a solution for our new loft which, hopefully, will include RFID technology.