MICROMINE’s Pitram team place a strong emphasis on providing first class product support to ensure Pitram clients are getting the most out of their software investment. Pitram is a fleet management and mine control solution that records, manages and processes mine site data in real-time. The solution is suitable for both underground and surface mining.
There are various support channels available to Pitram clients including phone and email support and site visits by Pitram technical specialists.
Another initiative undertaken by the Pitram support team is the production of regular Pitram Health Checks for each of our mines globally.
The Pitram System Health Check is a standardised audit of the infrastructure necessary for the efficient operation of Pitram. Metrics related to the SQL Server, Pitram Installation and System Usage are assessed, and items of concern are noted for attention by client IT personnel.
The purpose of these health checks is to understand the current status of the site and deep dive into the performance of the Pitram solution.
Regular health checks ensure clients are aware of any potential issues and can further investigate before they escalate. It also assists clients to maximise the performance of their Pitram software solution.
The measurement methodology is detailed below.
Section 1: Health Check Details
The first section of the document details the administration details such as the name of the site contact, date of assessment and the Specialist performing the assessment. The Summary of Results shows the results of the assessment in a “traffic light” style. This traffic light system is used throughout the document to highlight areas that require attention.
Where any Orange or Red items are identified, the Pitram Specialist will provide additional information and support to ensure these are followed up.
Section 2: Product Details
This section shows the current Licence and Module details for the relevant site.
Section 3: Server Specification
Pitram relies on two servers, an Application Server hosting the Pitram Web application and the real time Pitram services. For each server, the following items are assessed:
- Memory: Is there enough memory available to the system to perform efficiently.
- CPU Usage: Does the average processor usage allow for increased capacity requirements during peak usage times like shift processing and end of shift
- Free Space: All disk drives are assessed.
- Error Logs: Windows Error logs are reviewed for any errors that may impact Pitram
- Maintenance: Do Pitram databases have sufficient maintenance plans in place covering database index fragmentation management
- Backups: Is an acceptable database backup regime in place
Section 4: Pitram Client Software Installations
Sites can have a number of Pitram Client software applications installed in different locations. It is common for rarely used client applications to miss being upgraded when a system upgrade occurs. This section assesses the version of Pitram software applications installed and the amount of free disk space available to the applications on each PC.
Section 5: Shift Processing Performance
Data captured through the Pitram Control Room and Pitram Mobile applications is automatically uploaded to the Pitram Reporting database in real time. However, there is often a need to reprocess the transactions for an entire shift, normally as a result of editing of historic data. The time taken the reprocess a Pitram shift is a key indicator of the performance of Pitram.
Section 6: Control Room Activity
This section assesses statistics related to the number of transactions (events) recorded in each shift, and by what method. A large variation in the number of events recorded in a particular shift can indicate poor usage of the system or failure by equipment operators to call in.
The method of capture is also indicated. Events can be captured through the Data Acquisition (be control room operator), through Event Editor (indicating edits of data), or through Pitram Mobile computers installed on equipment units.
Events can also be created by the EventGenerator. This is a Pitram facility that infers Pitram events based on information from positioning systems or through business rules. The number of EventGenerator events can indicate the level of business rule automation configured at a site.
Section 7: Data Quality
This section provides a high-level overview of the quality of data in the Pitram Reporting database. Firstly, systems with an active Materials Management module analyses all material movements and highlights suspect transactions. Suspect transactions include:
- Transactions that result in negative stockpile tonnages
- Transactions where the source or destination location is not configured correctly in the Pitram Reference data
- Transactions where material is moved to PRIMARY locations
- Movements where the source and destination are the same
- Movements where the material recorded at the source is invalid for the destination location
Section 8: General Items
The General Items section contains specific configuration aspects of the Pitram solution:
- Pitram Services Uptime – Are there any unexplained restarts of the Pitram services
- The Scheduled Clean-up task is a service run automatically by the Pitram server to clean-up temporary files generated over time. This check ensures that the service is running and executing successfully.
- The Library Content is an assessment that the Pitram document library is not being filled up with erroneous reports.
- Failed Jobs is a review of all automatically scheduled reports that have failed to generate during the assessment period.
- Internet Explorer is an assessment of whether site is using a version of Internet Explorer that is compatible with Pitram’s minimum specifications.
- Operating System assesses whether the Windows operating system on Pitram servers and control room computers meets MICROMINE’s minimum specifications
- SQL Version assesses whether the version of Microsoft SQL Server hosting the Pitram databases meets MICROMINE’s minimum specifications
- Pitram Version assesses whether site is currently using the latest available version of Pitram.
Section 9: Historical Results
This section plots the summarised results of this health check compared to preceding checks at the same site. This provides a quick visual indicator as to whether assessed results are improving or being maintained at an acceptable level. MICROMINE provides this report to the Pitram and IT staff nominated by the client.
MICROMINE solutions assist to make mining easier for our clients and a key part of that is ensuring clients have access to quality software support services. Pitram’s experienced team of support specialists are located across the globe and can provide support services in multiple languages.
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