No, thats my point.
Modern enterprise CMMS have used mobile device inspection for over 15 years as I said. When I started with MSC in 2006 we used a mobile device for data entry on round inspections. Return to the ECR and sync. No paper and pen required. I don’t know that it has advanced outside of simple rounds for them since I left, but it is not new.
Likewise with the brand new CMMS at my last company. It was intended to be based on a mobile device for all manner of maintenance and inspections. And yes, we already had intrinsically safe cases for the devices since this was Oil and Gas. We used tablets for supervisory safety inspections too, audits, with photos, notes, etc. All automatically syncing for fancy management dashboard pie-chart crap.
But, those were massive corporations with untold amounts of money spent on requisition and implementation of those programs. So if you can make a cheaper more elegant solution for smaller organizations, then I’ll bet it has a business case.
I see both sides. For some tasks its easier to have a paper stuffed in your pocket to jot down notes and pressures and readings. If I have to take my gloves off and pull an electronic device out of my pocket and try and finger tap or use a stylus while dripping with oil and my head in a crankcase…I might prefer the grease stained paper. For a lot of other mundane inspections a mobile device could certainly streamline data entry. Scan a bar code on a fire extinguisher shows that both it and you were there at a timestamped time, just as an initialed paper but more accurate and traceable. I do find however that note/comment detail drops off when the keyboard is replaced with thumbs and a stylus.
One more point/suggestion: One major gripe I always have with maintenance management programs is difficulty seeing history while working on a current item. If I’m in the field performing an inspection and something doesn’t look right, I want the ability to tap one key on that mobile device and see what the reading/inspection recorded last time it was completed. You could say the dishonest worker might use this as a cheat to complete the inspection from the comfort of a bag of rags, but I think you should design systems for honest worker.