A protocol is a prescribed sequence of events which are expected to occur for an animal. For example, you may have a protocol that you use for synchronizing and breeding your cows. The protocol view allows you to view which cows are in a protocol and which events in a protocol have occurred. You can also stop protocols in this view and even enter events in the view that are planned for the protocol.
To start an animal in a protocol, use the Add Event dialog. Select the protocol to start there. DairyLive will automatically select the protocol for you if the cow is not currently in a protocol.
To design a protocol, click on the Design button at the bottom of the view. This will bring up the Protocol Design dialog.
The protocol view shows the barn name or number of each cow in the protocol in the left-most column. There are additional columns for each of the events in the protocol. These additional columns will have dates in them. The color of the date indicates whether the event has occurred, is overdue, is due now, or is still a future event. The color legend is shown at the top of the view's window.
You can see the animal details of any animal in the protocol list by double-clicking on the animal's barn name or number. You can enter an event in the protocol by clicking on a date. You cannot click on dates for events that have already occurred. When you click on a date, the Add Event dialog will be shown. This makes it very easy to quickly record an event in a protocol.
You can print the protocol list that was generated by clicking on the Print button in the toolbar. This will cause a "Print Preview" window to be shown, giving you an idea of what the printed output will look like. You can send this to the printer by clicking on Send To Printer. You can also save the list as an HTML document by pressing Save as HTML. HTML documents can be published on the Web or imported into other applications, such as Microsoft Word.
If something changes in DairyLive that may cause the list to become outdated, can you click Refresh to update the list with the current data.
After you have entered the last event in a protocol in this view, DairyLive will offer to stop the protocol. This removes the cow from the protocol. You can also stop the protocol at any time by selecting the animal and selecting Stop from the Protocol menu or right-clicking and selecting Stop. You can also delete a protocol, which removes it completely (as if it never happened), although the events in the protocol will remain in the herd database.