Content

Overview Building a Storage Location Hierarchy Using Storage Explorer Explore Refresh Counts Determining Storage Unit Capacity View Content Editing a Storage Location   Adding a Child Storage Location Moving a Storage Location Base Storage Rules and Validations

Overview	Top

Storage Locations and Storage Units

The storage system is a hierarchical structure of different storage components. These can be a combination of freezers, tanks, shelves, racks, slots, boxes, and box positions. Each of these items are represented as a Storage Unit, within the StorageUnitSDC.

Some Storage Units have sister SDIs that add additional information about the storage unit. OOB, this includes Physical Stores (such as Freezers, Tanks), or Storage Containers (such as Boxes, or Packages). A storage container holds Trackable items.

Trackable items permit LIMS objects like Samples, Arrays, and Boxes to be stored in those positions of the storage hierarchy.

The storage location will often be a concatenated path using the labels of the parent levels and this path. This is where a trackitem item is stored.

The example shown here presents a common storage hierarchy where a freezer contains shelves, and moveable racks, which have slots that take a storage box.

Configuring the behavior of the different items in the storage hierarchy is the StorageUnitTypes. There is a separate definition for each class of storage unit.

Freezer A Shelf 1 Rack Slot   Box Shelf 2 Box

Each Storage Unit is based on the StorageUnitSDC. The LabVantage interface interchanges the terms Storage Location and Storage Unit. This document therefore follows suit.

Each Storage Unit has attributes such as its number of child units, the maximum number of Trackable Items it can hold and a graphical display representing available space. These attributes are defined by a Storage Unit Type. A Storage Unit Type must be defined for each Storage Unit.

Storage Explorer lets you view a Storage Unit graphically. Attributes defined in the Storage Unit Type determine how Storage Explorer displays.

Storage Unit Types are preconfigured OOB and require no adjustment. However, they are configurable. For all properties and behaviors, see Storage Unit Types and the storageunitrenderer Element. 

Building a Storage Location Hierarchy	Top

Here is an example of how to build a simple Storage Location hierarchy. Create a Storage Location from LIMS → Storage → Storage Explorer. The Storage Explorer page opens. Click "Add".

This opens the Storage Units Creation wizard. In the Create Storage Units page, add the top-level Storage Unit by clicking Add. Here, we add a Freezer:

A new row appears below the Freezer. This is for adding a child Storage Unit to the Freezer. Add a child by clicking Add. Here, we add a Shelf:

For each added Storage Unit, a new row appears to let you add a child. In some cases the Storage Unit may be configured to automatically add a child storage unit (such as slots below racks and box positions below boxes). These Child storage units can be required. See Storage Unit Types → Allowed Children for more information.

Here, we have added a child to each Storage Unit to build the following hierarchy:

Manually added Children		Automatically added with mandatory Child (Slot)

Now that we have chosen the Storage Units in the hierarchy, click "Next". In the next page, we specify details about each Storage Unit:

Item	Description
Type	Storage Unit Type such as Freezer Shelf or Rack.
Count	Number of instances in this level of the hierarchy. In the example shown above, the count indicates that 2 shelves will be created within this Freezer.
	Expands the hierarchy for Storage Units having a Count greater than 1. For example, expanding Freezer shows all 2 locations under the Freezer:
Environment	Environment associated with the Storage Unit. NOTE:   To enable the Freeze Thaw Tracking feature for Trackable Items, this Environment must be marked as a "Freeze-Thaw Candidate". Trackable Items in any Storage Location having this Environment will then count their number of freeze-thaw cycles.
Label	Text that identifies the Storage Unit.
Description	Brief description of the Storage Unit.
Max TI Allowed	Maximum number of Trackable Items the Storage Unit can hold. This is defined by the Storage Unit Type. Storage Units defined with -1 indicates an unlimited storage capacity. If not pre-defined in the Storage Unit you can do so during Editing. See Editing a Storage Location, Max Trackable Items Allowed. NOTE:   If defined as "0", Trackable Items Allowed will be considered No, you will not be able to assign Trackable Items (such as Samples) to this Storage Unit.
Moveable Flag	Whether or not the Trackable Items in the Storage Unit are moveable. For example, a Rack on a shelf is moveable, or a storage Box can be taken out of a slot and moved (or the shelf can not be moved from the freezer).

Save the hierarchy by clicking Next:

Click Finish. The Storage Location shows in the in the Storage Explorer list page.

Using Storage Explorer	Top

Storage Explorer provides a sense of the current overall inventory in a given Storage Unit. The Storage Explorer List page lists the top-level Storage Location (such as Freezer, Tank). The "Explore" button opens a graphical view of the lower (child) level Storage Units (Shelf, Slot, Box). For each level, a progress bar indicates utilization according to capacity.

From the Storage Explorer list page, you can "Add" new Storage Locations or "Edit" existing. See Editing a Storage Location for more information. The following additional options are available.

Option	Description
Add Child	Adds a child Storage Unit to the selected Storage Location.
Explore	Opens a graphical view of a Storage Location and all Child Storage Locations (same as clicking the Explore icon).
Refresh Counts	Manually refreshes the counts provided for each Storage Location. Configure the Storage Unit Type to always refresh the statistics before the Storage Unit is expanded. NOTE:   Counts are only accurate to the last execution of the StorageStatsCollection action. See Refresh Counts, Determining Storage Unit Capacity for more information.
View Content	Displays a list of the Trackable Items filed into the selected Storage Location and below.

Storage Explorer is available whenever a lookup is used to find storage space (File Samples, Assign Storage, Check In, etc.).

Storage Location Details

Information shown about the Restrictions, number of Shelves, Department, GLP, etc. is all configurable in the StorageUnitType on a storage unit type basis.

When Samples (Trackitems) are placed directly in a Storage Location (Freezer, Shelf, Rack or Slot as opposed to in a Box) a count displays with a link to the Trackitem details.

Expanding Child Levels

Expanding a Rack displays any child Storage Units including Slots with Boxes. Click the box to open the Box view.

Boxes display the content of the Storage Unit. Unsorted Boxes with a defined capacity list the number of specimen filed, and the capacity of the box (see Refresh Counts, Determining Storage Unit Capacity for more information about capacity).

The progress bar provides a visual cue that lets you quickly find a slot with available space. Clicking the box opens the View Box dialog where you can see more details. Boxes defined with unlimited storage capacity (-1) are shown with a dotted line around the box and no progress bar.

See Boxes for detailed information about configuring the Box dialog.

Once a Box is added to a Slot, the Slot itself can no longer be selected.

Operations

Perform any of the following operations for the selected Storage Unit(s).

Storage Explorer reports the storage capacity of the various levels within a storage hierarchy. How many slots are filled versus empty, and the overall specimen capacity and specimen count. The Storage Unit count is cache information normally refreshed by a recurring task. These statistics (counts) can be refreshed in a number of ways.

Determining Storage Unit Capacity

The Storage Stats collection stored procedure checks all active Physical Store Storage Units and calculates the statistics down through all levels of the hierarchy until reaching the Lowest level (Last Node) Storage Unit.

Lowest Level (last node) Storage Unit

The lowest level (last node) is the Last Storage unit in a Storage Unit hierarchy and generally contains the Storage containers. Any Storage Unit that defines a Specimen Capacity is also considered to be the lowest level (last node).

The lowest level Storage Unit is used to calculate storage unit statistics, calculations are only performed until the lowest level. The statistics calculation sums up the capacity of lowest level storage units.

Storage Units in the Storage Unit hierarchy are marked as the lowest level (last node) when:

Calculating Capacity

Using the size of the container in the Last Node (it is either a fixed size container, or an unsorted container which has a maximum size) the system can calculate the LastNodeCapacity which is then set in the Last Node Storage Unit.

If the Last Node is empty, the system looks at the child Storage Units as defined in the Storage Unit Type. When there are multiple, the capacity is assumed to be the maximum sized container. The LastNodeCapacity is then set for all empty slots.

When the hierarchy does not include a Last Node ("Specimen Capacity" is defined) the user supplies the maximum number of specimen the Storage Unit may hold. When this user supplied max capacity is specified, it will be used in lieu of any calculated capacity.

The Last Node Capacity is set whenever a container Checkin or Checkout occurs.

View Content lets you view the Track Items filed within the selected Storage Location.

See Trackable Items for more information about fields and operations available on the Track Item list.

Editing a Storage Location	Top

From the Storage Explorer select a Storage Location and click "Edit". Here you can more specifically define the Storage Unit.

Displays information about each child of the parent Storage Unit above. To add children, see Adding a Child Storage Location below.

Any Restrictions associated with this Storage Location are displayed in the Restrictions tab. Restrictions are hierarchical, Restrictions defined at a parent level will be inherited by child levels and displayed here.

To add Restrictions for this Storage Location, click the "Manage Restrictions" button. See Manage Storage Restrictions for detailed information about defining Storage Restrictions.

Adding a Child Storage Location	Top

To add a child Storage Location, select a single parent Storage Location from the Storage Explorer and click "Add Child". In the Add Child wizard, the Storage Unit Type (as defined by the Parent) is automatically selected and the row is disabled as shown below.

A second is automatically added from which you can select children that are allowed in the selected parent. Click + to extend the hierarchy.

The same details page as the parent Storage Location is provided.

When the wizard completes, the new child structure is added as a child to the parent. 

Moving a Storage Location	Top

To move a selected Storage Location, click "Move", then choose the new location from the lookup. Choose Storage Explorer to browse for available space.

Base Storage Rules and Validations	Top

Assign Trackable Items to Storage	Top

The "Assign Storage" operation is available on these pages: