Australia's Science Forum

Just having a time out before I go nuts

went to log on to chemwatch yesterday to do the stocktake .When I looked at the Manifest I instantly recognised a whole lot of random things that shouldn't be there .
I rang Chemwatch who apologised and said when the schools moved to the new server that a few schools had this happen . They said they couldn't fix it and instead I had to manually go through and remove all the random editions which ended up being around 100 .
While doing this I also notised that some of the chemicals like Potassium hydroxide was now showing as a >0.1M 0.5% solution and not as a solid .
So after trying to fix this , the only other Pottassium Hydroxide that would add was coming up as Totaline Condenser cleaner non acid .

Why Why Why do we have to be forced to use this totally useless system .

I rung Chemwatch again and their IT people couldn't even look at our file because the server was so slow

Oh and that's just the Science manifest ...I hate to know what the rest of the schools manifest looks like ....unfortunately I know how will probably have to sort that mess out too

Just checked mine - I've never heard of half the stuff that's now living in my corrosives cabinet!!!!!
Like you, Richard, I'm too scared to look much further just now......

Just checked ! I knew I shouldn't but I did !!! Big mistake, just more work to do !!!!

Hmmm wondering how wide spread this is ?
Who do we complain to in the Dept that Chemwatch isn't working for Schools

I only use Chemwatch for SDS's, I have my chemical stock take on Excel sheets. Maybe Alan Smith he is the Manager, Compliance and Safety, Asset Management Directorate, with NSW DoE.

Another reason why I'm so happy that my predecessor decided against setting up a manifest in Chemwatch!!!

Not using it either - have a spreadsheet based list instead. I can easily manipulate it to make it simpler to read, whilst still retaining other information just hidden away. What I love is I get to name the chemicals the way that I want them named, instead of some having the brand name included and others not. At my last school (CEO school), I got permission from the the principal to convert the Chemwatch manifest into a spreadsheet. A bit of work the first year, but saved me hours of work the next year.
Here I've gone straight to the spreadsheet system, hoping no one tells me to change!

At the TPL day I attended recently, at which Alan was a presenter, he basically said do your stocktake however you wish, on chemwatch, on a spread sheet, with pen and paper, there are no hard and fast rules according to him! Mine is done on chemwatch, I'm not game to check yet, I'll deal with that later.......................but I think I'll be changing mine.

Ok that's interesting remlap12. I've just worked out how to print off a report from Chemwatch and have included SDS date so now I have it on XL I think I may just use that next year and keep the Chemwatch as a backup and way to get SDS's .
To be honest Chemwatch is capable of doing a heap of good stuff , it's just sooooo buggy and clunky . And did I mention slow .

Interestingly today I went to do the report for the office and realized that another random 5 chems had been added . Chemwatch told me it was just when they swapped over the server that this happened but I suspect there is something else causing the bugs . At least the Random pop ups have no quantity so it's easy to pick them if you just scroll though looking for zero quantity .....assuming you only have Chemicals listed with a quantity to begin with .

remlap12 wrote:At the TPL day I attended recently, at which Alan was a presenter, he basically said do your stocktake however you wish, on chemwatch, on a spread sheet, with pen and paper, there are no hard and fast rules according to him! Mine is done on chemwatch, I'm not game to check yet, I'll deal with that later.......................but I think I'll be changing mine.

Do it, Helen!

Yes Merilyn, I have your blank!!!! Ha ha

You can't rush these things. How long ago did I send that to you?

Mmmmmmmmmmmmmm.........................did you have to bring that up?????? I been busy!

which is why i DO NOT use Chemwatch - you are relying on a thrd party to not STUFF YOUR WORK UP ... excel all the way !!!

I used this excel list from ASSIST website
https://assist.asta.edu.au/sites/assist ... -2016.xlsx
kept a main copy of it but then have my manifest which I copied all the chemcial lines from the list into ... any that werent on there I used the SDS to build the line in my manifest ... looks AWESOME (if I do say so myself) /... oh and I have hyperlinked the SDS onto the manifest as well ... and set it up so they turn orange when a month from expiring and turn red when they have expired!!

Surprise surprise...another random 6 again this morning.
Chemwatch help are surprised to here this as nobody else has reported this to them .They thought it was a one off event .
Anyway I have E-mailed them the details ...they will look into it.

THis is so very interesting, indeed.

Lorikeet, do you have a location on there? I really like the idea but wasn't sure if you needed to have locations in the manifest too. This can be multiple places as we have a senior prep room and a middle years prep room plus bulk chemicals and class sets in different places.

The continuing saga ..... my 6 chems from 2 weeks ago has now grown to 44 with another 12 appearing in the rest of the school manifest .
Still no answer as to what's going on although my situation has been forwarded to the web designers .

I would drop it like a hot potato and go to excel or something much more reliable and less time consuming ..