Inventory Types

When we first created the program we thought about having a different sale inventory and a different rental inventory and a different coupon inventory, etc. But there were 2 problems with that idea. One, we would have had to create more files (and as it turns out a lot more files!), and Two, it was too much work. And if we have to do less work when it comes to programming, it means less bugs.

So we decided to categorize the kind of inventory by creating an inventory type. Currently, we have 10 inventory types:

It turned out great, we simply have a different screen depending on the type of inventory item (Not to be confused with the Item Type, this is an inventory type).

We also act on the item differently. If it is a rental, we know we must leave it on the rental screen so it can be returned later. If it is a sale item, we must take it off of the rental screen as soon as the transaction is completed. We also know that on a sales item we must decrease the quantity by the quantity sold, whereas you can only have a quantity of one for rental items.

And of course we operate differently on each inventory type when it is sold.

So you don't have to set the inventory type in each inventory item, you simply set it in the Item Type. If you are entering an item in the sales inventory, then when you add an item type to the item type table, it is already set to an S, then you select that item type and it brings in the S into the Inventory item itself. For the most part, you really don't need to think much about it, the program will handle it for you.