Core concepts

Proto Tracker models hardware the way it’s actually developed. A handful of ideas cover almost everything.

Concept	What it is	Example
Design	Something you build	MC-4 Motor Controller
Revision	A version of a design that gets fabricated	Rev A, Rev B, EVT
Mod	A rework applied to built units of a revision	Bodge R12 to 10k
Prototype	One physical unit, with its own serial	MC4-007
Status	Where a prototype is in your process	In test, Passed
Location	Where a prototype physically is	Lab, EMC test house
Holder	The member who has it right now (optional)	Sam Okafor

How they relate

• A design has one or more revisions.
• Each prototype is a build of exactly one revision of one design.
• A mod belongs to a revision. It can be applied to any prototype of that revision, and Proto Tracker records who applied it and when.
• Every prototype has one status, one location and one holder at a time. All are optional.
• On the Business plan you can add your own custom fields, such as firmware version.

The change history

Every change you make is recorded automatically, with who made it and when. That includes creating a prototype, moving it, changing its status, applying a mod or adding a log entry. For edits, the old and new values are recorded too.

The history is append-only: nobody (including us, through the app) can edit or delete it. So it’s the answer to questions like “when was this board reworked?” and “who marked it as passed?”. See Change history.

Organisations

All of the above lives in an organisation. People are members of an organisation with a role (owner, admin, editor or viewer) that decides what they can do. You can belong to several organisations, for example your company and a client’s. See Organisations and roles.