Feature Requests Archive A

Suggestions and discussion about upcoming features in future BeerTools Pro releases.
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billvelek
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I want to apologize; I didn't mean to come across like that.

Post by billvelek »

In re-reading my long post on Jan. 31, I regret that I expressed myself as I did. Part of that was probably some homebrew talking, and part was probably a bit of frustration on my part. When I say frustration, it is with the best of intentions -- sort of like constructive criticism, and I want to explain what I mean. However, I will save my explanation for another post when I have more time, but I do want to emphasize at this point that I am NOT complaining about the admirable efforts of Jeff and Lathe, and I have NOT run out of patience yet. I have no regrets with my purchase of BTP, but there are some issues that I will bring up in my next post when I have time. Meanwhile, I hope I didn't offend anyone, and I certainly don't want to strifle any ideas.

Cheers.

Bill Velek
Visit www.tinyurl.com/bvelek - portal to my brewing sites: 3,100+ members on 'Grow-Hops', and 1,350+ brewers on my 'BrewingEquip' group.
Running BTP v1.5.3 on WinXP 2005 SP3 w/AMD Athlon 64@3800+, 1GigRam, Res 1024x768
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billvelek
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"Hop Age" tool? ... Like 'BeerSmith' has??

Post by billvelek »

Let me add to the long list of suggestions here. While discussing hop degradation in another forum, someone referred me to this page of BeerSmith which apparently has a 'hop age' tool which is actually a program that calculates hop degradation -- http://www.beersmith.com/Help/hop_age_tool.htm -- and so I did a little checking and also found this software-- http://www.palmgear.com/index.cfm?fusea ... dID=127334
-- which also has a 'hop age/degradation' tool. I then located this article -- http://brewingtechniques.com/library/ba ... aretz.html -- which actually contains the mathematical formulas for predicting hop degradation that I hope will help Jeff and Lathe if they decide to try to implement this. I think that this would be a valuable asset for any brewer who maintains any sort of inventory of hops -- which probably includes the vast majority of us.

Thanks.

Bill Velek
Visit www.tinyurl.com/bvelek - portal to my brewing sites: 3,100+ members on 'Grow-Hops', and 1,350+ brewers on my 'BrewingEquip' group.
Running BTP v1.5.3 on WinXP 2005 SP3 w/AMD Athlon 64@3800+, 1GigRam, Res 1024x768
wrz0170
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Post by wrz0170 »

Hi there. Not sure how this ranks of importance, but with the spirit of suggestions :)

A checklist of sorts that you can print out on brew day. Going from putting a check mark on cleaning/sterilizing equipment to opening up your first bottle. With so many steps involved, it would be nice to keep track as you progress throughout your brew day and beyond.

Experienced brewers could probably do the entire process in their sleep, so this may be geared for the less the experienced and new brewers.

Just a thought.
soyousee
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Post by soyousee »

Right up there in the Windows category I would like to see,
a mash temp strike calculator and list of value converters
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slothrob
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Post by slothrob »

Do you mean something other than the Mash Strike Temperature Calculator and Value converter that the program already contains?
BTP v2.0.* Windows XP
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billvelek
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Post by billvelek »

By 'value' converter, do you mean the 'Units' tab on the calculator?

Bill Velek
Visit www.tinyurl.com/bvelek - portal to my brewing sites: 3,100+ members on 'Grow-Hops', and 1,350+ brewers on my 'BrewingEquip' group.
Running BTP v1.5.3 on WinXP 2005 SP3 w/AMD Athlon 64@3800+, 1GigRam, Res 1024x768
mlritchie
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Post by mlritchie »

I have seen a few similar posts on this subject, but I wanted to put in my two cents. BeerSmith has a nifty "BrewSheet" printout that is an awesome feature. After you enter your receipe, you can print it out in a format that is easy to carry to your local brew store for ingredients plus it orders everything in chronological order for the brew day. It also has a checklist column to help you keep track where you are in your brew. With some of my recent receipes with many hop additions, this has saved me. Before I completely give up BeerSmith, I would really like to see a similar feature in BeerTools. The simple print feature included in BTP is just not enough.
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billvelek
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Why isn't it enough?

Post by billvelek »

I'm not arguing with you; just curious as to why you think that the current printout from BTP is "not enough". With it, I can easily do everything that you have described.

The BTP format is only two pages long, so I can staple it together so that it "is easy to carry to your local homebrew store for ingredients" plus I can also very easily put "everything in chronological order for the brew day". While it doesn't have a checklist "column" to help you keep track of where you are in your brew, the steps are on separate lines easy enough to see, and I just use a pen and either cross through or put a check marK next to each step that is completed. Frankly, I can't imagine any recipe being so long and complicated that the current BTP printout still wouldn't be extremely easy to use just as you have described. Am I missing something?

Cheers.

Bill Velek
Visit www.tinyurl.com/bvelek - portal to my brewing sites: 3,100+ members on 'Grow-Hops', and 1,350+ brewers on my 'BrewingEquip' group.
Running BTP v1.5.3 on WinXP 2005 SP3 w/AMD Athlon 64@3800+, 1GigRam, Res 1024x768
mlritchie
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Post by mlritchie »

Don't get me wrong the print out is much better than ProMash and works, but I prefer some of the features that BeerSmith has on printing. As you said "you have to put it in chronological order". While this is an easy task of dragging and dropping the items, BeerSmith does this automatically no matter how you entered it based on boil time. Maybe if BTP offered the feature of sorting the ingredients list by column headings this would be a non-issue. I could sort the ingredients by the "boil" column first and then print.

The BrewSheet also has additional data that BTP does not. If I enter the number of days I plan to keep the beer in primary, secondary and force carbonation, the BrewSheet will list those dates for me. This way I don't have to think about it and I just refer to the print out.

In regards to the number of pages, I entered a pretty complex receipe that has hop additions every 10 minutes in a 90 minute boil and both print outs are 2 pages. So BeerSmith's print out is not complex.
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Post by wrz0170 »

mlritchie wrote:Don't get me wrong the print out is much better than ProMash and works, but I prefer some of the features that BeerSmith has on printing. As you said "you have to put it in chronological order". While this is an easy task of dragging and dropping the items, BeerSmith does this automatically no matter how you entered it based on boil time. Maybe if BTP offered the feature of sorting the ingredients list by column headings this would be a non-issue. I could sort the ingredients by the "boil" column first and then print.

The BrewSheet also has additional data that BTP does not. If I enter the number of days I plan to keep the beer in primary, secondary and force carbonation, the BrewSheet will list those dates for me. This way I don't have to think about it and I just refer to the print out.

In regards to the number of pages, I entered a pretty complex receipe that has hop additions every 10 minutes in a 90 minute boil and both print outs are 2 pages. So BeerSmith's print out is not complex.
I am borderline between BTP and Beersmith. The Brewsheet is really nice to have on a brewday. I have not seen what a print out looks like on BTP. So unfortuately, I cannot comment. Be nice to have "try before you buy" *HINT* :mrgreen:

The brewsheet that is referred to goes from cleaning your equipment, steeping, hop schedules and down to the exact date you should be able to open up your first beer and enjoy. Again, for the experienced brewer, this may be a non-issue. All I know is that when I used it on my brew day, it kept me on my toes and on target of what I needed to do.

BS also has a nice shopping cart feature (again, not sure if BTP offers it) With a few clicks, I can move all my ingredients to an easy to read shopping list to print out and take it to the LHBS.
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Romulan_Ale
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Extract / All-Grain Conversion

Post by Romulan_Ale »

I wouldn't mind seeing an extract to AG or vice-versa conversion. The trial I had of Beersmith had it and it seemed a handy tool. I'm sure this is more of a "bells and whistles" type of feature, but I thought I would throw it out there. :)
pmd428
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Icons

Post by pmd428 »

I would like to see icons instead of having to click on the words at the top of the page. Like a picture of a floppy for the save command etc.... To me its makes using window programs faster and easier.
BlackPoint
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Timer

Post by BlackPoint »

I dunno if this has been requested but it would be nice if there was a built in timer where you could specify the specific intervals on when to do next on brew day and have it count down for you.

I know when I was brewing my first batch we went by our cell phones on time and sometimes when we got a call it would be a bit stressful to have to rush to the nearest clock and guesstimate based on what our phones time was (some cell phones can
just-cj
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Post by just-cj »

What are you doing talking on the phone when you're brewing! That's worse answering the phone during sex!!! :shock: :wink:
BlackPoint
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Post by BlackPoint »

just-cj wrote:What are you doing talking on the phone when you're brewing! That's worse answering the phone during sex!!! :shock: :wink:
:lol:
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