Adding Batches

Adding a new batch is fairly self-explainitory, but here's a step by step guide in case you have any questions.

Starting at the top we'll select the Type first. This will tell the app how many incubation days for this batch, it will also populate the Breed dropdown with breeds from that Type. So go ahead and select the Breed for your batch as well. If the Type and/or Breed of your batch does not exist or has a different incubation period, and use the Types
and Breeds panels to add them.

If you don't change Group or Incubator, it will default to None for the group and the first Incubator will be set as the Incubator for the batch.

On the desktop as you're typing a batch name, you might notice that some symbols and punctuation don't show up in the input. This is by design, you are limited to letters a-z or numbers 0-9 as well as - _ , . and spaces, any other characters are referred to as illegal characters. On Android the input control allows you to enter illegal characters, but there are checks in place that will notify you and reject the name when you try to save the batch.

Enter the # Of Eggs. You can edit the number of eggs later, for example if you're scheduling a batch and aren't sure how many you'll actually set. Minimum is 1 egg.

Using the Candle Date dropdown, select the day you want to candle this batch. You can always change it later, for example if you candled a day earlier than planned.

Now you can either select a Start date, and it will calculate the rest of the dates when you save the batch. Or you can select a Hatch date and it will calculate the Start date right away and show it in the Start date picker. The rest get calculated when you save the batch.

If you decide to select a Hatch date, you have several options. You can select "Select Hatch Date" to enter the date in a date picker or you can select a previously Scheduled hatch date. Either way you'll find all this in the Hatch Date dropdown.

The Lockdown date can't be selected in the Add Batch dialog. If the default 3 days before Hatch date isn't your preference, you can always change it in the Settings before you add your batch.

Finally click Save to close the add dialog and add the batch to the database.

Managing Batches

Now that the batch is added, let's do something with it. Start by selecting the batch from the Batch List. Under Android this will open a dialog that allows you to edit batch data. Under the desktop selecting a batch will populate the Batch Statistics Panel and show the batch dates in the calendar. To show the batch dates in the calendar under Android use the calendar icon to the left of the batch name in the batch list.

Once your batch is selected you can start editing. Here is a list of things you can edit:

Name
Type
Breed
Group
Incubator
Eggs: If you decide to set more/less, you can easily adjust this value.
Fertile: After candling, enter the number of eggs that were fertile to see the fertility rates.
Chicks: Enter how many chicks hatched to see the hatch rates.
Dates: You can adjust any batch date independently from the rest.
Comments: For keeping notes about the hatch.

It is important to remember to click Update after editing anything in a batch. This writes changes to the database. Otherwise your changes will be lost.

Advanced Egg Management

Starting with 0.80, HatchKeeper supports managing eggs indiviually. This allows you to carefully monitor your eggs. This feature is not practical for large batches, so it's turned off by default and you'll need to enable it for every batch you want to use it on. On Android switch to the Advanced tab in the Batch Statistics dialog and check the Enable Advanced Egg Management checkbox. On the desktop, select Enable Advanced in the More Actions dropdown in the Batch Statistics panel.

After enabling Advanced Egg Management you will no longer be able to edit batch type, eggs, fertile or chicks in the Batch Statistics panel. Use the Advanced panel instead. So let's select a batch and switch to the Advanced Panel;

When you switch to the Advanced panel you will notice that there are two sections. The top(on desktop) or left(on mobile) section is the egg section, it consists of an egg list, three tag dropdowns, fertile checkbox, pipped checkbox, result dropdown, result date, and egg comments. The bottom or right section is the day section. It has a day list, egg statisics, day comments, and on the desktop, a weight entry control.

Selecting an egg from the egg list will allow you to set all three of the tags, set if the egg was fertile, set if the egg was pipped, set a result and result date, as well as egg comments. There's more though, if you look at the day section you will see that you can add a comment and weight for every day of the incubation proccess. This means you can add comments for every batch, every egg in that batch, and every incubation day for every egg.

Some things to keep in mind. HatchKeeper starts on day 0, so day 1 is the day following the day you set the eggs. The day comments are automatically day and date stamped to make it easier to keep track of where you are going. Selecting an egg will also select the current day unless it's out of the incubation range. In that case it will select the first or last day. You do not need to click update between editing eggs, but you do need to click update before moving on to the next batch. You will receive a warning if you fail to do so. Exporting a batch currently does not export andvanced data, although a text or printed report will. If you plan to use the weight feature, make sure you record the weight when you set it. Although you can, you do not need to record a weight every day for the weight loss feature to work. It gets it's percentage from the initial weight and the weight you added last. Disabling the advanced feature for a batch will delete all advanced data although basic batch data will not be affected.

Importing and Exporting

Export Batch: This is a file that can be used to transfer batch data from one HatchKeeper instance to another. You can export multiple batches using the groups feature. Note: 0.80 will not export andvanced data.

Reports: You can save reports as a text file or print them. This is great for archiving batches and groups for later reference. If you need a pdf you can use a pdf printer plugin through the print dialog.

iCal: This is a file that can be imported into your favorite calendar service. It will add the four batch dates as all day events. You can combine multiple batch dates into one file by using the groups feature.

Copy To Clipboard: This copies the batch stats to the system clipboard. This makes it easy to quickly share batch stats with your friends.