IRIS Updates for June 2023

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The IRIS Update - June 2023

Reintroducing Your Quarterly IRIS Update

With the rollout of IRIS v10 set to begin during the second half of 2023, the IRIS team is reintroducing The IRIS Update newsletter, which we will distribute on a quarterly basis to help you keep up-to-date on our current progress, timeline for onboarding users, training opportunities, and more.

Each newsletter will be broken down into four categories: 1) IRIS v10 Updates; 2) IRIS Tips & Tricks; 3) Training Opportunities (beginning with the next edition); 4) Questions & Feedback. As always, if you ever have questions or need assistance with IRIS, we are here to help at [email protected]

IRIS v10 Updates

User Feedback From November 2022's Webinar

The IRIS development team would like to thank all of the county staff who participated in the IRIS v10 preview webinars that were held in 2022. Specifically, we would like to thank McKenna Olsen from Linn County for providing a list of detailed feedback items regarding cost accounting and general application features.

This valuable feedback provided us with insights regarding the features and functionality that users are looking for in IRIS v10, as well as how those features should be designed to best serve their purpose.

Based on your feedback, we have been actively developing items, some of which are fine-grained, while others address major application features. For example, user feedback suggested that data entry workflows need to be faster. We have worked to further refine this feature and look forward to demonstrating the revised data entry workflow during future training sessions and webinars. Other major application features that we have been working on include:

Grid configuration options and settings
Grid filter creation and management
Data table display features

During the second half of 2023, we will be offering more preview webinars before the beta releases of IRIS v10. Not only will these webinars provide you with an opportunity to interact with IRIS’s new features and interface, but they also give us an opportunity to collect more feedback and suggestions from you. We cannot overstate the importance of user feedback during the beta development stages of the application, and we appreciate your continued voice and input.

If you have questions or additional feedback, please contact us at [email protected].

Beginning of New Fiscal Year Processes

As we enter into summer, we are also approaching the end of the current fiscal year. With Fiscal Year 2024 set to begin, July 1, there are several maintenance tasks that you will need to perform in IRIS v9's Cost Accounting System to ensure that you are ready to begin posting time cards for the new fiscal year.

The four areas you will need to update are:

Resource Classes
Equipment Rates
Employee Rates
Budgets

To help you work through this annual task the IRIS team has created a tip sheet to walk you through the process. You can view and/or make a copy of the tip sheet here. If you run into any issues updating your information or have questions about the process, please please contact us at [email protected], and we're happy to help.

IRIS Tips & Tricks

Making the Most of GIS in IRIS

As you may know, IRIS supports the tracking of geographic information system (GIS) locations for road features located at specific points such as signs, culverts, and bridges by allowing you to enter the global positioning system (GPS) coordinates for the road feature. Doing so can help you visualize the location of road features on a map, as well as perform some rudimentary analysis.

What you may not be aware of though, is with the right road base map, you can actually use GIS for all of the road features in IRIS! If your county’s GIS department has mapped your road centerlines with an appropriate linear referencing system (LRS), GIS programs such as ESRI ArcGIS can easily place those features on the map for you. The LRS defines the line work for the road, as well as the starting and ending milepost. It can then take the data from IRIS, and based on road number and milepost(s), determine where along the centerline the feature should be located.

The biggest advantage of this approach is it allows you to use the data you already have on hand, rather than having to spend additional time in the field collecting new GIS data.

Furthermore, as your road centerline mapping and/or your feature mileposts improve, your GIS locations will inherently improve as well. In addition, an LRS can help you perform more advanced analysis requiring distances between points on a road, which cannot be done with the GPS point method.

If you are interested in making the most of GIS and IRIS, please contact us at [email protected], and we can help you get started creating an IRIS-compatible linear referencing system.

Questions & Feedback

Your Opportunity to Ask Questions and Provide Feedback

The Question & Feedback section is an opportunity for you to ask questions of the IRIS team or your fellow IRIS users in regards to tips and best practices. If you have general questions that you would like us to address, or a discussion topic that you would like pose for other users to offer their thoughts and feedback, please email it to us at [email protected] and we will share your questions in the next edition of The IRIS Update.