RentalPoint To Go - IPhone App

RentalPoint has two mobile scanner options:

Windows Mobile Scanner
- The Windows tablet is large enough to run RentalPoint in full screen. Scanner handle is available from the 'related products' at the bottom of the link
  - Mobile Tablet: https://www.ruggedtabletpc.com/products/xtablet-t8650
  - Related Products: https://www.ruggedtabletpc.com/products/xtablet-t8650
LineaPro with IPod - for use with RentalPointToGo and RentalPointToGo2 iOS apps
RentalPointToGo: Updated support for Linea Pro devices (SDK 2.1, December 2016). Supports iOS 6,8,9 & 10, Linea Pro 1 through Linea Pro 6 barcode scanners with iPhone or iPod Touch, and InfineaTab 3 barcode scanners for iPad. RentalPointToGo make its easy to scan barcodes and process checkout and returns of your equipment. It works with and requires RentalPoint server service, either in the cloud or on your local area network.
RentalPointToGo2: Provides support for the new Linea Pro 6 and Linea Pro 7 accessories, which are made to work with your iPhone 6, iPhone 7, or iPod Touch 6th generation or newer. Like its predecessor, it connects to the RentalPoint server service, and lets you handle your RentalPoint bookings, and scan assets with your Linea Pro barcode scanner

Installing and using RentalPoint To Go (RPToGo)

Troubleshooting Connection Issues with RentalPointToGo on Port 8098

Installing the RentalPoint Server Service requires you to download and read this RentalPoint iPhone App PDF which has full installation instructions

Localhost Connection: On the machine you have the service installed on, open up a browser window and type http://localhost:8098. If it fails to load the page then you most likely need to allow the service to broadcast through your firewall. See screenshots below for instructions on how to do this.

LAN Connection: Type this into a browser window on a different workstation on the same local LAN (Local Area Network) “http://(Local IP Address of Server Machine):8098” (this is testing that one of the other workstations inside your office can talk to the RentalPointServer program). If this fails, then it is probably blocked by the Server Machine firewall or you have the wrong IP address for the server. You need to make sure you are using the local IP address of the server machine and not the external IP address (from a browser window). You can find out the internal IP address, by going Start -> Run -> cmd (then press enter). Then type in ‘ipconfig’ and this will tell you the internal IP address in use by this machine. Should be something like 192.168.x.x or similar.

If the above works, then with the iPhone on the same WiFi network, type in the local IP address of the server into the RentalPoint App. (Page 9 of manual)

WAN Connection: To get to the RentalPoint Server program from outside the local LAN, ie from on site, at the RentalPoint office, outside your office, etc the Router will have a firewall in it and will need to be told to let in port 8098 through the firewall and forward it to the internal IP address of the Server machine. Without doing this the router WILL ignore all communication attempts to talk to the RentalPoint Server program.
Once set up you should be able to type “http://External IP Address of Server Machine):8098” from any browser window and see the service page displayed.

If the above works, then with the iPhone on the any WiFi network, type in the External IP address (nothing else required) of the server into the RentalPoint App. The RPToGo program will add a prefix and suffix to this information for communication to the server program. (Page 9 of manual)

You also need to allow the main RPToGo server side program (RentalPointServer.exe) access through the windows firewall or any other software firewall on the server it is installed on.

Using an Alternate Port for WAN access to the RentalPoint Server Service

Changing the port number on the WAN side of the hardware firewall can be done but it also changes how the information needs to be entered into the RPToGo app on an iPhone.

To do this you need to:

Set up a pass thru of the port and a translation of the port number through your firewall.
- So if we want to use port number 45623 on the WAN side then we need to allow this port into the hardware firewall.
- Then we need to get the firewall to translate that port number to port number 8098 and send the packets to our internal server of 192.168.45.20 in this example.
- This translation has to be in both directions, so information coming from the internal server is also passed back outside of the WAN on the port number it arrived on. To do this, you need to look at the documentation for your hardware firewall.
Once the pass thru setup is complete, you can simply enter {Your_IP_Address}:8098 from a browser that is outside of your LAN and you should see a screen that tells you it is working.
In order to communicate from the RPToGo App, you need to enter the IP Address of the RentalPoint Server using the exact format 'http://<ip address>:<port>/bin
- Using sample IP address of 222.222.222.222 and port 45623

http://222.222.222.222:45623/bin

That value must be formatted *exactly* as above in the RPtoGo app for it to work, substitute your static IP address and the port number you used into the format above.

IPhone App Limitations

Date: June 15th, 2015

Supported iOS Versions

The following versions of iOS are supported by RentalPointToGo

iOS 6.1.6 (iPhone 3GS or iPhone 4, with Linea Pro 4 model)
iOS 8.1 (iPhone 4S with Linea Pro 4, or iPhone 5 or 6 with appropriate Linea Pro model).

UN-Supported iOS Versions

The following iOS versions are NOT supported since they have severe problems with communications with MFI Accessories such as the Linea Pro barcode scanner. iOS7 is particularly badly broken.

iOS 6.0
iOS 7.x
iOS 8.0

Full details of the bugs are listed below, taken from a LineaPro readme:

Warning: iOS issues affecting accessories:

1. iOS 7.1.2, fixed in 8.0 beta3:

Closing session while the accessory is transmitting data results in application completely stalls and takes time to be killed (black screen). The implications depends on the usage - if connect is called upon application launch and disconnect is never called normally, the chance of seeing it is next to none. Applications that call connect and close often as a result of changing views are pretty muchguaranteed to get hit by it sooner or later, recommended approach is instead of using disconnect, if you want to disable scanner and/or magnetic card - to use the respective functions and reenable them when the need arise.

2. iOS 7.x.x, fixed in 7.1.2:

When iOS is left sleeping with Linea attached for extended period of time (overnight), no connection will be possible with the sled until the devices are detached and reattached or reconnect is forced in another way (like making Linea restart). A workaround is currently implemented in 1.79 SDK version, but it results in significant (+ 3 seconds) delay of the connection.
The workaround set to be active on iOS 7.0.x versions

3. iOS 7.x.x, fixed in 7.1.2:

Long periods of using Linea without restarting the program results in inability to properly work with the device until the program is closed and reopen. The time varies by how the devices are used, but will be about 10 days for Linea4 and 20 days for Linea5 and lightning connector based devices. There is no workaround available.

4. iOS 6.x.x, fixed in 6.1 beta 3:

External accessory framework issue, that result in unstable communication, unable to connect until the device is physically detached and reattached, EA thread leaks or whole program crashes.
SDK 1.70+ mitigate the issue to a degree, but it still happens.

5. iOS 5.x.x, fixed in 6.0

When the iOS device is left connected with the Linea with program running for extended periods of time (10+ hours) without the iOS getting unlocked, it may refuse to connect to Linea until the iOS is restarted or disconnected and reconnected to Linea. Apple are notified of the issue.Possible workaround exists by making the program always connected to the accessory, even on background, by setting external-accessory in UIBackgroundModes: http://developer.apple.com/library/ios/#documentation/general/Reference/InfoPlistKeyReference/Articles/iPhoneOSKeys.html It does, however, have severe impact on the battery life on Linea with Opticon 2D engine when using barcodeEnginePowerControl:TRUE.
To combat that, new option to barcodeEnginePowerControl is added in (requires firmware 2.64) to specify maximum inactivity timeout, after which the engine will be turned off. Setting it to a value, over the maximum, which device is expected to idle in the day,like one hour, will ensure long battery life and going around the issue.

Barcode Scanning and Finalizing the Addition of Equipment using RPToGo

Checkout is the name given to the process whereby assets are scanned out of the warehouse.

While barcode scanning items at the checkout or prep stage, quite often assets are substituted or accessories added.

These assets may not have been included in your booking and the RPtogo App will ask you to finalise the addition of these assets in the main program.

This articles shows you the steps to take in order to finalise a checkout of equipment added in the checkout process using the RPtogo App.

Please click this link for more information: Finalizing the addition of Equipment PDF