General Protocols

Orientation
Motel Mate is a set of relational databases written within a programme called Filemaker.
When you first open Motel Mate will be prompted to login as a general user or manager. Depending on your account you will be presented with a menu either headed Front desk Menu or Manager Menu. However as the Manager Menu encompasses all features, this manual will refer to MotelMate as if the user has logged in as 'Manager'.

Starting MotelMate
Use the shortcut/alias on your desktop to open MotelMate. You will be prompted for a password. There a several levels of password each of which will have various restrictions depending how you have set them up in the user login accounts in the Adv Options.

Filemaker protocols
MotelMate is built upon Filemaker software. The programme is designed so that the data is saved once it has been entered into a particular field. This means that should anything happen while you are working on MotelMate, such as the power being switched off, then you can rest assured that your data will still be intact once you've restarted.

Layouts
One of the first things you will want to do when you open MotelMate is navigate the various screens, called layouts. Using these layouts, you can view records, enter data into fields, view reports and more.
There are two important work areas to distinguish from one another in MotelMate: the Status Area on the left hand side and the main Layout area on the right.


Screens
In MotelMate each of the tabs such as Home, Guests, Companies, Bookings when clicked open are a typical layout. These show the relevant field names and the field to be filled in with your data.

The Status Area
The Status area serves as a primary control centre for MotelMate.
In Browse Mode this is where most data entry and general use occurs.
Note the various functions of the Status Area in Browse mode. To jump to a specific record, type a number into the record number field and press Enter.

In the Status Area there is a picture of a little notebook in the top left corner of the screen which relates to the records in the database. This notebook will assist you in organising the information you wish to view.

In the example shown here, there are 434 records in total. However we currently have a 'found' set of 42 of which we are currently on record 1. To move through the records you can either click on the pages of the note book to move one at a time, or click and drag the blue slider under neath it.

It is also possible to move forward or backward through records by holding down the Command key (Mac) or Control key (windows) and pressing the Up or Down arrows on the keyboard.

If you are in a 'found set' and wish to view all records (perhaps you are in a list view of some sort) then the shortcut key to Show all Records is Ctrl + J.

Quick search
On many of the layouts you will find a Quick Search facility. To use this all you need to do is type in part or all of a name or business and hit Enter or simply click away (onto an empty part of the page). You will get a list of records immediately below relating to this 'find'. Just click on the name that you want to be taken it's relevant record.