June 5, 2012 - 2012 LIMS Buyer's Guide Available for Download

We have finished the release of the 2012 LIMS Buyer's Guide. This new edition provides an updated list of the leading LIMS companies and products along with pricing information for each.

Also, new for 2012, we have scoured Youtube and the vendors sites to find product demonstrations of their LIMS software. For each vendor that has product demos, we have posted the links to those demonstrations. The vendors are listed in the order of most demos to least number of demos.

To download a free copy of the 2012 LIMS Buyer's Guide, visit: http://www.limsbook.com.

April 22, 2012 - Corporate-Friendly Open Source Licenses – Beware, not all software is truly free, some can come with a barb

I have been doing some research on the different types of Open Source licenses. The following is a good posting that quickly summarizes the potential dangers of Open Source to corporations. You just have to know the rules but as with all software, you need to live by the license agreement. The funny thing is that GPL touts “freedom” but it is a rather restricted “freedom”. it has all the ring of truth of the double speak/thought from the book 1984 by George Orwell. Now I am all for Open Source in the corporate environment but you have to be careful, especially beware of AGPLv3.

April 21, 2012 - Experiences Using Cloud Computing for A Scientific Workflow Application

Clouds are rapidly becoming an important platform for scientific applications. In this paper we describe our experiences running a scientific workflow application in the cloud.

January 3, 2012 - Medieval Tech Support for your Laboratory Notebook

We all know that if you have a LIMS or a ELN that it comes with tech support. But did you know that tech support has existed since the Middle Ages for your paper based Lab Notebook?

Watch this hilarious video on Medieval Tech Support.

October 1, 2011 - Laboratory Informatics Integration for Contract Labs

The following is a webinar put out recently by a LIMS consultant on the topic of Laboratory Informatics Integration for Contract Labs - approximately 30 minutes long

September 19, 2011 - Connected Productivity in the Petrochemical Industry – Optimizing Information Sharing

The Benefits of an Integrated Enterprise Level LIMS Solution By Colin Thurston, Director of Product Strategy, Process Industries, Thermo Fisher Scientific

June 25, 2011 - Some of the most popular discussions in the LIMS Forum

Posted by: John H. Jones

The LIMSforum is a user discussion group located on Linkedin.  The group has nearly 25,000 members, making it the largest and most popular user’s group devoted to all topics in LIMS and Laboratory Informatics.  If you are not already a member you can join it at www.limsforum.com.  The group is open to everyone and the members are very helpful in answering questions and holding useful discussions.

Here is a list of just a few of the most recent popular discussions:

June 14, 2011 - BioBanking, Lean Lunches and Serendipity

On a typical day, I spend at least a few minutes browsing this blog and the LABVANTAGE social communities on LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook. I’m looking to see who is talking about what and who is new. While browsing our LinkedIn group, I noticed something a bit out of the ordinary. In a community composed of customers, employees and other interested followers from all over the world, I noticed a new member of the latter type who had much in common with me. His name is Jon Wetzel, and it turns out that, like me, he lives in Southeast Michigan and is a graduate of my alma mater, Michigan State. Go Spartans!

June 14, 2011 - What LABVANTAGE is Doing with Data Integration

At this year’s CTEC conference, I have the great pleasure of leading a training class called, “Laboratory Data Integration and Migration: Best Practices and Application”. (If you haven’t signed up for CTEC 2011 yet, there’s still time!) In order to be prepared for this class, I have spent most of this week writing the training materials. So I thought this would be a good time for me to write down my thoughts on the data integration and migration landscape here at LABVANTAGE, both in the present and coming in the near future.

June 14, 2011 - Six Sigma and Your LIMS System

Six Sigma is a well established process improvement technique. The goal is to drive down defects in manufactured products, and thus to enhance customer satisfaction and contribute to the financial results of the business. Key to Six Sigma is that it provides a quantitative approach to the improvements; to support this approach a variety of mainly statistical tools are used.

June 13, 2011 - LiMS forum, the professional network for LIMS, Laboratory, Scientific & Health Informatics

LiMS forum is the largest & most active User's Group for Laboratory, Scientific & Health Informatics professionals to meet, post articles, jobs, videos, downloads & SaaS Applications for LIMS, ELN, CDS, SDMS, LIS, EMR, Robotics, Chromatography, Spectroscopy, BioInformatics, Life Sciences & more...

Also, you can access the LIMS forum on your Android phone. Scan this:

June 11, 2011 - Test Group 1

Test

May 29, 2011 - Labmanager Magazine Articles

A collection of articles from Labmanager Magazine that provide useful tips and advice to laboratory managers and professionals.

April 16, 2011 - What is the best acronym to describe a comprehensive Laboratory Informatics System?

Recently there has been a very active discussion on the LIMSforum concerning the potential need for a term or acronym that describes a comprehensive, functional Laboratory Informatics System that manages all aspects of Laboratory Information.  There is a growing trend in the LIMS industry to have a comprehensive, full featured LIMS that provides for traditional LIMS functionality as well as functionality for Electronic Laboratory Notebooks, Enterprise Content Management (ECM) or Scientific Data Management System (SDMS) along with a host of other functionality such as ERP/accounting integration, HR integration, CDS (Chromatography Data Systems), Chemical Inventory, Batch Record Management, analyst workflow management and the list goes on and on.

Please take a moment to give your opinion as to what term works best if any:

April 14, 2011 - Best Practices in Cross-LIMS Data Migration on Vantage Point

You may remember from your primary school days those puzzles that were used to stimulate the learning process by adding amusement to the teaching of subjects that required a certain degree of memorization, like geography for instance. I recall a battery-powered interactive map showing marks of a certain geographical area with all names removed and haphazardly displayed in one side, little metal rods to connect each mark on the map to the right name in the list, closing the electrical circuit and switching a lamp or a buzzer on. I actually remember even building one featuring a map of Italy with regions and main cities for a lab assignment.

April 14, 2011 - Cloud Computing for the Enterprise: An Interview with Henry Fastert of SHI on Vantage Point

Members of the LABVANTAGE Strategic Solutions team spent a couple days with SHI’s Enterprise Solution Services team at their cloud data center in Somerset, NJ discussing how LABVANTAGE plans to leverage virtualization & cloud to meet the needs our of laboratory informatics customers. SHI’s IaaS cloud has been specifically designed to meet the needs of enterprise-class customers and SaaS application providers, and Managing Partner Henry Fastert tells Brian Potter, VP of Strategic Solutions at LABVANTAGE, how and why in this interview from April 1, 2011.

April 7, 2011 - LiMSuniversity.com, the on-line, Open Access, Virtual Learning Center for Laboratory Informatics users and professionals

Atlanta, GA – April 4, 2011 – The Laboratory Informatics Institute, Inc. has established an on-line, Open Access University for Laboratory, Scientific and Health Informatics. 

limsuniversityThe Laboratory Informatics Institute is pleased to provide the LIMSUniversity.com site as a free and open access learning and teaching resource for all stakeholders in the laboratory, scientific and health informatics industries.

March 23, 2011 - Looking for a flexible LIMS learning program that adapts to various learning styles and situations?

Question: What do you get when you mix a variety of training requirements with an assortment of jobs, then add in a limited training budget, combine it all into a restricted time frame and finally sprinkle it with certification requirements?

March 21, 2011 - Data Visualization can be an important LIMS tool

posted by: John H. Jones - President, LabLynx, Inc.

LabLynx, Inc. on LinkedIn

I have been experimenting with a very cool data visualization tool for the past year.  The tool is called Tableau.  With the large amount of data that is collected by a LIMS, the laboratory can use a self service tool like Tableau to empower their customers to visualize the data provided by the lab.

March 17, 2011 - LABVANTAGE at PITTCON 2011 in Atlanta

Opening day interview with Jerry Hacker, SVP Sales. Jerry previews LABVANTAGE LIMS running on an iPad 2, talks about our quality ELN capabilities, laboratory business intelligence and other highlights from this year's tradeshow.