Getting Started

This section will show you how to start quickly with IDpack Cloud (“IDC”). Please read the following information carefully. It will save you time and questions.

Before you start using IDC, we want you to understand the logic behind the software and get an idea of how it operates. IDC works entirely differently than our competitors’ software.

We decided to separate the card design from the card production, so we created Project Manager and Badge Producer, which together make up IDC. There is a reason for this: when you have created a project that is to be used at an event to print hundreds to tens of thousands of cards, you do not want anyone on the network to be able to interfere with the card design in any way. This is a significant security advantage you will not find in other software.

Moreover, with 24 years of experience selling our software IDpack for Windows, we realized two things. First, most of our customers don’t use Designer to its full potential and create very basic card designs with only the logo, Photo ID, first and last name, title, and barcode on a white background. Second, they struggle with the database because creating and modifying it is not simple and requires expertise most don’t have.

Those are the main reasons we decided to control the design and database with IDpack Cloud. You can choose your design from our template library, customize it with Project Manager, and select the fields you need for data collection in our fields list. That way, you can concentrate on your business, get unique cards with the fields you need for data collection, and do this anywhere in the world.

Nomenclature

Below are the different terms you will see throughout the documentation and application.

  • Projects include all the configuration and design needed to print cards. You can create as many projects as you like with different templates.
  • Templates provide predefined card designs that you can choose from. In Badge Designer, you can change all the images, dynamic text, and static text to your liking later.
  • Project Manager is where you choose and configure your template.
  • Badge Producer is where you create and print your cards.
  • Organization is an organized group of people with a particular purpose, such as a company, firm, concern, operation, corporation, institution, group, establishment, consortium, conglomerate, combine, syndicate, body, agency, federation, alliance, coalition, association, movement, society, league, club, network, or confederacy.
  • Record is a unique record of information in a project that you can print on a card printer. You can store more information on a record (defined in the Project Manager – Field Definition) than will be printed, which we also call data collection. For example, you can add the field Passport # to get the information on the screen but not print it.

IDC interface

We use the following nomenclature throughout the documentation.

  • Top Header – Profile photo, first name, badge earned, link to Profile and Dashboard, current plan.
  • Menu – Navigate the different main modules
  • Tabs – Navigate the different modules and sub-sections.
  • Toolbar – Call to action and the help section.
  • Search – Search the current section.
  • Content – Screen to use IDC.
  • Navigation – A filter and navigation bar are displayed when a table list is available.
  • Footer – Bottom of the page.

These menus and contents vary widely depending on your page location, subscription level, role, and privileges.

Let’s Start

Okay, now that you understand IDC, let’s start creating your first card and printing it in less than 15 minutes. Please read the following section on Project Designer to get started.

Great, you have created your first card and moved it to active. If you go to the Producer section, you should see it in the list. Please read the following section on Badge Producer to learn how to print your first card.

Congratulations—you should have printed your first card! Now, you can experiment more to get used to IDC and all its options and features. For example, you can create unlimited projects in your account, active projects for live production, and inactive projects for testing environments. Using the roles and privileges, you can set the project to active but only visible for testing purposes.