Forum Discussion
Integrate QR or Barcodes into Excel for Ongoing Data Entry into a Single Row?
Thank you for your insight! I understand why this method would not work in equipment checkout scenarios, as we would lose chain of custody.
However, another use case is that I'm looking to collect data over time—specifically, when a test is completed on a sample and the results are recorded. I’d like to use a prebuilt column for each test, and instead of overwriting previous data, I want to append new information and results to the same row for each sample. In this use case, I am trying to assign a single row to a sample, and utilize a barcode or QR code to return to that row for data entry.
I still would recommend a new row for each new set of data. To add columns for an indeterminate number of tests would be to create a set of data harder to summarize. This might be different if you know that you're always going to have precisely NNN tests and results, but even then, I will submit that a single row per test result (within any given compound or product that is being tested) will be far more conducive to reliable summaries. You just need to make sure to have unique identifying codes for each compound or product (whatever the entity is that's being tested).
And -- as someone who's also worked in connection with quality control of pharmaceutical products -- there's always going to be a time when an anomalous result or two will need to be investigated: "what were we doing differently THAT time?" This kind of investigation would be easy with a record that notes date and time. As noted before, it would also take advantage of Excel's marvelous abilities to analyze data at the macro- as well as at the micro-level.
The question of barcode or QR code is a separate question. I've never worked with those, but would be totally surprised if that's not been resolved. I'd ask my suppliers of lab equipment to find that solution, My expertise is more in database design, and that's where I'm coming from with my recommendation.