Getting started

On first launch

TrackInvent installs two locations — Kitchen fridge and Cellar freezer — and ten items prefixed (Ex.), in a first session named Personal (see Sessions). That is not your stock: it is a demonstration, so the app does not open on an empty screen.

You can remove them in one go from Options → iCloud sync → Delete the examples. Locations and categories are kept.

A question then appears — What will you store here? "Food" creates about sixty kitchen categories right away (Dairy products, Vegetables, Canned foods…); "Something else" creates none, and you will make your own. Nothing is final: see Categories.

If a stock already exists in your iCloud, it is picked up and the examples are not installed: a sheet tells you so and points you to the sync screen.

The three tabs

Adding an item

The + button, at the top of Stock.

• Name — required, and the only thing that really is
• Scan a barcode (TrackInvent Pro) — fills in the name, category and packaging photo from Open Food Facts when the product is listed there, and keeps the code
• Quantity — 1 by default
• Description and Price — optional
• Category — optional; the sheet shows the most used ones, searches, and creates what is missing
• Location — required, pre-filled with the nearest one if your locations have a position, the first in the list otherwise
• Manufacturing date — pre-filled with today, can be turned off
• Track expiry — turn it on to pick a date

Without an expiry date, an item counts in your stock but never appears in alerts or reminders.

The checkmark, top right, saves; the cross, top left, closes without writing anything. It is the same pair in every sheet of the app — creating a location, a category, a session, adjusting stock, cropping an image… — and the checkmark stays grey while something is missing, the name for instance: nothing to hunt for at the bottom of a form.

Editing an item

Tap it in the list. Nothing is written until the checkmark, top right; if you leave with pending changes, the app asks what to do with them.