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DRAFT⚠OIML SMART pilot programme · internal use only · all documents and specifications are drafts and may change without notice
OIML SMART

The sample lifecycle — every hand-off on the record

How a physical sample travels through an OIML-CS type evaluation: registered by the applicant, shipped with tracking, received and held, tested, and returned, retained or disposed — with the branch flows for the damaged, the lost and the replaced.

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Sign in and open Samples from any role's sidebar.

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One sample, one story

A type evaluation certifies a design, but it tests physical units. The platform therefore treats every sample as a first-class record with its own lifecycle: registered → in transit → received → held → under test → returned, retained or disposed. No step is implied — every movement is an explicit act by a named party, because a custody chain that silently updates itself is not a custody chain.

The invariants are simple and the routing is free:

  • The applicant registers the samples and ships them where the authority directs — to the Issuing Authority, or straight to a test laboratory.
  • Whoever holds a sample can see it, and everyone in the evaluation can see who holds it and where it is.
  • A testing laboratory tests the samples assigned to it; the authority evaluates against them; and at the end the samples go home to the applicant — or are retained for reference, or disposed of, each with its reason on the record.
The sample lifecycle: registered, in transit, received, held and under test, testing complete; then returned with receipt confirmed, retained with reason, or disposed with method; the exception paths — lost in transit, damaged at receipt, wrong serial, lost or damaged in custody — lead to a linked replacement that re-enters transitOne sample, one storyRegisteredserials and particularsdeclared by the applicantIn transitcarrier + tracking, alwaysboth, or the ship refusesReceivedcondition, photographs,dimensions recordedHeld · under testthe holder is named;the runs are model-declaredTesting donethe report carriesthe resultsReturned · receipt confirmedto the authority then home, or straightto the applicant; the arrival confirmedRetainedfor reference, with the reason recordedDisposedwith the method recordedthe closure the completion gate demandsLost in transiteither party declares; claim recordedDamaged at receiptcondition recorded; marked unfitWrong serialmismatch detected at receiptLost or damaged in custodythe holder reports;the authority decidesThe linked replacementreplaces · replaced by — the linkage survives for the audit;the replacement ships like any samplethe replacement re-enters transitSolid: the custody hand-off. Dashed: the exception path. Every act is named and attributed; the completion gate refuses open custody.
The custody spine in solid arrows; the exception paths in dashed: every branch is an explicit, attributed act, and every sample ends returned, retained or disposed.

What each party sees

Every console carries a Samples view, scoped to what that party may see:

Party The samples view answers
Applicant What to ship, where, and when. Every sample across all applications, its current holder, its tracking link, the returns in transit, and the receipt confirmation when it arrives home.
Issuing Authority The requests it issued, the receipts it registered, the samples it holds, the ones forwarded to laboratories, and the closure decisions — return, retain, dispose.
Test Laboratory The consignments arriving at the bench, the samples under test, and the return acts when testing completes.

Open any sample for its detail page: the declared particulars, the photographs and dimensions recorded at receipt, the condition notes, and the complete custody timeline — every shipment with its carrier and tracking number, every receipt, every hold, every return, in order.

Every shipment records a carrier and a tracking number, and the number renders as a link to the platform’s public tracking page — the same parcel-tracking experience a consumer knows, standing on an audited chain of custody.

When reality intrudes

The lifecycle has branches, and each branch is a real workflow rather than an apology:

A result comes back wrong. The authority flags the specific result with a question; the laboratory answers in place, or corrects the value and resubmits, or re-runs the test — and the report’s revision history preserves the whole exchange.

A laboratory declines or stalls. The authority re-dispatches the same tests to another laboratory with one click; the new request is linked to the one it replaces, and the coverage view shows what is complete, running, and not yet dispatched.

A sample arrives damaged — or vanishes. The receiving party records the condition and marks the unit unfit; the authority requests a replacement; the applicant ships it; and the replacement carries replaces the original while the original carries replaced by — the linkage survives for the audit. A sample lost in transit or in custody, or a serial that does not match the declaration, follows the same discipline.

The samples go home. Testing done, the laboratory returns the samples to the authority or directly to the applicant; the authority returns them to the applicant, retains them with a reason, or disposes of them with the method recorded; the applicant confirms the arrival — and the custody chain reads as one continuous story from the first shipment to the last receipt.

Why it ends in a gate

An evaluation project cannot be marked complete while any sample’s custody stands open. The samples are accounted for — returned, retained or disposed, each with its record — or the project is not finished. That is the doctrine: closure is earned by the record, never ceremonial.