AEF Task Validator identifies incompatibility issues

The Agricultural Industry Electronics Foundation (AEF) has extended its compatibility checker to include a new ISObus support service: the AEF Task Validator. The new Task Validator was created to streamline service and reduce downtime in the field for farmers and technicians who want to quickly resolve software formatting and incompatibility issues themselves.

Farmers who transfer data from their tractor to their Farm Management Information Systems (FMIS), or vice versa, via a USB stick will at times run into software incompatibility issues. This can be due to out-of-date software, USB formatting, or misread folders, for example. AEF said the Task Validator will help identify the issue, and provides resolutions to fix the incompatibilities.

Illustration: AEF

“The farmer can do a compatibility check to see if his tractor/terminal and FMIS ‘speak the same language’ so they can work together. By using the Task Validator, he can identify issues in the task data file and fix them easily himself,” said Jan-Hendrik Wölker, AEF Project Coordinator, AEF. “Normally, this is difficult to do and can be very time consuming, but the Task Validator will properly analyze and validate their ISOBUS taskdata to get to the core of the problem.”

The new AEF Task Validator is part of AEF’s database tool, a resource where users can look up information on ISOBUS compatibility functionalities and cross brand compatibility. The web-based database allows anytime, anywhere access for free.

“As more and more farms are online with FMIS and using the precision ag equipment needed to capture these efficiencies, it becomes incredibly important to develop a set of service tools to support equipment operators on the fly,” said Ryan Milligan, Deputy of Marketing Communications, AEF. “The AEF Task Validator is a powerful tool that everyone using ISObus certified equipment needs to have saved on their devices.”

According to a McKinsey & Company May 2022 survey, U.S. farmers are using agriculture technology

to support more farming operations. Nearly 55% of large farms today use farm management systems, and more than 50% of large farms use some form of precision agriculture hardware. Nearly a quarter of small farms use this technology or intend to use it over the next two years.

AEF said its database is a repository of all ISObus compatible products in the world, where users can drill down by brand, product, or ISObus functionality to confirm product compatibility.

Users can register for the AEF Database online at: aef-isobus-database.org.