V.

SHIPS MANAGEMENT SYSTEM (VMS)

Introduction

Welcome to Revision 02 of the V.Ships VMS documentation which includes a substantial amount of
suggestions and observations from both seastaff and shorestaff. We therefore thank all those that
have continued to contribute to the revision of the electronic VMS.

Amendments and additions to these procedures have been highlighted in blue for easy reference. A
summary of the changes made in Revision 02 will be sent in Circular Letter format.

Revision 02 follows the same format as Revision 01 and the changes mainly consist of text
amendments, additional regulations and updates and more links to further information.

As the majority of existing staff, both shore and sea based, are now familiar with the system, the
following instructions are directed at new members of staff that may not have had an opportunity to
familiarise themselves with the system.

The Main Menu displayed on the

right of this page provides links into
each section of the VMS, reference
documents and log books.

The documents beyond the Main

Menu provide summaries of the
more detailed procedures that
should be familiar to most officers.
However the thinking behind this
level is to provide a simpler
condensed format which will be
easier to use for officers wanting to
“refresh” their memory as well as a
better reference for officers about
to be, or who have just been,
promoted.

The links within the “summary files” consist of detailed explanations and useful reference materials
that were previously either included in the text of the manuals or excluded due to the size. Most of
this material is useful for training or for reference when an unexpected or infrequent event occurs.

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Navigating the VMS

There are four primary ways of navigating or finding your way around:-

1 Hyperlinks.

The three levels are linked by “hyperlinks” embedded in the text. These links are indicated by
underlined text and are activated by placing the curser over the text and clicking once on the
mouse button.

Generally the links go into increasing detail (i.e. down a level) however there are links that go
across a level into a related subject. Clicking on a link will open a new page which enables the
user to have more than one document open at a time. All files can be closed as normal. The
majority of the forms are in Word format and will therefore also open a new page and again
can be closed as normal. Some forms, which require to be completed by hand are in PDF
format to ensure they are printed and completed by hand.

2. The search facility.

As the majority documents are in PDF format, a search facility is available. To start your
search, in the PDF document click Edit and scroll down to Search (Step 1)

A separate menu page will then appear on the screen (Step 2).

Step 1 Step 2

You can choose to search the current PDF document or all the documents in a specified
location, i.e. the VMS on your hard-drive.

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All instances of the word or words that you searched for will appear in a drop-down menu on
the left-hand side of the screen and also highlighted in blue, as illustrated below.

3. Bookmarks on the left hand side of the page. If not already displayed, on the left-hand
side of the screen you will see the option to show bookmarks.

Click on the bookmarks option and a “list” of the sections will appear. Clicking once on any of the
sections listed will take you directly to that part of the document.

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4. Index – the Index provides a comprehensive alphabetical list of the main headings
throughout the VMS. The Index is navigated by clicking on the particular subject which will
then take you to that section in the VMS. The alphabet across the top of the first page and
bottom of all other pages has been introduced enabling the user to skip directly to the first
entry that begins with the required letter. For example, if the user wishes to find reference to
“Hydraulic Systems”, clicking on “H” will take them to “Handover (Engineer Officer)”.

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Read Out Loud – A feature of Adobe allows you to have the document read out loud. This
is activated by clicking on the View drop-down menu and selecting Read Out Loud and then
Activate Read Out Loud. By returning to the menu, you will then be given further options, i.e.
to read the current page only or the entire document.

This can be a particularly useful tool if, for example, several people need to hear a particular
procedure or where there is a better understanding of spoken English than read English.

A note on quality assurance

The electronic VMS is the “controlled document” and protected by being distributed in “PDF” format.
Users are free to print off pages or sections if they require however these will be “uncontrolled” and a
watermark will also print stating that it is an “uncontrolled copy”.

We encourage all officers to copy this VMS onto their own computers for personal use however
remind them that it is their responsibility to ensure they replace with the latest version which we
expect to distribute every six months.

PLEASE CLICK HERE TO ACCESS THE VMS MAIN MENU

7 of 7 General Instructions to Master & Chief Engineer

Created: October 2007 Revision Number: 02