ANKO Marine Load Planner is:
- A fully 'Type Approved' product
- Provided under open and flexible license terms which allow meeting the most common vessel and operation needs
- Fully maintained and updated, while a comprehensive support scheme is available throughout the product’s life cycle
License Terms
ANKO is considered to be ship’s equipment and hence it is licensed to the vessel for on-board use. As a result the ANKO license is transferred along the vessel in case the ship is sold.
The vessel license is a ‘site license’, therefore ANKO software can be installed on any number of PCs on-board and used by any number of users.
Additional installations for the office or PCs of the managers / owners are allowed free of charge. The above additional free licenses can be used for the purpose of checking and supporting the ship’s operations and are valid while the vessel is owned/managed by the company.
The supplied ANKO software is not ‘locked’ or physically copy-protected and the installation media / setup files can be freely copied for backup or further installation in compliance with the terms of license.
Type Approval
ANKO Marine Load Planner software is fully ‘Type Approved’.
ANKO Type Certification covers practically all available assessment aspects by the Classification, including: Intact Stability, Longitudinal Strength, Grain Stability, Damage Stability, Lashing Calculations etc.
It is noted that ‘Type Approval’ is voluntary and it aims to ensure that the software performs both in terms of functionality and calculation results accuracy, as per the statutory requirements.
Although ‘Type Approved’, ANKO may still require, as per pertaining regulations (depending on ship size, type, or other commercial specifications), additional ‘Ship Specific Approval’.
Ship Specific Approval
Regardless of ‘Type Approval’, ANKO Marine Load Planner, as any loading software, may be required to acquire a ‘Ship Specific Approval’ by the vessel's Classification Society.
This is done to ensure that ship modeling is adequately accurate and is within the required tolerance (e.g. as specified by IACS URS L5).
To carry out a ‘Ship Specific Approval’, the following steps are performed:
- Preparation of two booklets which are to be submitted to the Classification Society for approval review:
- Test Loading Conditions booklet and relevant calculation results
- A booklet containing detailed information on the ship’s modeling, including Hull, Compartments, Geometry Definition, Accuracy Check Results, Lightweight Distribution etc.
- Submission to, and review of the booklets by the vessel’s Classification Society and any follow up action required.
At the final stage, an on-board test should be performed. This is required by regulation to be done during the course of the vessel’s life cycle, in order to ensure that calculation results obtained by the software are identical to the relevant ones contained in the ‘Class Approved’ Test Loading Condition Booklet.
It is noted that additional on-board tests for loading software verification may be regularly requested by Class Surveyor during the ship’s life cycle.
ANKO Marine Load Planner has been approved by practically all Classification Societies, including all IACS such as:
- ABS
- KR
- BV
- LR
- CCS
- NK
- CRS
- PRS
- DNV
- RINA
- GL
- RS
- IRS
Maintenance & Support
ANKO is fully supported regardless of the time the initial license was issued.
ANKO is continuously developed and updated to meet emerging hardware and O/S requirements and evolving statutory Class regulations.
A maintenance and support service/contract are available for ANKO on an annual basis.
However, as ANKO software is considered to be ‘ship’s equipment’ and therefore transferred along with the vessel when this is sold, in most cases it is not typically conceived as a system subject to a software maintenance arrangement by the operators.
Thus, in practice, it is more common to request support on a ‘per incident’ basis. This may call for an upgrade prior to any other action (see Upgrades and Copies).
Upgrades & Copies
At any time, only one version of ANKO Marine Load Planner is maintained and updated.
Internal procedures ensure that modeling data are always available, but it is not practical to maintain each vessel’s specific software version.
In case support is required, or an installation copy is requested, it should be ensured that the data files are upgraded to be compatible with the latest available ANKO version.
The above process is also applicable in case a new installation copy is requested for an existing vessel application. Such upgrades are typically available at low rates, depending on the version of the original installation of the ANKO software.