Nautilus IV - introduction

Nautilus IV (Nautilus InCab - driver edition)

Nautilus IV is the fourth incarnation of this software designed for over the road truck drivers in US and Canada. In version IV we have improved all of the printouts, the trip settlement details, as well as added support for different types of accounts that allow the driver to track Maintenance, Escrow, Insurance, truck and trailer payments, or any other fixed cost. The Nautilus IV is redesigned everywhere except for the [Trip Sheet] interface, which many drivers have become familiar with over the last year.

About Nautilus IV product line

This software is developed by two truck drivers, the father and son. Father have been driving for last 30 years, and son is a software programmer with 10 years experience in software development as well as 3 years as over the road trucker, one of the few software engineers that can back a 53' trailer in to a dock in downtown Los Angeles without hitting anything :0)

Just like you, we were trying different software to manage our finances, keep track of our maintenance, state miles, fuel purchases and any other expense we would incur out here.

At fist we have tried a number of off-the-shelf trucking software products, but all were to cumbersome to use, did more then we ever needed and to achieve the task we would have to have several of them running. Granted some of the trucking accounting software packages provided a thousand reports but had no trip sheet, others cost low to begin with but had a four-digit price tag to add all the features that we would want to use. One thing was true for all of them the data entry was such a complex procedure that nearly required a full time secretary in the truck with us.

After spending a lot of money on software that did not do what we needed out on the road we ended up using simple Microsoft Spread Sheets. With time it grew to an unwieldy hip of files and a nightmare at the end of the year. Reluctantly we set out for a gargantuan task to write the trucking software to do all that work for us. The bulk of the software was written on the road on a laptop computer in the truck. All design was done over the cell phone as we were crossing the vast empty lands of North Dakota, Wyoming, or sitting in traffic in Los Angeles CA. Programming was done while sitting in the bunk and drinking a lot of cheap truck stop coffee. Be that a rest area, a Flying Hook, Pilot, Petro, a small Ma and Pa truck stop, repair shop driver lounge, dock at US Foods or even a chicken house whenever we had a chance to write a line of code it was written...

We published the first Beta version in 2006 and form then on it was tested with real data, real trips and real people for about a year. We did all the tech support and programming from our trucks... Today we drive our chairs in the office while our server is happily pumping 11 downloads a day on average. Our beta testers number over 250 truck drivers in US and Canada. The software is being continuously improved with driver suggestions on daily bases. With us you get real customer support, you actually get to talk to the people that wrote the software and care about how it performs, imagine that?!

Remember: if you have any problems with our software let us know. We cannot help you if you do not call us. Alternatively: if you do not have any problems with it and you like using it, get on that CB and brag about it :) show your cool computer toys to your fellow truck driver. This software could be the best one-hundred dollars you ever spend. Just think of all the junk you can buy at a truck stop for one hundred bucks. With this program you will see that perhaps you should cut down on those cheesy puffs and lot lizards to show any profit :).

This trucker software is intended for use by a truck driver and not really suitable for the office. This is why we call it Nautilus InCab which went through versions 0, I, II and III. Our latest release is Nautilus IV. We are now working on the office version. By the end of 2008 if not earlier dispatchers in small trucking companies across US and Canada will see power of the upcoming Nautilus office which will be linked with the Nautilus over secure and inexpensive Internet connection.