DHIS2-RTS (Real-Time Stock management) uses a native DHIS2 Tracker program for recording all stock transactions (distributions, discards and stock corrections). A healthcare facilities is expected to handle about 100-300 TEIs (healthcare products) and record about 10,000 to 100,000 events per OU per year.
We have have confirmed that natively DHIS2 allows to limit the number of downloaded events only for an Event program but not for a Tracker program. We are concerned that, eventually, the large number of event data stored in the local database on the mobile device will exceed the available storage, slow down and eventually stall the Capture app. We have seen the Capture Android app “stalling” and the mobile phone screen turning black for several minutes if the user has access to a large number OUs and synchronises data from an “aggregate” Data entry form.
DHIS2 recommends the following specifications for mobile devices:
RAM: recommended 4-8 Gb
Storage: recommended 32-128 Gb
Can somebody who actually implemented a Tracker program at scale please confirm how many events a mobile device can store and handle without impairing the use of the Capture Android app.
it is hard to tell the number of events that create a performance issue in the device, it will depend a lot on the device specifications, the size of the events, number of OUs and other metadata configurations. It would be great to hear from other implementers about their cases.
As you mentioned in this other post, the right approach would be to limit the number of tracker events, which is not currently possible. This approach will involve a big change in the way the Android app does the synchronization, but I do think it is worth exploring. I have created this ticket to explore it.
Unfortunately, as you mention, it is not currently possible to limit the amount of events in a TEI. We do have a ticket to review the case and provide a proper solution. You can follow-up the ticket here.
Sorry for the inconvenience this is causing. Let us know if you have any other commenst/questions
Hi Darshan
This is George Mc Guire, also working on the DHIS2-RTS implementation in the Comoros for HISP Centre UiO (LMIS technical advisor). We are well aware of this issue and have opened a roadmap issue in October 2024 but do not know whether and when this functionality may be added. There have also been more general discussions on allowing “sun setting” of Tracker Data.
According to the advice we have obtained so far and based on the estimated number of transactions (which in turn is based on a sample count obtained during our field visit in three health care facilities in the Comores), we are confident that for the first one or two years, mobile devices will cope with the (unlimited) download of events during synchronising.
However, we will be watching this issue carefully to detect any slowing down of the downloads early on.