Home-Barista.com

Lately I've been logging my shots using a Google Form.
It helps me remember the parameters I was pulling last and I can use it to give me hints for dialing in futher shots.
It has a very convenient interface which I can bring up on my phone. I can also rather easily change the questions or options on the fly if I need to modify the stuff I am logging with the form.



I've decided to share my template for anyone who is interested in doing the same:
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1acm3x_7WwJfQSudZiNotW4g21sXgHkB_MoZmkhfWru8/edit?usp=sharing

Setting Up Your Own Shot Log
Here is how you can copy the template to use and edit as you wish:

• You will need a Google Account.
• Click the link above.
• At the top right next to your account image there will be three vertical dots: click that button and then choose Make A Copy
  
  
  
• Name the form whatever you wish. Make sure to leave the ""Share it with the same people" box unchecked or your form will become public.
  
  
  
• If this is your first Google Form it may ask you to Take a Tour of Google Forms. It might be a good idea: it is short and informative.
• You will now be on the edit screen for your form. Here you can add or delete questions or make changes to existing ones.
• Since I almost exclusively use lever machines now my inputs are geared toward a lever user. Feel free to change them to match your prep / machine.
• If you want to check out what your form will look like when you enter data in it or you are ready to log your first shot click the 'eye' preview button.
  
  
  
• You will then be in the live form. Bookmark this live form for further use, especially on your phone.

NB: In order to allow everyone to make copies of the template to customize as they wish I've had to make the template publicly editable.
This means if you forget the Make a Copy step then you will be editing my template rather than one of your own. Don't do that.


Consuming Your Responses
At any point you can see your logged shots by going into your Google Drive and checking out the [YOUR FORM NAME HERE](Responses) Google Sheet. Google Forms also has some sort of graphical results view which is cool to see my overall trends but not quite as useful for dialing in as seeing the most recently logged shots for a particular coffee.
How you rate a shot on the Sour<-->Bitter and Bland<-->Aggressive scales can help you dial in your next shot according to Jim's graphs in Espresso 101: How to Adjust Dose and Grind Setting by Taste

Thanks for bringing your project and Google Forms to light here on HB. I hate manual entries so I never logged anything for longer than a few shots before I got tired of the documentation. Documenting still makes the espresso experience seem a little too 'sciency' and a lot less enjoyable, but it would be nice to have a log of a set of great parameters for different coffees without having to go back into the memory bank and fiddle with that mess.

Kudos!

I think it'd be cool to just have a universal one for the forum. That way when you get a new coffee or certain region you can see what others have done.

brianl wrote:I think it'd be cool to just have a universal one for the forum. That way when you get a new coffee or certain region you can see what others have done.

That's not a bad idea. I'll see what I can put together this week.

Ok i see you have a lever

Personally i think all this should be automated...

My Gaggia Classic is now controlled using an arduino. I use my ipad to adjust its preinfusion, soak, and pour times with an interactive menu and sliders. All settings are saved on the controller's flash rom. I can run shots just pressing a hardware button based on saved settings, or through the iOS interface. A terminal screen on the ios device shows all the steps of each pour and can be scrolled back. Settings can be checked any time and updated.

My plans include integrating roasting with brewing... When i roast, i weight greens coming in and roasted weights and that would be recorded into a database. So the controller will know whats available and how it was roasted and let me choose it for brewing. I have an internet scale i built as well so it would record weights.

Was just thinking to add ratings for taste.

All data should be served up in a web page wirelessly and be searchable.

Let the computers do the grunt work using sensors and a central data store.

Consider this an iterative step in that direction, as many home baristas are either logging their shots using a more manual process or not doing so at all.
This is a very low effort way to get data into a format which can be analyzed and aggregated.

The more modern espresso machines are starting to come out with many of the features that you are describing.

Some of this data will of course be a bit more difficult to capture automatically on a lever, but I have a fair bit of embedded systems experience myself and have some of my own projects in mind.

In the meantime the Google form is an inviting way to encourage home baristas to record and review their shots and shot prep.