Pet Pal | HELP | The ultimate pet management app for your iPhone

Need some help figuring out all the amazing features that Pet Pal has to offer? Choose a category below for a detailed walkthrough of the basic features.

Getting Started Enter description here.

If you haven’t added any pets yet, this is how your app will look when it starts. Go ahead and tap the ‘+’ (Add) button in the nav bar to bring up the ‘Add New Pet’ screen.

Continueing with our example for Norman, the Ball Python, we enter ‘Ball Python’ in the search field, and hit search.

You will be presented with just some basic info fields (don’t worry, more will come later). Go ahead and enter your basic pet info. Now that that is complete, lets lookup some species details from the species database. Go ahead and hit the “Lookup Species Details” button.

Notice that many more species were returned besides just Ball Python (Python regius). This is because with the search we entered, the terms ‘Ball’ and ‘Python’ were separated by a space, so it actually searched for anything with ‘Ball’ and anything with ‘Python’ in the name. The next section will cover some advanced search techniques to aid in limiting search results. Scroll down to the list item 'Python regius', and select it.

You are now back to the Pet Info screen, with many more relevant fields added to the list. In the case of our example, the Desired Temperature Range and Desired Humidity Range fields are automatically populated from the Pet Pal database.

Once you have chosen your species, the app will do a lookup of that species for any additional information that is known. You will then be presented with a pet attributes screen. In this case, the app knows that Pythons are ectothermic, so that field is already chosen. Go ahead and select Done.
Genetic Variations Enter description here.

Many animals have variations that distinguish them from other animals of the same species, but are not recognized biologically as a separate species. These are known as genetic variations. In cats and dogs for instance, these variations are known as breeds. For most reptiles, these variations are known as morphs. The 'Genetic Variation' field, allows you to enter the genetic variation of your pet. If the genetic variation (breed / morph) field is not visible in the Pet Info screen - select the 'add fields' button to bring up a selection of fields to add. Choose 'Breed / Morph'.

Here you can choose the term the genetic variation is known as, as well as the specific genetic variation itself. For instance, with many reptiles, the genetic variation is known as a 'Morph' - and with Norman, he is a 'Pastel' morph. For dogs and cats, their genetic variation is known as 'Breed'. And here is where you would enter their specific breed.

When searching for animals in the Pet Pal database, you can also include their breed or morph in the search, and if found in the database, this field will be automatically populated.

This adds the 'Genetic Variation' field to the Info screen. Here you can see that we haven't entered any information for the genetic variation yet. Go ahead and select the 'gen. variation' field to bring up its editor.
Taxonomy Enter description here.

When selecting your animal from the Pet Pal database, the complete biological classification (taxonomy) will be automatically populated from the Pet Pal database. The species field in the Info screen just shows the binomial name (Genus + species) along with any common names of the species. To see the complete biological classification or to edit the common name of the species, select the Species field.

Here you can see the complete taxonomic structure as well as any known common names and accepted binomial name.
Record Keeping Enter description here.

Lets start adding some feeding records for Norman. Before we do, we can utilize a nice feature of Pet Pal which automatically fills out the food type if we set his preferred food. If the preferred food field is not visible in the info screen, go ahead and select 'add fields' and then select 'Preferred' Food to add it.

Here you will see a list of Food Types. If the food type you need is not here, you can select the 'Edit Food Types' button to add a new type. Norman eats Large Mice that are Frozen/Thawed so I will select this for his preferred food type.

Now you can select the Preferred Food item which brings up the Food Type selector screen.

To add a record, select the Records tab in the Tab Bar. If you haven't added any records yet, this it what your screen will look like. You can view the records in list form, using the segmented buttons at the top to filter the record type, or by viewing a calendar. Lets go ahead and add a record by selecting the 'Add' Button.

Certain types of records can be applied to single pets or groups of pets. In this case, you are presented with a choice to choose between a pet group or a single pet. We want to create a feeding record just for Norman, so choose the 'Pets' button in the top segment control, and choose Norman in the list of Pets.

Here you can choose which type of record to add. Lets select 'Feed", as we are adding a feeding record for Norman.

Notice that because we set Norman's preferred food item previously in the Info section, the food type is automatically selected for us. Of course, if this is not what he ate for this meal we can change it here, but we will leave it be for this record. The date of the record is set to the current date automatically - so if you are creating a record for a past event you can change the date using the 'activity date' field. Lets set the amount Norman ate, which is 1 Large F/T mouse. Select the 'food amount' field.

Once this is done, save off the activity screen and you will be taken back to the Records List. Here you can see the record you just created. There are many different types of records that can be stored. Also, each record can contain a detailed text note as well as either a photo or PDF attachment.

Here you can select the amount of food eaten. Because Norman ate a single mouse, we will select the control to 1.0 (#) - with # meaning 'number of items'. You can also choose an amount based on weight by choosing a different unit value in the value type column.
Unit Conversion Enter description here.

When entering numerical values that have an associated unit of measurement, such as size and weight, Pet Pal has a neat feature of unit conversion built into the numerical value picker. In this example, we are entering a weight, and lets set it to 1.0lbs.

And again, changing to grams, we see that 1.0lbs = 16oz = 453.6g. Note that after changing the unit type, you can change the numerical value to any value you desire. The unit conversion only occurs when changing the unit type column.

By simply changing the unit type to ounces (oz), the numerical value is automatically converted from 1.0lbs to 16oz.
iOS Calendar Integration Enter description here.

Lets add an upcoming vet appointment for Norman, and add it as an iOS Calendar event and set a reminder for the event. In the Records screen, select the 'Add' button to add a new Record. Select 'Vet Care' as the record type and select Norman as the pet for the record.

He you can see the familiar iOS calendar event screen - where you create an iOS calendar event and can set start time/end time, alerts, etc.

Here we can set the activity date - in this case the date for the vet appointment, as well as any other fields you need to set. The Vet field will bring up the iOS Contacts list where you can choose your vet from the Contacts app. This is all that is needed to be done to create a vet record, however if we want to create a reminder and add it to the iOS calendar, we select 'add to calendar'.
Growth Charts Enter description here.

Pet Pal allows you to chart your pet's growth over time. You can chart both size and weight of your pet on the same chart. In order for the growth chart to show any activity, you must have several size and weight records stored.

By selecting the Growth tab, each pet's growth chart can be viewed. To select a particular pet, click on the top header area. You can also swipe the chart left/right to scroll through all of your pets.
Search Tips Enter description here.

When searching for your pet's species in the Pet Pal database, it may be helpful to limit the number of results returned. For example, entering the following search term 'Pastel Ball Python' - will match any of the terms separated by spaces - known as a boolean OR match. So all species with a Pastel morph plus all species with Ball in the name plus all species of Python will be returned. You can also search by genus - so for example, searching for 'Avicularia' will list all of the beautiful species in the 'Avicularia' genus.

There are several ways to limit the results. One way is to use the ^ character before each term to specify a boolean AND match - in other words, all the terms with the preceding ^ character have to be in the result in order for a match to occur. So to find all Python species that have a Pastel morph, you would enter the search term: '^pastel ^python'. Note that case is not important.

You can also search for an exact phrase match be surround the phrase in quotes: "Ball Python" will find all Ball Python matches including all the morphs.

The search is only performed on the following fields:
• Genus
• Species
• Subspecies
• Common Names
• Genetic Variation (Breed / Morph)

Violet, an Avicularia versicolor, says Hi!

Quick Tips

SPACE

Words separated by a space perform a boolean OR search

^

The ^ character preceding a word performs an AND search for each word preceded by ^

"phrase"

A quoted phrase will perform an exact match for the phrase in quotes