Biomedical and life sciences research have been transformed over the last 30 years by the “omics” revolution, which has generated great insights about disease, evolution and individual variation. ‘Omics’ is a suffix for various terms such as genomics and proteomics that collectively embrace technologies made possible through ability to analyze and characterize organic molecules much more quickly than in the past. Naturally this has been associated with radically new equipment, such that the modern laboratory looks quite different from its predecessors. Yet, until very recently, one thing that had not changed was a reliance on traditional manual methods of recording and monitoring equipment, with an almost embarrassing lack of connectivity. It has been very much a case of the cobbler’s…