CapaSystem

An industrial factory manufactures components for automotive and general industries. The production process includes a person that finishes and/or inspects each component. This person will be referred to as the operator throughout this document. Currently the operator is required to fill out all the necessary details regarding the component they are working on onto a paper document (forilo document).

This process is inefficient and slow, and data is not easily accessible for analysis and decision making. The factory management wanted a system in place to replace the paper-based process, with extra features to analyze the data in real time, and make decision based on it, like detecting the components that are bottlenecks in the production line, or components that are more prone to defects, or operators that are more efficient than others. in addition the system will also handle and track inventory, order and clients lists and information, and generate reports for the management.

Screenshots

Screenshot 1

Restrictions and requirements

The system needed to be host-able on the factory’s local network, and not on the cloud.
The android app needed to work on very low end devices (512mb RAM).
Tech stack was limited to PHP for the backend (in house expertise and server capabilities).

Challenges

From the technical perspective, there was no real challenges to overcome, the challenge was more human than technical, as processes on those factory floor, was not really documented, most workers have been working there for decades, so gathering all the requirements and understanding the processes was a challenge, and required countless hours of interviews/meetings with the workers and management, and a lot of iterations to get the system right.

My role

I was responsible for both the backend and the android app development, so I designed the database schema, implemented the API endpoints, and developed the android app.

Outcome

The whole system took around 6 months to complete (including the testing and iterations), it was successfully deployed on premises, and was used until the factory was closed down in 2020 due to the economic crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. The system was well received by the workers and management, since we received no bug fixes requests or improvement requests during it’s lifetime.

Personal Note

This project was my first paid project, it holds a special place in my heart. It was a really great learning experience, and seeing it being used to improve a real world process was rewarding. it’s the kind of project I think any developer would love to work on, and I am proud to have been a part of it.