The offline app is a better option than a web app since the internet can sometimes be a major problem. With this app, the workers can send the invoices to the server manually later if there was no internet at the moment of recording the invoice.
you are right! I used try and error with the workers. I kept in touch with them from the beginning. Besides that, I worked there during the summer break when I was a bachelor student. I have an idea of how stuff works there.
The App can be adjusted very quickly to serve similar business fields. You need only to change the products and properties in the data classes and some calculations logic. Of course, our real data is not open-sourced. I could not find similar solutions in the market so I decided to take the initiative to build one.
My tip is not to use custom styling for buttons/text/etc just use the default Material design. It is already pretty nice, certainly better than what a non-designer can come up with. If you are interested in details, check out the design guidelines at https://material.io/, they cover a lot of stuffs from colors to padding sizes.
That is a good point! Our workers have Android phones which are at least 6 years old. Later after the test period, I am planning to provide them with a tablet specifically for running this App.
The problem is that the workers are not sitting in front of the computer. They are moving around inside the warehouse with the customers. For them using a phone or tablet can be the best for them. Therefore, I chose to build an App that is simple but productive.
The App is used now by our workers in the wood warehouse to replace handwriting invoices. There is no online market place here. As a manager, if I want to know how the business does, I need to call the sales team at the warehouse and have a conversation for about 15 min, and I get no data to analyze. With this App, I am now getting near real-time info about the business without interrupting the workers and the sales team. The App is not for customers. The App is similar to the App that the waitress uses at the restaurant to take orders. The App can be adjusted to fit any other similar business field.
Maybe adjust the tagline to be something to be 'internal' or 'order tracker' to clear up the confusion?
What learning resources did you use when building this? Personally whenever I've looked at building an app, I find the concepts for layout and communication entirely opaque and unintuitive.
Thanks for the suggestion! I started with the Udacity course: Developing Android Apps with Kotlin. However, that was not enough. I knew exactly what I want to solve. I was facing specific problems so it was easier to google those problems and find the answers than following a course. I am not a good designer. I tried to make the design as right and as simple as the solution needs.
