TRIVEC The waiter’s job just got a lot faster! (thanks to the new ‘native Handy’ app)

Customer Background

Trivec is a leading supplier of POS systems to restaurants, bars and hotels. On the European market, their solutions simplify business operations and optimize payments. With over 8,000 customers around Europe, Trivec solutions are in constant use and in heavy demand.

Our challenge

In a fast-paced environment where there’s little margin for error, waiting staff are in the front line when it comes to customer satisfaction. At Fastdev, our task was to assist Trivec in providing them with the ‘Trivec Handy’, the best possible product to help efficiently take orders and payments. We had to understand how to re-develop an Android app for the catering industry.

With multiple variable options and a modular design, it was a complex project that required close attention to detail. The smallest error in code could cause lost orders, customers – and business later on for the end client.

To meet the challenge we knew that an Android mobile app written in Kotlin was needed.

An additional challenge was Domino — a base system where all the dishes are created and stored. Domino has a huge variety of settings and combinations. Each combination has to be processed in its own way, and sometimes combinations are unexpected (our test databases inherited settings from a real restaurant). As a result, every feature had to be tested on multiple databases.

Our Approach — Re-developing an Android app for the catering industry – Xamarin to Kotlin, the Fastdev team and Methodology

1. Xamarin
   They already had a Xamarin (cross-platform application) but it could not scale as the customer wished. It had multiple memory leaks and crashed often when it was most needed
2. Kotlin
   The client required a Native app for Android. It had to be Android as they port this app to a specific device, the name and all the specs of which were known.
3. The Fastdev Team
   Our team consisted of 3 Android developers, 1 Quality Assessment Engineer and 1 Project Manager
4. Methodology
   We used Agile methodology, specifically, 5 development milestones divided into 17 sprints.

To deal with all possible crashes, we connected the application during the early developmental stage to MS Azure Analytics / Crashlytics service. This catches all crashes and allows the developers to see specific actions and system responses that lead to applications crashing.

It was possible to adjust system API calls with the help of Trivec developers. This provided the possibility to enhance the system. We were also assisted by Trivec’s designer who was always ready to answer questions and provide us with necessary design elements.

Quality check – SonarQube

Trivec were very keen to avoid any coding errors, they required 80% code coverage by unit tests. As a result we answered their requirement for all code to be passed by the automated ‘SonarQube’ program. SonarQube runs a check on each line of code to ensure that there are no system failing faults and reports the code coverage with unit tests.

Once we had satisfied and passed the SonarQube check with a clean code report, Trivec Handy was ready for use in the pilot phase.

Results – A re-developed Android app for the catering industry and delivery to market reduced “… by at least 4 months”.

Trivec came to Fastdev to re-develop an Android app so it could work seamlessly with their existing market-leading products. In Trivec Handy they are satisfied that Fastdev has delivered a robust and efficient solution. As a result the lives of waiting staff and kitchen management can become easier, more efficient, and overall, less stressful.

Now, with the new hand-held Trivec Handy, waiting staff can take orders at the table much quicker. It helps reduce the running back and forth even more, which often causes mistakes and can lead to a loss of money.

Client testimonial

“We had to change the programming language to gain more performance in our existing mobile app. For that, our internal software engineers needed time to train and get used to the Kotlin environment.

Thanks to the quick help from the Fastdev Project Manager and team members, we could have our ‘old’ app re-written at Fastdev, while our engineers had the time to get the new language in the fingers.

The Fastdev team was continuously in very close positive contact with our internal engineers and product owner to guarantee a seamless knowledge transfer during and at the end of the project.
This reduced our time to market by at least 4 months. Well done, Fastdev!”

Paul  Binon, Engineering Manager at Trivec