Web and Mobile Apps to Streamline Building Inspections

About Our Client

The Client is an Irish municipal authority that deals with inspections of buildings after maintenance.

Challenge

The Client needed a software solution that would allow them to manage inspections of buildings after maintenance and accumulate reports automatically.

Solution

Being an experienced application developer, ScienceSoft implemented a solution that consists of two parts: a web app and a mobile app.

The web app is used by customer support specialists. When they get a request for an inspection from a customer, they create an entry in the database and assign an inspector. It is possible to:

• Configure request settings.
• Manage inspectors.
• Manage necessary inspection procedures.
• Rate the quality of completed inspections
• Monitor inspection statistics.

The Android application is used by the inspectors who are visiting customers' premises. The target device is the Samsung Galaxy Note 2. With the app, each inspector can:

• View the list of inspections assigned to them.
• Assign or change the set time of inspection.
• Cancel an inspection (if the facility isn't accessible).
• View additional information for each inspection, including the address of the building and a customer's contact details.
• Call customers via the app.
• Use detailed custom field forms for faster reporting.
• Take photos from the app and attach them to reports.
• Edit photos to highlight certain areas.
• E-sign the report and get a customer's e-signature using a stylus.

To ensure the app's better performance in offline conditions, ScienceSoft applied asynchronous loading for images and automatic caching.

The reports are sent to the back end when the app is online. Until then, the collected information is stored locally on a device and is encrypted. Synchronization with the back end is performed at the end of each inspection and at the end of the working day.

Results

With the help of the solution developed by ScienceSoft, the Client was able to streamline its business processes and improve the quality of the services it offers.

Technologies and Tools

Web app: WCF Services, ASP.NET Web Forms, Entity Framework, DevExpress, C#, Microsoft SQL Server, LINQ.

Android application: Eclipse Juno IDE, Android Tools, Memory Analyzer Tool, Logcat, Lint, Tortoise SVN, Android API 13+, Java, SQLite, JSON, XML.