How and why I built PoochPlay
About me
I am Freelance Mobile Application Developer, i have experience in Native Application development (iOS Android)
The problem I wanted to solve
An idea came to mind of my client about an application for pet wellbeing, as he is very fond of dogs he wanted to make an application for people who like to have dogs as their pet but being in a busy life style they are unable to take proper care of their pets and in absence of pet's actual owner any other responsible person can take care. Also people generally don't have any idea how much food his pet needs.
What is PoochPlay?
PoochPlay here is a mobile application which is all about your pet (Dog) wellbeing, with this application one can take proper care of his pet, example by making reminders of doctor's appointment, alarms for medications, alarms and reminders for daily schedule of his pet. Also that might help too in the absence of pet's owner if he is unavailable other person can get all the schedule of the pet like what to feed how much to feed, when to take him for a walk pets pee time etc. the most important part is my client wanted to keep the track record of dog's daily physical activity, here the activity tracker device was introduced which had connectivity with the application via bluetooth and was placed on the collar-belt of pet and we recorded pets step count, as there people hire dog walkers in the city it was unable to check upon them but with the activity tracker how much pet walks is recorded into the application.
Tech stack
As the application was to be built for mobile phones, watching the market we preferred to go with native iOS and Android Platforms, we choose swift 2.3 as iOS programming language as 9.3 was the latest iOS version that time and in android Marshmallow, later iOS 10 and Nougat was launched within development.
Technical Details about what we used for the development :-
- FCBluetooth Sdk for Phone and Bluetooth Hardware Device connectivity (iOS + Android).
- Local notifications in iOS for alerts and alarms, for android we used alarm manager.
- Sqlite database For maintaining Activity Records on both platforms.
- Core data in iOS
- Code Ignitor & PHP For Backend (Api's & Admin Panel).
- Asana was used in order to follow the agile methodology.
The process of building PoochPlay
At the starting we got some of hardware devices and their Sdk as it was the core functionality of the application we configured the device with Sdk as per the requirement on both the platforms we kept the mode of Milestone wise parallel development throughout the process. Firstly the design part was done with the Backend (Api's & Admin Panel) then Secondly we moved forward with the api's integration on both the ends (iOS , Android). Then with weekly update to our testers they used to assign bugs and crashes to the asana.
Challenges I faced
While we were in mid phase of development new os on both the platforms were launched ie . Nougat in Android and iOS 10 with new phones iphone 7 & 7 plus with major changes in the programming language Swift 3.0 and also Xcode 8, which made slight delay to our final delivery plans but we bought time from my client and migrated the code from swift 2.3 to swift 3.0.
Key learnings
within the development process i learnt a lot, i learnt about the different type of dog breeds, i also learnt about the agile methodology as it was our first project where we followed agile.
Tips and advice
Before starting any project or while gathering requirements always keep in mind weather the tech we are using that may be our IDE or programming language or platform is going to be updated in future in short always keep scope for future technology updates before starting.
Final thoughts and next steps
Finally we successfully delivered phase one of the application with all milestone tested and deployed. As future scope for next phase ie Phase 2 of the application the Food section is started where one can calculate amount of food to be feed to the pet on basis of the activity, diet, health, age, weight of the pet.
Links :
Poochplay
Poochplay Android Application
Poochplay iOS Application
In embarking on the journey to create PoochPlay, my motivation stemmed from a passion for enhancing the well-being of furry companions. Recognizing the need for innovative solutions in pet care, I founded PoochPlay with the goal of fostering a healthier and happier lifestyle for pets and their owners. Through meticulous design and dedication, at https://borderfreesupply.com/ became an integral partner, enabling us to deliver quality products that redefine the pet care experience.
I’ve always wanted a dog, but for various reasons, I wasn’t able to get one earlier. After I turned thirty, my husband bought me a puppy as a birthday present, and I immediately became attached to him. This puppy, on the other hand, is a rascal. According to my acquaintances, they used Dog training - https://dogrook.com/pages/pet-school courses to train their dog and the dog improved dramatically in terms of obedience. Considering how little I know about dog training, I would be wise to take advantage of these classes.