668fc67133a43_saas

<h3>Overview</h3><p>The client, requested we design a human resources system suited to their specific industry sector and country. It was decided to investigate a Software as a Service (SaaS) solution that could first be used by the client and later sold on a monthly subscription plan to other related companies in the same sector. This would initially involve creating a software design document that would outline the required features along with deciding factors, technologies, security concerns and key milestones.</p>

<h3>Solution</h3><p>As a sub contractor for a software consultancy, I performed preliminary research followed by a system design document. The system design proposed the use of Laravel PHP Framework with Stripe payments for automated monthly subscriptions. Development would incorporate an agile approach to allow for later additions and evolution of the early features. Initially the focus involved building a fully functional prototype. This prototype would then form the foundation for evolving the system.</p><p>Working in Laravel, I developed the early stages, database design, seeders, subscription and signup, user interface, recruitment and personalised signed documents before handing over to a larger outsourced team for rapid development.</p><h3>Results</h3><p>After developing the marketing site, SaaS subscription features, recruitment process and personalised signed documents, the client demonstrated the progress prototype and secured a new investment partner. This has allowed for the introduction of a wider team of developers who are continuing to develop and evolve from the original prototype.</p><h3>Technologies</h3><p>PHP, Laravel, Livewire, Stripe Subscription Payments, Multi-Tenant SaaS</p>

Multi-Tenant SaaS

6697e07a2f086_listings-design

<p>The client, requested we propose and create a directory system for paid property listings. Payment would be monthly or yearly and represent a cost effective advertising option to support the existing marketing efforts of property owners. The design followed a common pattern to other property search websites with mapping and search by tag, location and keyword for each listing. The paradox to success of the directory involves advertisers first expecting users and users first expecting advertisers for the website to be viable for advertising or a useful online resource.</p>

<h3>Solution</h3><p>To help make the website an attractive destination for regular users, it was proposed that the website be pre-loaded with a large number of carefully researched listings. Having a growing user base would later encourage advertisers to signup in order to promote there listing and convert from a basic to a featured version.&nbsp;</p><p>After creating the initial graphic design and various page visuals, the website was developed using PHP/Laravel. Laravel has some great tools for building and evolving the database design ie “migration” as well as populating ie "seeding" tables with relevant data such as locations, cities, tags and categories. Laravel also includes tools to generate authentication for login and registration along with authorisation to protect features designed only for admin roles.&nbsp;</p><p>The consumer website has search by tag, location and keyword for each listing along with map and markers for each region. Advertisers can claim their listing using a verification process or sign-up to create a new one. Subscription payments are automatically renewed at the interval selected using credit card tokens, this ensures sensitive credit card data is only ever transmitted or captured by the trusted payment provider.</p><p>Much of the data came supplied in spreadsheets by the research team. Rather than manually typing the data in the UI, batch import process was created to read and insert data into various tables like listing, tag, location as well as API calls to geo-tag addresses for the mapping features.</p><h3>Results</h3><p>Whilst its still early in release, subscribers continue to grow and the website is steadily improving in the search engines for target phrases. The current site represents a good starting point for further feature development whilst focusing on core deliverables in the first release.</p><h3>Technologies</h3><p>PHP, Bootstrap 5 CSS, Laravel, LiveWire, Laravel Cashier, Stripe, Google Geo/Map API</p>

Laravel Property Listings

668fc665b498e_marketing

<h3>Overview</h3><p>Forestry is one of New Zealand's prime industries with timber products widely used in the construction sector. The client, a leading timber provider, processes forestry into a variety of building products designed for a range of uses. The client asked for ideas to help their team of regional sales representatives market products to builders merchants, to distribute promotional merchandise, track performance and develop a database of customers and end-users.</p>

<h3>Solution</h3><p>Working as a sub contractor for a software consultancy, I developed a solution design with product training features. The system consists of a range of courses, exams and certifications which candidates complete after reviewing training materials or in person sessions.</p><p>Whilst the system supports casual registration and access to on-demand product training, the primary usage involves attending an event, hosted at builders merchants and presented by a sales representative. Attendees would be:- builders, end users or the builders merchant's staff.</p><p>The key benefits of the system include training staff, advisors and end users on the correct product. Detailing key points of difference between the premium timber product and lower cost competitors. Developing relationships between sales representatives, builders merchants and their staff. Developing relationships between builders merchants and their customers. Collecting registration details for supply of promotional merchandise and future marketing opportunities.</p><h3>Results</h3><p>The system has proved to be very popular with the sales representatives. Following initial deployment the system has been expanded to support various certification scenarios from specific exams, course completions and event attendance. The system also allows builders merchants to brand certificates for their hosted events further supporting the partnership between reps, their customers and end users.</p><h3>Technologies</h3><p>Custom PHP, PDF Generation, Concrete CMS Custom Theme</p>

Marketing Tool

668fc6c71f626_goldfish-invoices

<h3>Overview</h3><p>There are plenty of software options for invoices out there and for full accounting you will find it hard to beat Xero. I have simple invoicing requirements but need to generate them as PDFs in a certain way. I also need the ability to modify and adjust things which is often not practical with software as a service subscription systems like Xero. My previous invoice software was developed with an earlier version of CodeIgniter framework which is now obsolete. My choices are to rewrite and patch the old system to work on the latest CodeIgniter framework or develop on an alternative platform.</p>

<h3>Solution</h3><p>Given the latest CodeIgniter would involve major changes to my legacy code, it seemed like a great opportunity to expand my skills with Laravel. The new project will utilise Laravel framework, and be a good exercise in designing and producing a useful end product within a quick time frame. Using Laravel and some other tooling to short-cut development, I scaffolded the role based login and authentication along with some crude listing and editing features for some of the basic data models. Invoices are a little more complex so I applied LiveWire UI components to add, edit and remove related line items, payments and history. Following that I perform calculations for tax, totals, due dates and amount owing and use the DOM PDF dependency to output the branded invoice as a PDF file.</p><p>I adopted LiveWire which is a technology to bring ajax components into Laravel similar to React or Vue but using PHP in place of Javascript. I would consider it a good evolution from JQuery which is the previous way I might build ajax interfaces before React or Vue became prominent.</p><p>I made good use of the database migration and seeder features in Laravel to pre-fill the database with sample data. The application also has automated feature tests to check url availability, role based access permission security and various financial scenarios for the calculations.</p><h3>Results</h3><p>Goldfish Invoices has now been beta released as an open source project on my GitHub account. I also use it for my own invoicing and will continue to expand and improve over time with reporting and further modal dialog forms and alerts to improve the user experience.</p><h3>Technologies</h3><p>PHP, Bootstrap 5 CSS, Laravel, LiveWire, PDF Generator</p><p><a href="https://github.com/goldfishinternet/goldfish-invoices">View on GitHub</a></p>

Laravel Invoice Application

668fc6ac43522_open-cart

<h3>Overview</h3><p>Manufacturers face various challenges bringing products to market especially if they supply globally. The client wanted to support various global distributors by providing each with e-commerce and promotional tools to drive sales and showcase their products. Each distributor had different requirements - variations in product range, metric or imperial measurements, prices, currency, tax and shipping. To add further complexity, some distributors would own and run the e-commerce sales tools, others would just manage and process orders.</p><p>The in-house head office team already included a marketing manager and a designer however other professionals such as photographers, IT and software developers where contracted in when required. This lead to a variety of disparate systems built and hosted with different languages and technologies.</p>

<h3>Solution</h3><p>A casual contractor, I continue to work with the in-house team developing and maintaining e-commerce websites for various global distributors. Working from supplied designs websites are developed and optimised for regional SEO. Where product data is shared between distributors, text titles and descriptions are made unique to avoid duplicate content issues with Google.</p><p>When payment or shipping extensions are not available, I write or adjust custom payment facilities along with specialised shipping features that utilise api calls to remote shipping providers.</p><p>Over time, as each distributor's shopping cart ages - I work with the designer to replace or refresh the target website. If that is not possible, I work on maintenance and support patches to help secure and extend the life of older systems that still generate good sales.</p><h3>Results</h3><p>A continual maintenance and review schedule, coupled with regional Google Pay Per Click advertising campaigns have proved to be an effective strategy over the last decade as sales continue to improve year on year.</p><h3>Technologies</h3><p>Custom Open Cart Themes, Custom Open Cart Extensions, Credit Card Payments, Shipping Providers</p>

E-Commerce

668fc69a2e787_health-and-safety

<h3>Overview</h3><p>Forestry is one of New Zealand's prime industries with timber products widely used in the construction sector. The client, a leading timber provider, processes forestry into a variety of building products designed for a range of uses. Each year the heavy processing machinery is stopped so that annual maintenance can be completed by multiple contracting companies and individual contractors.</p><p>Each contractor needs to understand and comply with the Health and Safety responsibilities laid out in the client's policies and any work needs to be planned and approved in advance. New contractors need to have been given induction training and every few years each contractor needs to complete a review to confirm they understand the safety rules of the work site.</p><p>The client had some basic tools to train, induct and track contractors however they requested ideas to improve the process and remove some of the manual steps that slowed down the induction of contractors and posed problems with reliability.</p>

<h3>Solution</h3><p>Working as a sub contractor to a software consultancy I developed a system to train and induct contractors online. Each contractor is held in a draft state until they complete training and successfully pass the induction exam. Any new work is submitted as a request by the contractor's company and held in an approval queue before being given site access and permission to perform hot work, work at height or vehicle access.</p><p>For contractor companies with multiple staff, they have specific tools to add contractors to their team and begin the induction process. Companies can see any staff that have failed inductions and require further training. Using the system's messaging tool they can liaise with the client's administrators on the occasion that they need support.</p><p>The key benefits of the system include training contractors, keeping compliance records and tracking jobs.</p><h3>Results</h3><p>The system has proved to be successful and much appreciated by the admin team. It has now handled over six annual maintenance breaks in addition to managing general contractor access through the year.</p><h3>Technologies</h3><p>Custom PHP, PDF Generation, Concrete CMS Custom Theme</p>

Health and Safety

668fc68d65239_blend-tool

<h3>Overview</h3><p>Manuka Honey is one of New Zealand's premium health products. Each extraction is tested and graded by measuring the concentration level of active ingredient which forms the key health benefits found in Manka Honey. Part of the production process involves mixing various batches to satisfy commercial orders for a specific grade of honey. Optimising this process can have a major profit benefit so careful selection and blending is required in order to maximise the harvest.</p>

<h3>Solution</h3><p>Working with operations manager we developed a combination of databases and automation processes to collect and track internal extraction data through the year and merged this with remote testing result data provided by accredited laboratories using their api services. Utilising a combination of stock levels and test grades we designed and developed a software tool to select a range of optimal blend options from current stock and save these as draft or final blend combinations for use by the commercial supply team.</p><h3>Results</h3><p>This automation process helped cut out many months of manual work, improved accuracy and allowed new staff to quickly become familiar with the blending and selection process.</p><h3>Technologies</h3><p>Multiple CRON Processes, Multiple API Sources, Automation, Database, Email Alerts, CSV Export, Javascript UI, PHP</p>

Honey Blend Tool

668fc67cdc8b5_custom-ecommerce

<h3>Overview</h3><p>The farming industry has various health and safety risks specifically those associated with off road vehicle use. Often accidents are avoidable and are caused by a lack of training or hazard awareness. In order to confirm compliance and reduce insurance levies, farmers need to demonstrate that they and their staff are suitably qualified, licenced or trained in the operation of machinery and vehicles.</p><p>As a farm vehicle trainer and assessor the client wanted to offer various certification packages for online training and assessment. These would include courses for Quad Bikes, Farm Bikes and Tractors.</p>

<h3>Solution</h3><p>Working as a sub contractor for a software consultancy, I developed a custom training and e-commerce system with marketing facilities to promote online certification. The core system consists of a range of courses, exams and certifications which candidates complete after reviewing training materials.</p><p>The project involved creating a set of design visuals which, once approved, were converted to a custom Concrete CMS theme. The e-commerce system presented a range of course qualifications as products. Unlike standard e-commerce each item purchased resolved to an individuals access to a course and certificate. Farmers purchase training courses and assign them to staff for completion. Each course consists of training materials defined as HTML text, graphics and photos, file downloads or videos. Courses have multiple choice exams and an optional practical assessment. Once completed the student's course becomes a qualification certificate. Farmers use these certificates to provide evidence that staff have completed suitable training. This helps ensure staff are well trained and farmers comply with Health and Safety regulations potentially reducing insurance levies.</p><h3>Results</h3><p>Following initial deployment the system has been expanded to support practical assessments and qualification of regional assessors. The system continues to certify farmers and staff although online remains more successful than practical in-person assessments.</p><h3>Technologies</h3><p>Custom PHP, Stripe Payments, PDF Generation, Concrete CMS Custom Theme</p>

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