Business Situation

MapShots had an existing desktop application, EASi Suite.  In early 2000, MapShots made the jump to add a mobility component to their EASi Suite.  Although it was well received by their customers, MapShots felt it could be taken further to help streamline their customer’s field processes further. 

MapShots is committed to advancing the state of agricultural information systems.  In addition to this nucleus of talented, seasoned professional, MapShots retains the services of other professional developers, testers, industry specialists, writers, and support staff to ensure that the enhancements, upgrades, and new products continue to meet the ever-growing needs of the agricultural industry.

Solution

With this philosophy, MapShots decided to retain the services of OpenNETCF to write their Pocket Crops product which supplemented EASi Suite.  An OpenNETCF consultant was brought onsite to get first hand knowledge on the EASi Suite of products and to formulate a strategy and architecture for the mobile addition (Pocket Crops) to EASi Suite.

With a firm understanding of MapShots requirements, it was decided to develop the Pocket Crops application to support Microsoft’s Windows Mobile Pocket PC devices using .NET Compact Framework 2.0.  OpenNETCF’s Smart Device Framework and Calendar controls were also used to accelerate the development process for Pocket Crops.

With a firm understanding of requirements and of EASi Suite, OpenNETCF was able to start the development process offsite.  Weekly updates were delivered to MapShots to deliver to internal team members and a select few customers to comment on the user experience of the application.  The application was also taken out into the field by customers to get real world use and feedback to incorporate into the application.

Benefits

In approximately eight weeks, MapShots was able to deliver a Windows Mobile application that integrated with their existing EASi Suite product line to their customers.   MapShots was able to gain a competitive advantage by being the first in the industry to deliver a robust mobile agricultural data management solution.  MapShots was able to concentrate on their core desktop product and have OpenNETCF deliver their mobile solution to augment EASi Suite.