About Client
The client is an industry leading distributor of HVAC equipment parts and heating/air conditioning supplies. They deal in commercial as well as residential parts and supplies. Spread over 40 locations in 8 states (Ohio, Indiana, Kentucky, Illinois, Iowa, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and Tennessee), the client is the 10th largest HVAC distributor in the U.S. and the largest independent Bryant distributor in North America. This client will be the Midwest preeminent HVAC distributor. Its customers trust and rely on it because of its outstanding customer service, high ethical standards, industry-leading products, and business partnerships. The company was named as the Tri-State Family Business of the Year by the University of Cincinnati Growing Center for Family Business. The client proudly employs over 500 people with over 10,000 cumulative years of HVAC expertise. It is an award winning company, receiving consistent recognition, awards and accolades from its manufacturing partners throughout the years. Programmers.io has successfully facilitated the client’s adoption of modernized cross-technology solutions while providing the state-of-the-art security solutions.
Transportation and Warehousing
The Challenges
1. SSO Portal with OAuth 2.0 Security
The client was facing a major challenge working on the old AS400 screens and needed to adopt modernized cross-technology solutions with robust security. The application’s security was the biggest concern for the client as its existing application was based on a legacy system. The client also wanted a platform that would manage all its users and would have a separate database (PostgreSQL) created by leveraging the existing DB2 tables and RPG code from the AS400 box.
The Solution
01.
Our team designed a web-portal where users can sign in using SSO (Single Sign On) and could see all the application functionalities assigned to that user. The functionalities of the users were limited by adding certain roles, which assured security.
02.
If an admin user logs in, s/he gets additional features on the dashboard to manage
- User info
- Different applications that are available.
- Manage authorities of roles.
- Assign user to applications.
03.
As there were multiple apps, instead of maintaining separate logins for each application we used SSO so as to offer a generic login page for all the web applications.
04.
Programmers.io used modern RESTful API approach for performing all the database interactions. (All database information resides in AS400 box.)
Front-end Technologies
- HTML, CSS, Bootstrap (Material Design), JS/jQuery.
- The webpage is responsive/mobile friendly.
Back-end Technologies
- JAVA Spring MVC to write our business logic.
- For security OAuth 2.0 and JWT token.
2. PayPal Integration
Our client wanted to change its existing credit card gateway from Curbstone to PayPal. This change was required to secure the payment transaction procedure between the client and its customers. PayPal integration with any e-commerce platform enhances its authenticity and credibility. Programmers.io pitched in to build an architecture around the existing Curbstone RPG process to use PayPal APIs from AS400 and write new code for the integration.
The Solution
01.
Our team analyzed the existing process and found out that we could leverage most of the code to change the credit card gateway from Curbstone to PayPal.
02.
Our team started the analysis to find out the piece of code which we could replace with our new logic which calls the PayPal API for credit card transactions.
03.
Our suggestion was to use SQL to call the PayPal API, which is the latest technology to call any API from AS400 box introduced in V7R3.
3. Web Catalogue
Our client needed a way to view and maintain all the products in their database (DB2) along with their images which were stored on another Windows server. The client also required the functionality of full-text search (search over multiple fields and tables) and advance filtering.
The Solution
01.
For creating a web catalogue to maintain the data and images together, we created a JAVA web application (using SSO) where the user could easily sign in and have a wider look at all the products.
02.
We provided two different views (list/grid) for displaying the products. Customers could now see all the product information and images at a single place in a user-friendly manner.
03.
Customers could now apply filters to search for specific products as per their requirements. For full-text search and filtering we provided a section in HTML with different filters where users can apply multiple filters.
Front-end Design
- HTML, CSS, Bootstrap (Material Design), JS/jQuery.
Back-end Technologies
- We used JAVA Spring MVC to write our business logic.
- Our team recommended OAuth 2.0 and JWT token for security.
- We implemented SSO (Single Sign-On) for sign-in functionality.
4. Application for Generating invoices
The client was facing a huge challenge in providing the invoice to its customers on time. The customer had to call the customer support line or the client’s salesperson to ask for the invoice, which resulted into manual invoice generation and delivering. The client saw this as a cumbersome process and wanted a web application where the customers could log in, view their invoice, and download the invoice. The client also wanted a functionality where user could choose the file format of the invoice to be downloaded.
The Solution
01.
Our team designed a portal where a user could sign in and could see all their invoice details present in AS400 DB2. They could also change the date range to view their old invoices.
02.
User could choose multiple invoices to download at the same time. User could also search/sort/ filter invoices and open the list of invoices for the selected date range.
03.
In the invoice generation application the customer could select the file format (PDF/CSV/QuickBooks) in which he/she needed to download the invoice. They could also open any invoice in PDF format on the browser.
04.
All the data to generate the invoices resides on As400 DB2. So our APIs communicate with the DB2 to fetch the invoice information and then generate the invoice based on that information.
Front-end Technologies
- HTML, CSS, Bootstrap (Material Design), JS/jQuery.
- The webpage is responsive/mobile friendly.
Back-end Technologies
- JAVA Spring MVC to write our business logic.
- OAuth 2.0 and JWT token for security.
- SSO (Single Sign On) for generic login page for all the web applications.
- Modern RESTful API approach for executing all the Database (which resides in AS400 box) interactions.
5. Application to generate automated sales report
The client was facing a major challenge generating its sales report on the old AS400 screens. It was a complicated and time-consuming process since most of the steps involved were manual. The client wanted to adopt a modernized cross-technology solution to get rid of the traditional AS400 screens and add new functionalities like filtering and sorting to its sales reports. The client required an easy platform to view the sales summary on different levels.
The Solution
01.
Our team designed a web application where a management person could sign in using SSO and OAuth. The application will only allow those users who are authorized to view the application. All the summary was calculated using the data from their AS400 DB2 database.
02.
In the application user can:
- View the report on multiple levels such as regional level, salesperson level and customer level.
- Apply filters/sorting on any column.
- Change the date range of the report as per requirement.
- Download the report in Excel format.
Front-end Technologies
- We used HTML, CSS, Bootstrap (Material Design), JS/jQuery.
- The webpage is responsive/mobile friendly.
Back-end Technologies
- JAVA Spring MVC to write our business logic.
- For security we used OAuth 2.0 and JWT token.
- Modern RESTful API approach for executing all the Database (DB2 & PostgreSQL) interaction.
Technology Stack
Business Impact
Programmers.io enabled the client to easily manage the users and applications by building a modern web portal. Our team suggested the use of SSO (Single Sign On) for signing in and OAuth 2.0, which ensured the security of the web application.
PayPal integration through our approach decreased the development time to a fraction, hence saving our client a lot of time and money.
Programmers.io enabled the client to look at and maintain all their items through the application of a web catalogue in an easy and convenient way. Previously they had to maintain details (in DB2) and images (in image server) separately. Now they can maintain both from a single point.
Programmers.io invoice app helped the client’s customers to download their invoice from the application anytime. It has saved the time of both our client’s sales people and their customers.
Programmers.io enabled the client to easily view and generate sales reports using a modern and user-friendly web portal. This helped the client’s management team to see the report anytime and anywhere hassle free.
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