Programmers.io: A Proven Track Record of Success

The Client

Based in Fort Worth, Texas, the client is a valuation consultant firm specializing in mass and specialty appraisals for industries like large industrial, oil and gas, and real estate. Along with valuation services, it provides end-to-end cartography, IT, mailing, and printing solutions.

Key Deliverables

• Deciphering and understanding a legacy green-screen-based AS400 system
• Transforming a green screen interface into a modern and intuitive web UI
• Addressing long-pending customizations during new system development
• Supporting new APIs and services with existing partner and third-party systems
• Designing a system that could support diverse deployment environments
• Ensuring system accessibility and optimal performance while migrating
• Managing numerous reports and replicating their functionality in a new web application
• Safeguarding a large amount of business-critical data during the transition

Prime Challenges

• The client’s green screen-based AS400 application was difficult to access remotely and had limited options for usability.
• New employees had to follow a steep learning curve before working on the application.
• The legacy application was difficult to scale and accommodate growing business needs.
• There was a lack of IBM i/AS400 talent to manage and maintain the application.
• The application required high maintenance costs and complex enhancement efforts.
• The report-centric application required significant development efforts to create diverse format-based reports or modify existing ones.

Proposed Solution

• Initial Migration Steps: The team conducted a thorough assessment of the technical environment and business needs before deciding to transition the application into a web-based solution using modern technologies.
• Considerations: They started jotting down the factors that may affect the overall system to ensure it runs simultaneously and is accessible during migration.
• Customization Enablement: The team intends to make the application easy to amend and enhance as per the client’s requirements.
• Usability Enhancement: They aim to transition the model in a way that enables business users with domain knowledge to operate the application.
• Maintenance Reduction: The team wants to make the application an API-based one that can help lower infrastructure and maintenance efforts and costs.
• Scalability Improvement: They intend to ensure the application can be scaled horizontally and vertically when business requirements grow and application loads increase.
• Business Intelligence Tool Integration: The team aims to integrate a business intelligence tool that would simplify report creation and modification irrespective of their formats.
• Deployment Decisions: They plan to deploy the application on the IBM i server initially, which can be transferred to their preferred servers in the future.

The Client

Headquartered in Romeoville, Illinois, the client is a leading CPG logistics company focused on streamlining supply chain processes for 100+ organizations in the retail industry since 1981. They offer a comprehensive suite of products and services, including asset-based transportation and warehousing, automated dispute resolution, inventory handling, online traceability, trade show services, and more.

Key Deliverables

• Migrating from legacy EDI HQ tool to Cleo Integration Cloud (CIC) for streamlined integration.
• Building and validating end-to-end transaction setups for new and existing trading partners.
• Using Jira ticket-driven development in Cleo Clarify based on client priorities.
• Performing comprehensive testing and validation, ensuring data accuracy and system readiness before go-live.
• Executing a structured deployment strategy with a two-week post-go-live monitoring phase to ensure stability.
• Maintaining SVN repository synchronization for staging and production environments.
• Collaborating with client teams to ensure successful migration and seamless daily operations post-deployment.

Prime Challenges

• The client was dealing with complex integrations while managing multiple EDI transaction types across various retail and logistics partners using a third-party tool called EDI HQ.
• To overcome these challenges, they decided to migrate from EDI HQ to Cleo Integration Cloud (CIC).
• This migration required a complete setup in CIC, including configuring Trading Partners, building inbound and outbound data flows, creating rulesets for outbound data analysis, and setting up business processes such as inbound routes, outbound routes, launchers, and connections, using CIC Studio and Cockpit.
• Additionally, the client needed to thoroughly test the entire data flow within the Cleo Cockpit to ensure accuracy and performance.

Proposed Solution

• Trading Partner Evaluation: While this step is generally managed by the client or their internal sales/business team, the usual process involves evaluating the potential business volume from a new trading partner, reviewing their EDI specifications, and estimating the Level of Effort (LOE) for integration. Once the business case is approved internally, development can move forward based on the agreed priorities.
• Development and Integration: As a part of the client’s migration strategy, Cleo Clarify was designated as the development platform. Programmers.io followed this direction to build integration setups for both new and existing trading partners, based on Jira tickets provided by the client. This ensured a smooth transition and consistent delivery aligned with their migration plan.
• New Onboarding: For onboarding new trading partners, the plan was to create transaction-specific components based on the document types involved. This included setting up inbound configurations such as Trading Partner profiles, Events, Inbound Routes, Route Business Processes, Rulesets, and Inbound Dataflows. On the outbound side, the setup involved configuring Events, Schedulers, Envelopers, Launcher Business Processes, Outbound Route Business Processes, Connections (BPS), and Outbound Dataflows.
• Existing Onboarding: For existing trading partner onboarding, existing packages are checked in Cleo Clarify based on document types. Additionally, credentials and update packages are verified based on the files received. The packages are deployed on the server as well as synced to the SVN repository for staging and then to production after successful testing.
• Testing: Thorough system integration testing is conducted to validate the end-to-end data flow. This includes verifying files received from Trading Partners, ensuring accurate ruleset is applied, converting data conversion, and successful data insertion into Synapse.
• Validation: Before going live, key elements are double checked for a successful production launch. This includes verifying correct Purchase Orders (POs) entered into Synapse, aligning POs with the client’s ERP system, ensuring each Trading Partner is correctly linked to the right customer ID, checking “Ship To” details, validating export mapping for the outbound process, confirming that the outbound dataflow is enabled with the correct event configuration, and making sure the outbound file format matches the client’s expectations.
• Deployment and Support: A careful process is followed to ensure everything goes smoothly when moving to production. Before going live, all packages are checked and tested in the staging environment. Once everything is approved, the credentials are switched from test settings to production settings and the packages are synced to the production system. After deployment, everything is monitored for two weeks to ensure smooth transactions flow between Cleo and Synapse, reducing risks and ensuring reliability for our clients.
• Trading Partner Migration: The Cleo tool is used to develop Trading Partner setups in CIC Studio. The setups are validated using production test files received from HQ. Lastly, these are run through the new Cleo setup to ensure everything works as expected. As part of the migration strategy, EDI activity data are analyzed to accurately configure and test partner documents, ensuring seamless data exchange, minimal downtime, and a faster go-live.

The Client

The client is a recognized and trusted consultancy group focused on driving safety and sustainability in the oceanic and energy sectors. They offer a substantial range of end-to-end consultancy services and support the development of renewable technologies and resources globally.

Key Deliverables

• Collecting legacy maritime reports from different surveyors, formats, and file types.
• Identifying report types based on unique identifiers for organization/processing.
• Collecting and structuring unstructured written data from legacy reports.
• Addressing duplicate data issues for accurate and consistent reporting.
• Presenting the data in an organized, visually pleasing format with intuitive UX.

Prime Challenges

• This project involves a massive amount of legacy data that needs to be modernized in both structure and presentation.
• Data collection also involves finding ways to identify, organize, and process different file formats, types of data, data duplicates, and sources.
• Creating a new application that can receive and present the data in a quick and reliable way.
• Creating functionalities that can organize the reports based on specific KPIs requested by the client.

Proposed Solution

• Divide the entire process into three parts: AI processing, DE (Data Engineering) processing, and presentation layer.
• Prepare a data flow using Logic Apps and Azure Functions (using Python/Pyspark as programming language/API) to identify, filter, and send documents to be processed with the appropriate prompts.
• Azure Data engineering solutions are designed to clean, transform and store data in delta tables by implementing Medallion Architecture using Azure Synapse Analytics and Azure Storage Accounts.
• Use Azure Data Lake Storage (ADLS) to manage unstructured data.
• Implement Delta Lake to store and manage data effectively.
• Remove duplicate records with defined filtration techniques, presenting only unique records at the Power BI layer.
• Present different Power BI reports for internal and external users, highlighting key KPIs.

The Client

The client is one of the largest technology companies focused on improving collaboration, scaling processes, making data-driven decisions, and delivering better outcomes in the healthcare industry. Headquartered in Overland Park, Kansas, they have served over 20,000 health organizations across the USA for 40+ years.

Key Deliverables

• A brand-new system was required to be built from scratch while preserving core functionalities.
• Predefined UI designs were to be implemented seamlessly using cutting-edge technology.

Prime Challenges

• The client’s legacy technology-based patient registration software contained numerous errors, causing frequent performance and security issues.
• Its poor user interface was unappealing to customers, creating negative user experiences and impacting brand image.
• A new system was required to be created using the latest technologies from scratch while retaining the existing functionality.

Proposed Solution

• Architecture Identification: Programmers.io started by identifying a dependable and user-friendly application architecture for the new system.
• Functionality Alignment: It was aimed at using Vue3 in the frontend and Rest API in the backend to integrate the new architecture with the existing functionality.
• UI Design Implementation: The predefined UI designs were planned to be converted and implemented using the modern tech stack for a better user experience.
• Testing: Telerik’s patented ‘mixed element find logic’ feature was to be used for enhancing test reliability and stability as well as minimizing test maintenance efforts.

The Client

The client is a Kansas-based food system company that specializes in the production and processing of pork in the United States. They are one of the largest pork producers in the U.S. and process more than 6 million hogs each year.

Key Deliverables

• Analyzing the architecture and configuration of the client’s legacy system
• Enabling a custom library for documentation and future training purposes
• Improving overall User Experience (UX) for a more user-friendly web portal
• Enhancing system performance with updated frontend technologies
• Using scalable technologies that can support the development of complex applications in the future
• Optimizing complex and time-consuming workflows with automation
• Using technologies that offer strong security frameworks for sensitive data and security compliance

Prime Challenges

• The client lacked domain expertise in legacy system complexities and had no way to train new employees on maintaining the system.
• They were having issues with slow performance and overall ease of use, leading to delays in operations and order times.
• The application as it currently stands is unable to scale and accommodate growing business needs.
• Their application still relies on several complex, manual workflows that are slowing down processes and are susceptible to errors.

Proposed Solution

• Integrating a custom SharePoint repository with the backend (Node.js)
• Creating custom components and libraries that can be accessed across the suite of applications (PnPJs)
• Enabling common file operations (bulk upload/download, delete files, create or alter custom fields, etc.)
• Implementing Microsoft Power Automate to handle complex workflows
• Integrating Power Automate with the database (DB2) to trigger workflows based on user configurations
• Syncing the frontend and backend with the power automate workflow
• Maintaining strict security and confidentiality standards to ensure compliance

The Client

The client is a Canadian processor and marketer of frozen seafood. Their retail branded products are sold throughout the United States, Canada, and Mexico, and are available in most grocery and club stores. They are also a supplier of frozen seafood products to North American restaurants and food service distributors.

Key Deliverables

• Conducting an in-depth analysis of their recent middleware integration
• Analyzing the existing Java coding in order to identify the reported issue
• Applying real-time testing between the different applications and processes
• Fixing all discoverable data and code issues concerning the new integration
• Providing hypercare support to ensure the integration is set up for success

Prime Challenges

• After recently integrating a new Warehouse Management System with their existing ERP, the client was experiencing data gaps between the two applications.
• Additionally, they were having issues with their real-time data synchronization.
• Testing their real-time data synchronization would be difficult, given the number of applications and processes involved.
• Missing and misaligned data was impacting their current workflows and accruing unexpected costs.

Proposed Solution

• Initial in-depth investigation of their integration, including the Dell Boomi middleware and all applications involved
• Analysis of the existing Java code in JDeveloper in order to find and resolve the reported issues
• Successfully test their real-time scenarios and deliver a solution within the stipulated time frame
• Perform hypercare postproduction support to guarantee smooth and continuous business operations