The challenge
We were approached by our client because they needed a small desktop application that would enable their workers to onboard hundreds of IoT devices to their cloud. The solution included authenticating on the client's cloud using OAuth 2.0, connecting to the requested device via BLE, reading authentication data, and uploading it to the cloud.
The use case requires users to link their IoT devices to the cloud so they can be tracked and configured more easily. For larger contracts, our client handles the onboarding, which can be multiple hundred devices at once, and each one requires a manual connection.
The client approached to simplify and streamline this process. However, due to the niche use case, a maximum development time of 100 hours, including prototyping, was requested. The final version had to be delivered within 2 months. To be usable by workers, the solution had to support multiple languages and be easily deployed on an enterprise-managed Windows system.
The solution
Professionally managed and prototyped
- Refinement of requirements together with the customer
- Iteration on simple excalidraw sketches
Onboard every device in seconds
- Native OAuth 2.0 using Windows-redirect links and auth refreshing
- Proxy configuration to work behind the customer VPN
- Onboarding time < 5 seconds
- > 10 supported device models with 3 different authentication algorithms
Automated releases and testing
- Deployed as signed MSIX from CI
- Views and important business logic unit tested
The result
rosslight provided the complete solution in just 5 weeks, from start to finished product. During development, we published 11 deliverables to rapidly gather customer feedback and quickly adjust to changing requirements when additional devices with different authentication needs had to be included. The result is an app that has been used successfully every week for the past 4 months and has led to a 80% reduced onboarding time for our customers.
Summary
- UI Design: Modern, cross-platform UI
- Language/Framework: C# + Avalonia
- Communication: BLE + proprietary communication protocol
- Deployment: CI/CD with signed MSIX packaging