Introduction:
Brewpod, a versatile beer brewing application, caters to the needs of both novice and seasoned brewers. With a wide range of features, it makes brewing easier, improves the quality of brews, and fosters the growth of a community of passionate beer enthusiasts.
Mission:
The mission of a Brewpod is to simplify brewing, improve beer quality, foster a supportive community, promote innovation, and ensure accessibility for all levels of brewers.
Objective:
These are some main objectives-
Recipe Management - Allow users to create, store, and share beer recipes, including ingredients, quantities, and brewing steps.
Brewing Process Guidance - Provide step-by-step guidance and timers for each phase of the brewing process, from mashing to fermentation.
Inventory Management - Track inventory of brewing ingredients such as malt, hops and yeast, enabling users to plan and shop effectively.
Calculations and Conversions - Automatically calculate and convert measurements, such as gravity, temperature, and volumes, to ensure brewing accuracy.
Scheduling and Planning - Create brewing schedules, set reminders, and plan for upcoming batches or events.
Recipe Adjustments - Offer tools to adjust or scale recipes based on available ingredients and batch size.
Cost Tracking - Calculate the cost of brewing a batch based on ingredient prices and track expenses.
Data Analysis and Trends - Provide data analysis and visualization tools to help users analyse the quality and consistency of their brews over time.
Collaboration and Sharing - Allow users to collaborate with other brewers, share recipes, and provide feedback on each other's creations.
Mobile Compatibility - Ensure that the application is accessible on mobile devices for use during brewing processes.
Data Security - Implement security measures to protect sensitive brewing recipes and data.
Community and Support - Foster a community of brewers by providing forums, FAQs, and support resources for troubleshooting and learning.
Integration - Offer the ability to integrate with other brewing-related tools, such as temperature controllers and fermentation monitoring devices.
Regulatory Compliance - Ensure that the application provides the necessary tools for tracking and adhering to brewing regulations and tax requirements, especially for commercial breweries.
Feedback and Continuous Improvement - Gather user feedback to continuously improve the application, adding features and addressing issues.
The primary aim of a Brewpod application is to simplify and enhance the brewing process for both hobbyists and professional brewers, helping them create better brews, manage their resources, and build a community around their shared passion for beer.
Technologies Used:
Typescript: TypeScript is a statically typed superset of JavaScript developed by Microsoft. It adds optional static typing to JavaScript, making it easier to catch and prevent common coding mistakes during development. TypeScript also introduces advanced tooling for code analysis and refactoring, making it a popular choice for building robust and maintainable web applications.
React Native: React Native is an open-source framework for building mobile applications using JavaScript and React. It allows developers to create native-like mobile apps for multiple platforms, such as iOS and Android, using a single codebase.
Tailwind CSS: Tailwind CSS is a utility-first CSS framework that streamlines web development by providing a set of pre-defined, highly composable classes for styling HTML elements. It allows developers to quickly and easily create responsive and customizable user interfaces with minimal custom CSS code.
Node Js: Node.js is an open-source, server-side runtime environment that allows developers to run JavaScript code on the server. It is designed for building scalable and high-performance network applications, particularly web servers and APIs, using non-blocking, event-driven architecture. Node.js has gained popularity for its efficiency in handling concurrent connections and its ability to work with JavaScript on both the client and server, enabling full-stack JavaScript development.
MongoDB: MongoDB is a NoSQL, document-oriented database that stores data in a flexible, JSON-like format. It is designed for high scalability, performance, and ease of development, making it a popular choice for applications that require fast, unstructured data storage and retrieval. MongoDB is known for its ability to handle large volumes of data, its horizontal scalability, and its support for dynamic schemas, which allows for easy and rapid development and iteration of applications.
AWS: Amazon Web Services, is a comprehensive and widely-used cloud computing platform provided by Amazon. It offers a vast array of cloud services, including computing power, storage, databases, machine learning, analytics, and more, allowing businesses and individuals to build, deploy, and manage applications and services in a flexible, scalable, and cost-effective manner.
Rabbit MQ: RabbitMQ is an open-source message broker software that facilitates communication and data transfer between different parts of an application or between multiple applications. It acts as a message queue and enables the asynchronous exchange of data, making it a crucial component for building distributed and scalable systems.
Timeline: 6 Months
Team size:
Our project team consisted of 6 members, which included two frontend developers, a junior and a senior, one backend developer, one quality assurance specialist, one project architect, and a project manager.
Problem Faced:
The major problem in this application was to get connectivity and data from the iOT microcontroller ESP-32 module which is sitting inside the brewPod machine. As we were using react native for the mobile application, we had to first find a compatible library to support the type B to type B port connection for the application, then when it got connected we faced problems related to API level which the library and the device we are using supports.
Once we resolved all these issues the other issue was to keep esp32 connected throughout the brew process as it was disconnecting again whenever we move to another process.
ESP32 was connecting only with Android versions less than or with 10. Making it work for Android versions 12 and more was another issue we faced and resolved.
Fetching outputs and responses were not working that great as some conditions didn’t met while brewing.
Designing the brew process schema which takes details of every data point and stores it to cloud with respect to brew history, ratings etc.
Setting up the CICD pipeline with the GithbActions for multiple environments was the problem as for single environments it's not that tricky. It took a lot of brainstorming due to the lack of resources available along with the community support.
Conclusion:
In conclusion, the Brewpod serves as a valuable and versatile tool for brewers, whether they are homebrewers or professionals in the industry. This program has a ton of tools to help users with all aspects of brewing, from creating recipes to fermenting them and more. Through this program, users can manage ingredients, equipment, schedules, and expenses more efficiently, which helps brewers make consistently high-quality beer.
Moreover, the communal and sharing features of beer brewing apps encourage cooperation, knowledge sharing, and brewers' friendship. The brewing industry grows and improves as a whole because of the active community of professionals and enthusiasts that are formed through the sharing of recipes, experiences, and remarks.