The Project
Background
At KRS we don’t just write software; we guide our clients from the initial meeting to the final product delivery, we are able to rely on our 17 years of experience in maritime software. Our expertise spans various maritime sectors, including fleet management, crew planning, HSEQ safety and compliance, procurement, fuel import operations, and now even shipbuilding. Read more about SMART Ship Management. Recently, KRS partnered with Softcom Solutions, a company known for its innovative maritime products and expertise in the ship brokering market.
The challenge
The client, an international shipbroking company based in Denmark, required a web-based solution to manage their ship brokering operations.
The project scope included:
- Porting functionality: Existing functionality required replication from a desktop-based application, as well as expanding this further with new features, into a web application.
- Single destination deployments: Web applications notably allow easier deployments, which enable instant access from all platforms, along with avoiding the need to roll out locally installed applications.
- Incremental delivery: This follows the architectural pattern of porting the legacy functionality from the existing application and bringing it into a production web environment in smaller bite sized chunks.
- Cross platform: The application required to be accessed by multiple users across all supported browsers and mobile devices.
The project also needed to be “white labeled”, which allows it to be rebranded based on the client’s individual corporate identity.
Mobile responsiveness was also a consideration, as much of the original application contained data grids that had to be redesigned to accommodate mobile needs while considering the user experience.
“With so much emphasis on design and User Experience (UX), the team were excited to get the application looking great on all devices.”
Abi Ball, KRS Developer
Given the complexity of shipbuilding and the diverse international requirements, our initial project objective focused on establishing clear working agreements among vendors and stakeholders. It quickly became evident that extensive collaboration was needed.
In addition, one of the ongoing challenges was coordinating team members from various international locations and time zones, from South Africa to New Zealand to Denmark.
Our overarching goal was to create “one team”, with members from various vendors working together daily. Client stakeholders formed part of the delivery team, participating in the design, planning, testing and the regular sign-off process.
“When individuals from diverse companies come together as a team, their unique perspectives and strengths form a powerful synergy. Together, we achieved what might have been impossible alone.”
Phlip Olivier, Softcom Solutions
The Technology
Sailing to the solution
To ensure that each feature was delivered on time, each vendor had to bring their technical expertise, whether it was cloud infrastructure, database, APIs or UI, and work together across the technical stack. This had the added benefit of sharing knowledge across companies.
In this case KRS and Softcom, were highly experienced in their respective fields. Softcom with the domain and desktop application development, and KRS with our web application and user interface expertise.
KRS’s primary responsibility was focusing on delivering the front-end UI, based on our industry standard scaffolding of Svelte & JavaScript, HTML, CSS and calling the available Rest APIs.
The source code collaboration between software companies was run through Azure pipelines to ensure continuous delivery of the product.
What the Client says
“It is a joy to collaborate with such a professional team that has a commitment to quality.”
Suzette Joubert, Softcom
