EnviroMonitor | Project duration: 2015-Present
The PRoduct
EnviroMonitor is a system that allows farmers to track the conditions in their fields to ensure that their crops remain healthy. In the system, you have sensors that connect via wires to a device called a “Node”, which in turn communicates wirelessly to another device; a completely wireless device called a “Gateway”. The ability for Nodes and Gateways to communicate to each other through a mesh network makes it possible for farmers to install sensors throughout their fields to monitor their crop and soil conditions to a very fine resolution without needing to run cables everywhere.
The Challenge:
Work with the product manager at Davis to understand the product and create a mobile app experience that’ll make the installation of crucial agricultural sensors as painless and easy as possible. Develop a look and feel that Davis Instruments can use on future products.
My role:
Visual Design, User Experience, Interaction Design
RESEARCH overview
Through going over past research done by Davis Instruments the Product Manager and we were able to establish the following:
This is a new and highly intricate product.
The people installing these systems will often be the resellers that have sold the farmers the product.
Installers (a lot of them age 50+) will be installing these systems in wide open fields, often in the middle of the day when the sun is highest.
Speed is important, installers have a lot of ground to cover and many devices to install.
There are many sensors that must be wired correctly in order to function.
Understanding the process
By exploring different scenario's and drawing upon the experience of the product manager working with resellers/installers we were able to reach the following conclusions:
Installers may want to test the hardware (staging) before packing up and doing the field install.
Installers are use to working outside, they have relatively big fingers and have trouble navigating some apps.
The installers are usually not that tech saavy and will not understand some of the more intricate phone interactions.
Both the installers and farmers will want to keep track of the location and condition of each device.
Information Architecture
When I had arrived at Davis most of the product requirements and research had already been documented and the product manager had even created a rudimentary prototype using keynote.
The prototype was great at giving me deeper insight into what my product manager was thinking but we later realized that a deeper dive is necessary in order to understand all the potential edge cases that may occur during installation.
Shown below is a flowchart showing all the steps for installing a Gateway, Node and sensor. This flow chart (and others not shown here for edge cases) were a product of many discussions with members from the firmware team, the marketing team and the web development team. In the end, the installation process became quite complex due to decisions made while designing the hardware. But with this implementation the installers will not find themselves left stranded without any information.
style
By leveraging our research and looking at Davis Instruments current branding, we developed a color palette and icon set to use in EnviroMonitor and to serve to lay the ground work for evolving the Davis brand.
Rapid Prototyping
Once I developed the flows and the style I moved forward with prototyping using Invision. Because the development team is located in Belarus and there is a slight language barrier, these prototypes also served as a great way to communicate the desired out come of every interaction to them. Shown below is a later prototype that shows how Gateways and Nodes are added to an EM system.
In order to hand off specifications to our development team in Belarus I used a combination of presentation decks, Zeplin and interaction videos/gifs to communicate the UI requirements for this app. Shown below is an example gif I had made for setting device location. Ultimately many of the interactions and features did not make it to the final product but these gifs provided a quick and efficient way to for us to gauge what would be realistically possible for our developers to implement given the time frame we were working in.
iterating and feature enhancements
After the initial handoff and implementation we began testing the system by observing potential customers install the EnviroMonitor systems. Based on their feedback we went back to the drawing board to figure out the many area's where we can improve in the app to make the process even easier for our customers. Shown below are some example documentation I created to help communicate to stakeholders and our dev team the changes we wanted to propose and have implemented.
launching
With launch date approaching, we realized we still had not created the app icon yet. With the aid of a contract designer we created the icon and I created and managed all the assets for the iOS and Android app stores.
Along with EnviroMonitor, we created additional icons for additional apps that we would be working on after EnviroMonitor.
Reception
Through the hard work of everyone involved EnviroMonitor was recognized in several trade shows and many farmers around the world has adopted the use of this technology with great benefit to their grow operations.