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In this series of articles, we get to know the creators of OviPro and get a peek behind the scenes from different perspectives.
OviPro’s design has undergone major changes during the extensive project, and although the changes have required a lot of work, the end result is well worth it. Lauri Nevanperä, a Lead Front End Developer opens up with insightful examples what kind of changes have been involved and how the changes are going to affect the future users of OviPro.
The first change is related to the API first -method, which has greatly streamlined workflows. But what is an API? With the help of an API, the user interface (UI) and the server are able to talk to each other. For example in the realties search page, UI requests realties from the server and server returns the correct realties for the user.
The traditional way is to build the server first, then the UI and finally the APIs.
This approach, however presents challenges since the API must always be finished before the UI. Also it’s harder for UI developers to identify how the server should be called. Lauri explains how he has been tormented by the poor communication of the user interface and the server for most of his software career.
With OviPro´s groundbreaking solution, OviPro’s API specs are now done first, and only then will the APIs be put into practice.
This kind of implementation also makes it possible to make both the server and the user interface at the same time, which speeds up and streamlines the working process tremendously.
Looking beyond the technical benefits, this method also allows the makers to really concentrate on developing various features to ensure state of the art user experience for OviPro. Now time isn’t wasted on the coordination of every step when everything needs to be ready in a certain order.
The second change focuses on the implementation of the Design System. Lauri compares Design System to PowerPoint’s master slides. Now, imagine a situation where a company doesn’t have master slides with a predefined layout. Now imagine what the presentations of each employee would look like as everyone would make different slide shows. Everyone would also do unnecessary duplication in creating different visuals and content. You could think the Design System as the PowerPoint’s master slides where the user experience is coherent, logical and smooth throughout the OviPro service.
You could also imagine the Design System through a chemical example where a proton would represent shapes, shadows, colors, or typography. Correspondingly, atoms, which are assembled from protons, would be for example buttons or chips. Now we could move on to even more complex stages where we would form molecules, such as data cards or list elements, and from molecules to even more diverse stages of organisms, i.e. a list page with controls and search fields.
What makes the Design System so unique is that all the components (atoms, protons, molecules, etc.) are available to both UI designers and developers, which means that the developers are able to create a first-class user experience much more effortlessly. What this means is that the users of OviPro will have such a smooth workflow that they are able to free a lot more time to the most important tasks – serving their customers.
Best of all – the Design System will have UI updates over the years, which means that OviPro’s UI will also stay up-to-date and fresh now and in the future.
Be sure to watch our interesting videos where Lauri talks about his work as OviPro’s Lead Front End Developer, reveals the changes in user interface design and talks about his thoughts on the launch of OviPro. You can find the videos from here >
