Mobile Solution Developer Improves Application Performance ...



Overview

Country or Region: International

Industry: Information Technology

Customer Profile

JL Mobile Systems is a pioneer in mobile applications that support workforce automation. The company’s software supports leading companies throughout Latin America and a growing list of nations.

Business Situation

JL Mobile Systems strives to increase market share by improving customer experience.

Solution

Company developers migrated the company’s sales force automation solution, XSales® Rep, to the beta version of the Microsoft® .NET Compact Framework version 2.0.

Benefits

■ Enhanced performance

■ Easy migration

■ Increased device support

■ Superior platform and development environment

■ Beneficial partnership

| | |“With the .NET Compact Framework 2.0 and SQL Server Mobile Edition and using Windows Mobile software, we kept two critical factors—memory management and application performance—in balance.”

Maria Isabel Rodrigues, Research and Development Manager and Lead Programmer, JL Mobile Systems

| |

| | | |A developer of information solutions for mobile professionals, JL Mobile Systems pioneered the |

| | | |development of mobile solutions for workforce automation in Venezuela. The company’s sales and |

| | | |delivery customers face constant time pressure to complete routes in geographically dispersed areas, |

| | | |while providing good customer service. JL Mobile Systems wanted to increase performance of its |

| | | |applications and thereby help enable customers to complete all aspects of their sales and delivery |

| | | |routes more quickly. Company developers migrated the company’s sales force automation solution |

| | | |XSales® Rep to the beta version of the Microsoft® .NET Compact Framework version 2.0. With the .NET |

| | | |Compact Framework in place, the company enjoys vast improvements in memory management and, more |

| | | |importantly, better performance. Now, JL Mobile Systems is poised to improve customer experience and |

| | | |extend its market. |

| | | | |

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| | | | |

Situation

With 19 years in business, JL Mobile Systems develops mobile applications that support workforce automation. The company’s software supports more than 3,000 routes for leading companies throughout Latin America and the Caribbean.

The company meets customer needs by combining top-notch service with advanced technological solutions based on Microsoft® software and technology, and delivers its solutions through a network of certified partners. The success of JL Mobile Systems is apparent; the company is currently expanding into new markets, including the United States, Mexico, the Dominican Republic, and Puerto Rico.

JL Mobile Systems sells a suite of fully configurable workforce automation software for Microsoft® Windows Mobile™–based Pocket PCs. The suite has two components: XSales® Rep and XSales Visor. Mobile sales and delivery representatives use XSales Rep. The solution automates the entire distribution chain, including order and fulfillment, and customer relationship management, and connects readily with other company databases and systems.

Realizing the need for supervisors to keep track of sales figures and other metrics, JL Mobile Systems developed XSales Visor for sales supervisors. XSales Visor helps supervisors manage and coach representatives who spend much of their time on the road. Although the suite was developed by using Microsoft Visual Studio® .NET 2003 development system with the C# programming language, this case study describes JL Mobile Systems’s experience working with the .NET Compact Framework version 2.0, Microsoft SQL Server™ 2005 Mobile Edition, and the Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 development system.

Because XSales supports distribution companies that require multiple customer “touch points,” XSales applications are large. In fact, XSales Rep has almost 154,000 lines of code and supports an average of 5,500 records.

Naturally, running such a large application on mobile devices can push the limits of application performance and device memory management. Even with the good performance and memory management that it was experiencing with the .NET Compact Framework and Microsoft Windows Mobile 2003 software for Pocket PCs, the company realized that the size of its applications—and the typical number of records those applications handled—was pushing performance and memory management boundaries. JL Mobile Systems needed a way to meet customer demand for faster, more powerful applications.

Says Mayte Ortiz, Marketing Director at JL Mobile Systems, “Sales representatives are under pressure to complete their routes quickly. Quicker application performance can speed them along and even give them time to take on an additional route. This positively impacts customer service and the bottom line.”

Solution

With the announcement of the Microsoft .NET Compact Framework 2.0, JL Mobile Systems realized it could improve memory management and performance even more and, thereby, keep up with customer demands for speedier, more powerful applications.

Says Juan C. González, President of JL Mobile Systems, “When Microsoft invited us to join the early adoption program, naturally, we jumped at the chance to adopt the benefits of the next edition of the .NET Compact Framework.”

JL Mobile Systems migrated its XSales application to the beta version of the .NET Compact Framework 2.0. Also as part of the move, the development team is working with SQL Server Mobile Edition—Microsoft’s next-generation mobile database solution and the latest version of Microsoft SQL Server 2000 Windows CE Edition—to extend enterprise data management solutions to Windows Mobile–based devices.

|“Based on this migration experience, it is |

|clear to us that Microsoft is working hard to|

|create a user-transparent transition upgrade |

|of the .NET Compact Framework, an upgrade |

|that vastly improves application |

|performance.” |

|Maria Isabel Rodrigues, Research and |

|Development Manager and Lead Programmer, JL |

|Mobile Systems |

The Migration Process

JL Mobile Systems’s developers found it easy to migrate XSales Rep to the beta version of the .NET Compact Framework 2.0.

Says Maria Isabel Rodrigues, JL Mobile Systems’s Research and Development Manager and Lead Programmer, “Because every line of code ran ‘as-is’ against the new version of the .NET Compact Framework, we were able to get XSales Rep running right away, and immediately take advantage of all the .NET Compact Framework 2.0 features such as increased performance, generics, and the new interoperability functionality.”

Performance Testing

JL Mobile Systems met performance challenges by basing its application on the .NET Compact Framework. The applications use the SQL Server Mobile Edition database on the devices.

Says Rodrigues, “With the .NET Compact Framework 2.0 and SQL Server Mobile Edition and using Windows Mobile software, we kept two critical factors—memory management and application performance—in balance.”

Before and after the migration, JL Mobile Systems tested XSales Rep by using the same device, an HP iPAQ h2215 Pocket PC with a 400MHz Intel® XScale™ processor and 64 megabytes (MB) of Synchronous Dynamic Random Access Memory (SDRAM) and 32 MB of Flash ROM. The Pocket PC was running Microsoft Windows Mobile 2003 software for Pocket PCs.

JL Mobile Systems found that the application performed much better and had better memory management on the beta 1 version of the .NET Compact Framework 2.0. In particular, the logon action improved dramatically—down from over one minute to just over 42 seconds on the beta version of the .NET Compact Framework 2.0. Table 2 shows some of the other results of JL Mobile Systems’s tests.

“Based on this migration experience, it is clear to us that Microsoft is working hard to create a user-transparent transition upgrade of the .NET Compact Framework, an upgrade that vastly improves application performance,” says Rodrigues.

Benefits

JL Mobile Systems and its customers are poised to benefit greatly from the .NET Compact Framework 2.0, SQL Server Mobile Edition, and Visual Studio 2005. Developers appreciate having a single, unified programming model for Windows–based desktop and mobile applications—a benefit that extends to customers in the form of faster applications and improved memory management.

Enhanced Performance

JL Mobile Systems experienced better performance and better memory management by running XSales on the beta version of the .NET Compact Framework 2.0.

“Faster applications map to customer satisfaction. For representatives who are under pressure to complete routes in a certain timeframe, performance becomes absolutely critical,” remarks Ortiz.

Benefits for end users don’t stop there. With the combination of the .NET Compact Framework and Windows Mobile software, developers were able to design XSales so that application upgrades can be issued transparently and with only minimal impact on performance. “It is very powerful for developers to be able to develop knowing that performance is not going to be constrained. They can dedicate their efforts to the business logic, instead of worrying about limitations on performance, which impact the customer,” says Rodrigues.

Easy Migration

Ease of migration enhances both developer and end user experience.

Says Rodrigues, “The overall migration process was extremely easy and almost intuitive for the average developer.”

JL Mobile Systems’s clients benefit from improvements in the development platform and from an easy migration as well.

“Easier development and migration allow us to apply resources to more important development goals, such as incorporating new functionality,” adds Rodrigues.

Increased Device Support

JL Mobile Systems will benefit from the ability of SQL Server Mobile Edition to support an expanded list of devices, including future releases of the Smartphone.

Comments César A. Bello, Regional Director at JL Mobile Systems, “SQL Server Mobile Edition support for Smartphone devices is a huge advantage because we are already developing business applications for Smartphones, including a light version of XSales Rep and XSales Visor. Sales managers at customer companies will be able to check sales figures or key performance indicators from a Smartphone. SQL Server Mobile Edition supports our product roadmap for the future, and that’s exciting.”

Additional device support in SQL Server Mobile Edition will enable developers to use the same database functionality from a Smartphone to a Pocket PC to a TabletPC.

Superior Platform and Development Environment

Besides improved memory management and application performance, JL Mobile Systems‘s developers are experiencing additional benefits from the Windows Mobile platform and development environment:

■ Integration with Microsoft SQL Server 2005. This integration allows developers to execute some database operations from the development environment, including operations over the .sdf files of SQL Server Mobile Edition.

■ Reduction of auto-generated code, resulting in optimized applications.

■ Management of general, shared resources that can be added as a general XML file to avoid duplication.

■ Reduction in lines of code, specifically with regard to business logic.

■ Improved and integrated debugging capabilities.

■ Extending development team skills and easier training and orientation for new developers.

■ Easier integration of the application with the Internet or intranet.

JL Mobile Systems is also taking advantage of other features of the beta version of the .NET Compact Framework 2.0 that increase developer productivity, such as generics, form inheritance in the designers, and COM interop.

Also, developers can access, check and validate the database on the Pocket PC from within the development environment.

Beneficial Partnership

Concludes Mayte Ortiz, Marketing Director at JL Mobile Systems, “Developing for, and using, the latest Microsoft software and technology helps our products sell better and puts us in a better position, competitively. The fact that XSales is a Certified Windows Mobile application boosts its acceptance among clients and potential clients.”

Microsoft Visual Studio .NET

Microsoft Visual Studio .NET is the rapid application development (RAD) tool for building next-generation Web applications and Web services. Visual Studio .NET empowers developers to rapidly design broad-reach Web applications for any device and any platform. In addition, Visual Studio .NET is fully integrated with the Microsoft .NET Framework, providing support for multiple programming languages and automatically handling many common programming tasks, freeing developers to rapidly create Web applications using their language of choice. For more information, visit:

msdn.vstudio

To acquire Visual Studio .NET, visit:

msdn.vstudio/howtobuy

For MSDN® subscriptions, visit:

msdn.subscriptions

The Microsoft .NET Framework is an integral Windows component for building and running the next generation of applications and Web services. For more information, visit:

framework

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| |Software and Services

■ Microsoft Visual Studio 2005

■ Microsoft Visual 2003

■ Microsoft SQL Server Mobile Edition

■ Microsoft Windows Mobile 2003 software for Pocket PCs

■ Microsoft Windows Server System"!

− Microsoft SQL Server 2005

|Techno™

■ Microsoft SQL Server 2005

■ |Technologies

− Microsoft .NET Compact Framework 2.0

Hardware

■ HP iPAQ h2215 Pocket PC | |

Table 2. Comparison of running XSales Rep on the .NET Compact Framework 1.0 and the beta edition of the .NET Compact Framework 2.0. | | |Action |Loading the application |Logging on | |Free memory before (MB) |.NET Compact Framework 1.0 |30.9 |27.74 | | |Beta edition of the .NET Compact Framework 2.0 |30.69 |26.8 | |Free memory after (MB) |.NET Compact Framework 1.0 |27.74 |8.32 | | |Beta edition of the .NET Compact Framework 2.0 |26.8 |21.61 | |Memory in use (MB) |.NET Compact Framework 1.0 |3.16 |19.42 | | |Beta edition of the .NET Compact Framework 2.0 |3.89 |5.19 | |Time (sec.) |.NET Compact Framework 1.0 |15.78 |1:22.4 | | |Beta edition of the .NET Compact Framework 2.0 |12.54 |42:19 | |

The XSales Rep architecture

© 2005 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. This case study is for informational purposes only. MICROSOFT MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, IN THIS SUMMARY. Microsoft, MSDN, Visual Studio, the Visual Studio logo, Windows, Windows Mobile, and Windows Server System are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries. All other trademarks are property of their respective owners.

Document published April 2005 | | |

For More Information

For more information about Microsoft products and services, call the Microsoft Sales Information Center at (800) 426-9400. In Canada, call the Microsoft Canada Information Centre at (877) 568-2495. Customers who are deaf or hard-of-hearing can reach Microsoft text telephone (TTY/TDD) services at (800) 892-5234 in the United States or (905) 568-9641 in Canada. Outside the 50 United States and Canada, please contact your local Microsoft subsidiary. To access information using the World Wide Web, go to:

For more information about JL Mobile Systems products and services, call (954) 476-8787 or visit the Web site at:

Table 1. Fast Facts | |Lines of code |153, 735 | |Forms |54 | |Data classes |48 | |Business logic classes |23 | |Hierarchy |3 levels maximum | |Developer hours needed to develop XSales Rep |1, 440 | |Executable file size |2.81 MB | |Four databases (number of tables/ total size) |146 total tables / 5 MB | |Total records |5,500 (average) | |Additional Dynamic Link Libraries (DLLs) |Custom controls, security, and printer driver | |

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