Chris Peacock
Technical Marketing Director - Aquaread
Digital
Cross-platform mobile application for specialist sensors
Development of Aquaread’s probe companion app and launching it to app stores.
Aquaread
Engineering a high-precision mobile app
Aquaread delivers advanced water quality testing for groundwater, surface water, and wastewater. To complement the hardware, a mobile app was partially developed but required significant work to bring it to life.
Aquaread approached us to help complete the mobile app. We began by reviewing the existing codebase, which was built on the Xamarin platform and examined the probe’s source assembly code to understand how it interfaced and communicated.
To prepare the mobile app for launch, several screens required polishing and UI improvements. We enhanced the reliability of the Bluetooth connectivity with the probe and re-engineered the telemetry data processing for greater accuracy and performance.
The Aquaread mobile app successfully launched on the Android Store in June 2024, marking a major milestone in bringing advanced water testing capabilities to mobile users.
Expanding operating systems
We immediately began adapting the Aquaread app for Apple devices. As we transitioned to iOS, we encountered several platform-specific challenges, including limitations within the Xamarin framework and differences in Bluetooth communication timing. Through careful analysis and iteration, we resolved these issues to ensure smooth and reliable integration between the app and Aquaread’s hardware probes on iOS.
The Aquaread mobile app launched on the Apple App Store in August 2024, extending its powerful water testing capabilities to iOS users. This release marked the completion of a fully cross-platform solution.
‘d&f's deep understanding of high efficiency programming and computer architecture has allowed us to make our vision of a companion app for our water testing probes a reality. It is now used by our clients globally to test and record water quality. It’s a pleasure working with the team, who are exceptionally skilled and super responsive to all of our many requests.’
Feature enhancements
Following the successful launch of the Android and iOS apps, a series of post-launch enhancements were identified to improve user experience and functionality.
One key enhancement was the implementation of background logging support, allowing the app to continue capturing and storing data even when users navigated away or switched to other apps. This ensured uninterrupted data collection during fieldwork and made the app more reliable in real-world, multitasking scenarios.
We also extended the app’s capabilities to support the Aquasonde series of probes, which feature built-in internal logging functionality. This enhancement involved integrating compatibility with the updated hardware, enabling seamless communication between the app and Aquasonde devices.
Project Information
App development