Origin: Warranty Tracker
| Not caring for things brings a lot of trouble
Introduction
In the era we live in, we are filled with gadgets that make our lives easier and at the same time are expensive enough to eat up lot of our wealth. Whenever one purchases a device there is an expectation from a device that a particular device or a gadget should at least serve a user for a minimal amount of time and during that time there should be minimal expense on the device of that genre.
But the truth is that the devices we use are prone to small damages and usual wear and tear ultimately leading to a phase where they become non functional and then they are ready to break our bank, until and unless they are protected with a shield known as warranty. With the increase in the amount we spend on these devices, it turns out they are needed to be protected too. One thing we don’t remember is the date when we purchase the device because of the plethora of devices we have currently. That’s where our application comes in.
Functional Requirements
The project is basically an Android application developed using Flutter in Android Studio so the very first requirement is to have a device that has an Android operating system.
The project is divided into several modules one of them is the login module and therefore the user requires a valid email address to login and when the user registers for the very first time he/she would require to pass the authentication by clicking on the verification email that has been sent after registering to validate the email.
The software is based on reminding the warranty expiration and extension and therefore requires the user to register there devices with proper info regarding its name and especially its purchasing date and warranty span so that the application can send a notification at the correct time.
Another functional requirement is that the user should have a working camera in there device to scan the QR code and fill the information regarding the product automatically.
The output expected from the app is a notification regarding the warranty expiration and an email a few days before the expiration date and in future recommending several options where a user can extend their warranty of the product.
Existing Systems/ Motivation to build project
Whenever someone tries making a new project is mainly because there are some problems in the existing ones and those problems work as an inspiration so that a new project can make lives simpler. We looked up at this project when we found out that the existing methods had a lack of versatility and reachability there are a few existing approaches to providing warranty tracing but none of them are really successful.
Mostly the traditional approaches are applied till now to trace the warranty from the calendar app. Users have to register there devices on different dates using the calendar app and the calendar app usually notifies the user on the day the warranty expires only as a notification and mostly calendar dates crash with other numerous events like birthdays and weeding anniversaries, so there was not a specific application that keeps the track of warranty.
This new approach allows user to know when the warranty is going to expire and whether it is currently active or not, and it helps the user to organize there devices in a better manner at one place. The idea of this app was generated from my friends personal experience when his laptop fell while travelling and there was a cracked screen, the accidental damage warranty just expired 2 days ago and that one thing led to a paid replacement of laptop display.
Our Process
The application requires a user to log-in so that all of their devices can be stored at one place. After logging-in the user can register a device in two ways, either by scanning the QR code that we provide as an add-on to the device a user purchases or by simply registering the device with attributes like device name, the date of purchase and the warranty period. The app than stores the device info and reminds the user when a specific percentage of warranty has expired and its time to renew the warranty to keep the device away from huge expenses after damage. The application will remind the user about the warranty expiration and in future might also provide warranty extension recommendations. The user also receives an email when there are certain days required before the warranty expiration.
Technologies Used
The project is made using Flutter SDK and using dart as the programming language. Firebase stores the data of the users and helps with authentication by being the backend of the project. There is an occasional use of Application Programming Interface (API) for authentication and pushing the data.
