FAQ

1. Why CloudQCApp adopted the Android platform  ?
 
CloudQCApp is the first commercial and industrial QC App in the world!!  We have quickly adopted the popular Android Tablet as operation platform is for the sake of its endless open and extendable mobile features.   In these 2 years, Android Tablet is even more handy and light-weighed, but can be even more powerful than traditional Laptop.   Compared to iPAD, Android platform is cheaper and relatively easier for system deployment in future functions upgrade. With the price range only from several hundreds to several thousands dollars, Android tablet has now been well-proven as the most COST-EFFECTIVE platform that modern enterprises to start up mobile system operation, especially some outsite operations like QC process.

2.  Why CloudQCApp is not a Web-based System?
 
The direct reason is that Android App runs much faster than a Web-based System.  On the other hands, our important concept in CloudQCApp is DO ONCE to let Tablet to capture all TEXT and all IMAGES (products, defects, marks and labels, etc) and even videos using camera or other devices in Tablet to directly, and then also generate the professional EXCEL QC reports directly in 10 seconds. If we use web-based application in Tablet, it is more or less not so directly connect to Camera or Bar Code Reader, etc, and the whole inspection processes will be less direct.
One more important things, we can do the inspection TOTALLY OFFLINE by pre-downloading the QC projects into the tablet. This is especially for the inspection jobs to be done in some location where the Internet is not well-connected.
Indeed, the CloudQCApp have a web-based system called QC CENTRE to view and handle ALL the uploaded QC data from inspectors, with Audit Trail. This QC centre is also for Managers to assign view, approve, rollback all QC reports and also generate company’s KPI reports.  For our client’s experience, they previously used 10 days to prepare all KPI reports, but now, they can generate them in QC Centre in half an hours, and at ANY TIME !!!

3. Why CloudQCApp used MongoDB instead of the more robust MsSQL or Oracle RDBMS?
MsSQL and Oracle is SQL-based RDBMS that serves better for records with well-defined structured data, like customer and order data.  However, MongDB is NoSQL document-oriented DB that will serve better with free-style records with unstructured data, like QC records that might have various data formats for different customers or product types.

Technically, when compared to RDBMS, NoSQL databases are more scalable and provide superior performance, and their data model addresses several issues that the relational model is not designed to address:

  • Large volumes of structured, semi-structured, and unstructured data
  • Object-oriented programming that is easy to use and flexible
  • Efficient, scale-out architecture instead of expensive, monolithic architecture

So, it is our conclusion that SQL-based RDBMS is less suitable for the mobile QC application.  MongoDB has been used by big customers like SAP, SourceForge, Disney, Forbes, Taobao.  http://www.mongodb.com/who-uses-mongodb.  Our MongoDB runs on 64-bit Windows Server with no limitation on data. Server CPU speed not limited but fast CPU speed and larger RAM size is helpful.

As our understanding and user experience, MongoDB is very robust especially to handle vast amount of data, such as text, images, video clips. It is very applicable to be used in App application for its stability in document synchronization between Tablet and Server. Our infrastructure is very direct but effective to let the QC data to be input and manipulate OFFLINE in Tablet, and sync to Server ONLINE at any time ONLY WHEN 3G/Wifi available. This mechanism is very straightforward and never failed as it is like a simply Word document to be transferred to Server like email attachment. The Server program in CloudQCApp will then auto-build index in DB like standard SQL database for further data mining.

For the RAM consideration, our Server only used 4GB, and the RAM size of one of my clients’ Server with 100 over QC and over 8,000 QC inspections /month takes only 8G RAM, which is relatively not too big in size. So, I think the RAM and CPU usage is quite reasonable for MongoDB Server.

4. Can the QC data of CloudQCApp synchronize to your ERP system easily? 
 In CloudQCApp, we have an interface layer called BDI (Business Domain Interface) to synchronize your ERP data to QC Centre. We have many ways to auto synchronize the QC data.
  • PO header file (Booked QC tasks in EXCEL format) can be synchronized to our QC Centre in any schedule (say hourly, daily, weekly).
  • We can Import/Export Excel/Jason/XML/CVS output file in a standard data field format on schedule (real-time, hourly, daily, weekly)
  • On the other hand, since Enterprise might need specific data fields or consolidated data fields in specific data format, sequence, value type, etc.,  we can also do fields customization on the data output to achieve enterprise’s own purpose.
  • For a closer data integration,  we can provide Web-based Restful APIs for enterprise to pull data directly from our QC Centre,
  • We can also write Middle-ware Program to let our QC Centre push QC data directly to the Enterprise’s ERP main database/interface database on schedule (real-time, hourly, daily, weekly).

5. Why CloudQCApp does not allow users to login freely in any Android Tablet ?
This is our important User Protection mechanism that the CloudQCApp Login ID can only set to email account installed in the tablet, We purposely does not allow any Login ID to be input, except inspector’s valid email address in the Tablet. This mechanism is to ensure an Inspector can login his Tablet only and prevent him to login other registered Tablet not belonged to him. In other words, we also protect him from other inspector to use his Tablet. As your know, we have already used Tablet hardware ID to associated our App, that no one can install and open our App in a brand new Tablet without going through both hardware registration and email (User ID) registration.