For our mobile application, it will be difficult to find a developer or a team of developers who is technically skilled enough to create such a mobile application, considering all of the application’s functionalities. The application has to be able to take in the user’s personal dietary information/goals and then create a meal plan using that information. In addition to this function, the application also has to be able to regularly update, on a day-to-day basis, its database of currently served food, either in campus diners or other on-campus facilities that accept dining dollars. These functions are only some of the requirements that may be difficult to realize.
Some tradeoffs we could potentially explore depend on what features we ultimately choose to include in the application. For instance, as previously stated, we are requiring the application to, at the most basic level, create a meal plan according to the user’s dietary information. We also want the application to display all of the up to date foods and each of their nutritional information. Furthermore, we thought about implementing a calorie counting function within the application that would help students track their calories. While all of these functions are useful, implementing all of them could cause the design to be too big, too expensive, and too complex. Our goal is to design a solution that attracts all kinds of users, and making it simpler to use will achieve that. As a result, a tradeoff could be only designing the application to be a purely information-based application. We will not implement the miscellaneous functions such as a calorie counter, and will only implement the basic function of creating a meal plan and displaying nutritional information of foods.
Tasks such as displaying the nutritional information of foods, creating personal accounts, and selecting specific diners will be easier to support. These tasks will require relatively less development to achieve. However tasks such as creating a meal plan based on a user’s information will be harder to achieve purely because we need to somehow implement an automated process where we analyze the user’s information and then strategically select foods based on the user’s information in order to create a meal plan. This task will require much more development.
Some tradeoffs we could potentially explore depend on what features we ultimately choose to include in the application. For instance, as previously stated, we are requiring the application to, at the most basic level, create a meal plan according to the user’s dietary information. We also want the application to display all of the up to date foods and each of their nutritional information. Furthermore, we thought about implementing a calorie counting function within the application that would help students track their calories. While all of these functions are useful, implementing all of them could cause the design to be too big, too expensive, and too complex. Our goal is to design a solution that attracts all kinds of users, and making it simpler to use will achieve that. As a result, a tradeoff could be only designing the application to be a purely information-based application. We will not implement the miscellaneous functions such as a calorie counter, and will only implement the basic function of creating a meal plan and displaying nutritional information of foods.
Tasks such as displaying the nutritional information of foods, creating personal accounts, and selecting specific diners will be easier to support. These tasks will require relatively less development to achieve. However tasks such as creating a meal plan based on a user’s information will be harder to achieve purely because we need to somehow implement an automated process where we analyze the user’s information and then strategically select foods based on the user’s information in order to create a meal plan. This task will require much more development.