Start Preparing Your App's Development Team

Get your mobile application project started on the right foot by understanding key parts of the Integration Spec Sheet.

Before starting a big project, such as introducing a new app, it's good to understand where you're starting from. By sharing key information about your organization, existing tools, and your enterprise resource planning (ERP) tools, you're helping your development team get a clear picture of what to expect when they start working on your new application. 

Filling out the General Information Section

This section shows your team whom to involve throughout the project. Having this information early helps save time on communication and implementation.

Company Information

• Company Address
  • Use your organization's physical address. 
• Preferred App Name
  • The app name must be 30 characters or less.
  • Keeping the app name the same for both Android and Apple will eliminate confusion among customers. 
• Timezone
  • This information is important to consider for security programs that use time and location for web authentication.
• Feedback Email Address
  • This is where you'd like to route your customer's opinions about the application.
• Failed Login Email Address
  • This field is for whom will be the best contact to help customers should they find themselves locked out of the application.
• The login Assistance Phone Number
  • Indicates which person or department users should call if they have questions about how to log into the application.
• Company Contact Email/Phone Number
  • Indicates how customers can get a hold of someone at your company for general information or topics that fall outside the categories of feedback and login issues.
• Other Names Your Company is Known As
  • This helps your development team consider how to incorporate some of that information to make it easier for your customers to find your application and trust that it's the right one. 

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Data and Features Information

• ERP and Cash Bid Provider
  • This allows your development team to plan for what type of linkages and integrations they need to make or are likely to encounter.
• Features
  • This is what customers will be able to access within your application. If you'd like them to be able to receive and view digital scale tickets, for example, you would want to ensure that the corresponding column has it labeled as "Yes".  
    

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Contact Information

1. Main Contact
   1. This is for whom your team should be in contact throughout the entire project and is responsible for the application once it's published.
2. Contact For Tunnel
   1. This is the person who is responsible for maintaining the connection between the application and your organization's digital systems. They'll help ensure that accurate information flows smoothly to your users.
3. Contact for App Store and Google Play Store
   1. This is a key role to consider for this project and ongoing application management. These roles help ensure that users can find your app when they're ready to download it, as well as the application's status within the store.

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Data Validation Testers 

• Testers are key for ensuring that the application is performing as expected.
• When the application is ready for internal testing, these contacts will test that the data flowing to the application is accurate.
• We recommend having only 5 or fewer employees involved at this testing stage.
  • Five is generally a sufficient number for validating this type of data. And having employees test the application first allows your application to have a better first impression when it's ready for customer testing.

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Test Grower Cell Phone Numbers

• Once your application is ready for customer testing, we'll need a list of people who will be willing to provide feedback as they use the application in a real-world setting.
• We recommend coming up with this list toward the beginning of the project, that way we can reduce the risk of delay once it's ready for testing.
• Unlike data validation testers, we recommend 5-10 testers to help ensure that we get as much feedback from people who would represent your core users.

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Filling out the Features and Configuration Section

• Here's where you start getting into more of what you want the app to offer and how things should be ordered.
  • Think of this as the start for what information customers should see and how it should be displayed.
• Keep in mind, if there are no configuration options that you want that are available, we have to consider it as a custom feature.
  • These types of features will likely mean that we need to update that contract and possibly include a new discovery process and additional development time, which can change your launch date.

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App Information

• Welcome / Login Message and Login Button Label
  • These tell customers how to log into the application. It's important to have clear directions here so that users know exactly what to do in order to access the information that they need.
• Failed Login Message and Failed Login Button Label
  • These work together to let the customer know that their login attempt did not work and the next course of action.
  • Be sure to include your company name so your users know where they should go or how to contact your business to get access.
• In-App Company Name
  • This field tells developers what company name should appear inside the app.
• Pricing, amount, weight, and cash bid decimal fields
  • These tell developers how many numbers after the decimal would like to appear within the application. 

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Cash Bids

• You have the option to hide cash bids behind a login in this section of the form.
• If you select no, that means users can see cash bids without having to log in. By default, we have it selected as "no", but you can have that discussion within your organization to make the decision that's best for your users.

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Futures

• This section indicates which commodities you would like to include in the app and what order they should appear in.
• By prioritizing certain commodities, you make it easy for users to quickly find the most important information by putting it up higher on the list.
• Commodities can be removed from this list, but not added.

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Commodity Balance Positions

• Commodity Balance Position's purpose is to inform growers how many bushels are unpriced in a particular stage of the process, including but not limited to Open Storage and Deferred Payment. 
• Database Balance Names
  • You'll want to include the commodity balance position that your company uses.
• In-App Display Name
  • This is how you would like that to appear in your Bushel-powered application. Sometimes these might be the same name, such as Open Storage.
  • We recommend picking a term that users will easily understand for the In-App Display Name.
• Remote ID
  • This field is for documenting which characters we should use within the application to correspond to the Database Balance Name.
  • This won't appear within the application; however, it's important information to ensure your development team is connecting the position name to the correct ID.

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Custom Weblinks

• Custom navigation links
  • These allow you to provide as many as 3 custom links that can help users find additional information without leaving your app. 
  • Consider using this location to link users to your website, newsletter, market reports, emergency bulletins, weather forecasts, and ag news.
• Display Name
  • This is the label that users will tap on to go to the URL. To create a good label, consider something that sounds actionable for users.
• URL field
  • This indicates where you would like customers to go once they tap on the display name.
  • Ensure that it is a complete URL by including the "https://www." at the beginning to make it more likely that the URL will work for the user. 

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ERP Information

• If this information is on your spec sheet, please fill it out as best as you can with information specific to your ERP database.

Filling out the Locations Section

• This step of the process is usually the most time-consuming, so please allow yourself or your team adequate time to complete it.
• We need all active locations, their corresponding IDs from the database, and current contact information.
  • Sometimes your ERP might contain inactive locations and out-of-date info, so this is a good opportunity to ensure that your company's information is current and accurate.

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ID and Name Fields

• These two fields work together to help organize your business' location information inside the application.
• ID
  • This is the unique location ID that is assigned to each location in your ERP database.
  • For example, "HQ" may be an ID for company headquarters.
• Name
  • This field provides the full name for the corresponding ID in the left column. For example, this could be something like "Company Main Office" if you have "HQ" as the ID.

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Address Lines 1 and 2, City, State, and Zip Code

• Include the physical address of each location in these two fields.
• Then include the City, State, and Zip Code to complete the address. 

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Email, Phone, Fax, and Website

• Include an Email, Phone Number, and if available, a Fax number or Website for each location.
• This allows more ways for users to contact specific locations or in some instances a designated contact who can help them.
• By including the above contact information in the document, your development team can add it to your application so users can access it without leaving the app.

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Location Type

Differentiating the Location Type helps your development team know whether the location is an elevator, office, ground pile, or even a C-Store. This helps your team learn more about your business. 

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Display as Cash Bids Location and Cash Bids ID

Depending on your organization, you might want to show certain areas as a Cash Bid Location. For instance, you might not want your corporate office to appear as a cash-bid location. To indicate that a facility should be listed as a cash bid location, select "Yes" from the drop-down menu.

Filling out the Crop Types Section

This section refers to the crop information that your ERP database will share with the application. 

• Crop ID
  • Include the ID code that is listed in your ERP database for each crop. Generally, this is an alphanumeric code that the application will use to identify crop information to be shown in tickets, contracts, and if applicable, the commodity balance screen. If you do not know the Crop ID, your contact at Bushel will be more than willing to help you find it.
• Crop Name
  • Refers to how you would like that Crop ID to appear in your application. For example, the Crop ID in your ERP database might be for "yellow corn" but you might want to have it appear as "corn" in the application.
  • One consideration for this field is to shorten lengthy crop names to reduce the risk of it being cut off in the application. For example, instead of hard red winter wheat, consider using "HRW Wheat".

Filling out the Remarks/Discount Codes Section (if applicable)

Similar to the Crop Types section, this section is about how discount codes – such as those used to mark moisture, test weights, and damage – get sent from your ERP database and appear on the application. This will be key for the scale ticket in your application.

• Grade Factor Code
  • This is the ID that maps to specific reason codes within your ERP database. For this column, we recommend including as many of those grade codes from your ERP, even if you don't think your organization uses them that much. That way you reduce the risk of a grade code appearing in the app without an assigned display name.
• Grade Factor Display Name
  • This is how that grade code factor should appear within your application.
  • We recommend choosing display names that are easy for your users to understand, even at a quick glance.

Filling out the Cash Bid Crops Section

This section is only for customers using Bushel CMS cash bids within the application. This information is independent of what you provided in the Crop Types tab, so providing it will help your development team know what data needs to flow from a future feed.

• Crop Name
  • You don't necessarily need to have a consistent naming structure for crops in a previous tab.
  • This is the name that will appear within the cash bid area of your application. 
• Ticker Symbol
  • Ensure that you're using the correct Ticker Symbol that's tied to the crop name. This information is key for pulling in the correct trading information from the CME Group. 

Filling out the Database Name/ID Section

If your form contains this section, then your development team needs some additional information about your ERP database, specifically the Data Base ID name. Knowing this helps your development team build a good connection between your ERP database and your application. 

• Data Base ID Name
  • This is the label of your primary ERP database, from which the application will get its data from. If you have multiple databases, for example, there might be customer information and important data stored throughout them that will need to be connected for the application. To find this information, you can check your ERP or by contacting your provider.
• Final Steps
  • Once you're done with this form, submit it to your contact at Bushel who will be leading your development team. While you were working on this form, your development team was likely busy creating the accounts for the App Store and Google Play store.