IoT is a cutting edge technology impacting various industries like the oil and gas industry, digital manufacturing, energy, agriculture, cryptocurrency, and many others. Companies all over the world invest in the development of new IoT frameworks and products. The Internet of Things development is much more complex and challenging than traditional web development. The IoT software market has high standards for its products and development teams who build them. To build high-quality, scalable, robust, secure and user-friendly solutions a dev team has to bring their finest ideas to the table as well as reorganize their workflow.
Select an Operating System
Before starting the development process, several technical factors should be considered. Unlike traditional computer systems, IoT devices are far less powerful and have fewer system resources. The dev team has to evaluate IoT devices they selected to work with and choose an operating system accordingly. It should fit the requirements and devices’ capabilities.
Consider the Protocol
Choosing the right protocol is the key to success. Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, serial ports, Zigbee, and others have different energy profiles, advantages, and disadvantages. The security standards, the development strategy, and the whole software infrastructure are defined by the selected protocol. There are plenty of IoT related services and libraries to choose from. These instruments help software developers test their ideas before going into production saving time and money.
The Right IoT platform
Projects with requirements so complicated that it makes sense to develop a platform from scratch are rare. In 95% of all cases, there is no need to reinvent the wheel. Cloud providers have ready solutions, you just need to pick the one which fits your requirements. The cloud computing market can be overwhelming, and it’s better to spend extra time to do thorough research.
Here is a list of significant factors to consider when choosing a platform:
- Which protocols are supported;
- Vendor lock-in;
- The full cost of the platform including various hidden fees;
- What are its obvious and hidden limitations;
- Cloud ecosystem;
- Security;
- Scalability;
- The ability to integrate;
- Usability and UI
At Webdevelop Pro we have experience working with AWS and Google Cloud IoT applications and solutions. Though both options have advantages and disadvantages, we find Google Cloud to be a more preferable choice because of a better price and a larger set of features.
Security
“S" in IoT stands for Security
As you can see, there’s no “S” in IoT. By definition, IoT systems contain numerous connected devices, giving those with malicious intent multiple targets to scan for vulnerabilities. All devices in a network must be adequately tested, or the entire system is threatened.
You might recall an incident in 2016 when AWS, Twitter, Spotify, and other services were disrupted as the result of a major DDoS attack on Dyn. The root cause was defined as the availability of third party DNS service providers. A huge amount of vulnerable IoT devices were used to execute this attack. One can’t be too careful when it comes to applying security measures to IoT systems.
In our experience, security issues should be addressed and resolved during the process of product development, not after. Assuring security is a colossal challenge for developers working on IoT projects. The effectiveness of security measures depends mostly on how much effort and resources are put into it at the earliest stages of product development.
Here is a basic security measures checklist we apply to all our products:
- SSL/TLS encryption;
- Isolated VLA;
- Detached corporate VPN;
- Modern and updated anti-virus;
- End-user and machine-to-machine authentication;
- Vetted frameworks for web development and design;
This checklist is constantly updated and may vary according to the project at hand.
Development speed shouldn’t be preferred over products' quality
IoT software development is a constantly changing industry. Software developers have tough deadlines to meet along with changes and tweaks that need to be applied during the development process. To give it one's best in a fast-paced environment takes skills and experience. We ensure the reliability and security of our IoT solutions through QA testing. Users expect your product to work as advertised, and skipping on testing and security can affect the product's performance and thus your business.
A User-Friendly Design
We believe that every IoT product should be design-driven and have a simple yet powerful UI. An end-user is not interested in all the technical details and edge cases. They want a product that works and has a simple intuitive UI to set it up the way they see fit. To ensure great performance and positive user experience of any software is no trivial task. Our expertise in using data virtualization tools and modifying device configuration helps us find the balance between the technological complexity and usability of our IoT solutions.
Cross-Platform Deployment
IoT development implies working with various devices that have different architectures, protocols and operations systems. We create IoT software capable of encoding and decoding all types of data in a complex environment where various protocols and operating systems interact. Webdevelop Pro can build a highly secure custom platform with an easy-to-use and powerful UI for your business.