FoodX - Project Proposal

The Problem

• The fridge often contains expired food, which can smell bad and worse, can cause health problems.
• We buy food, but we have no good method to track its expiration date.

Our User

• Our primary user is the person that does grocery shopping in the household. Generally, we expect our primary users to be mothers.
• Secondary users are other people in the household: spouse, children, etc

Our Persona - Julie

Scenario

Julie is a mother of two children. She wants a way to track the expiry date of the items she purchases at the grocery store to prevent her children from getting food poisoning. She uses FoodX to automatically input expiration dates for the items she purchases at a grocery store. When any of the items expire, she is notified, so she can throw them out.

Existing Solutions
1. Expiry Tracker

• The items on screen look cluttered.
• The UI makes the process of entering an item look a chore

2. ExpireTrack

• We expect our user to use the app while in the kitchen, hence an online solution is not optimal
• The interface is not mobile friendly

3. FridgePolice

• This is by far the best existing solution
• However, as seen from the reviews, the users are not quite happy with the UI

FoodX

FoodX is a mobile app that allows the users to easily input and track the expiration date of their grocery items.

Features of FoodX

• Product recognition via barcode scan
• Automatic reminders before expiry date
• Items can be tagged with photos
• Automatic food categorization and built in food expiry information
• Search through existing items
• Sort by expiry date and item type

Use Cases of FoodX

• Scanning an item to automatically retrieve item type and expiration date
• Manually inputting item
• Manually inputting expiration date
• Taking a picture of the item
• Viewing expiration dates of existing items
• Manually deleting items
• Searching for items
• Searching items by expiry date
• Sorting items by item type

Prototype Wireframes: Design 1

Prototype Wireframes: Design 2

The Team

• Kwa Jun Yong - Experience with Web Design and Coding.Enjoys UI
• Aaaron Wong Jun Weng - Experience with Web Design
• Sreshta Vijayaraghavan - Experience with game development and automation testing
• Aravindh Dilli Dorai - Experience with creating wireframes and managing projects

Challenges

• Creating a UI that is fun and friendly for mothers, yet functionally powerful.
• Deciding between design prototypes
• Steep learning curve for Flash5 and HTML (The team is not familiar with these technologies)

But we are excited to create an amazing app that lets mothers track the expiry dates of their foods!