IoT project ecosystem: the second Yalantis meetup in Warsaw

Yalantis recently gathered the Ukrainian IT community in Warsaw for the second time at Yalantis Meetup: IoT Edition. The company has several ongoing projects in the green energy, medical, and industrial IoT sectors, facilitating knowledge sharing for specialists offline and online. The event brought together more than 50 participants from the Ukrainian tech community. During the event, three speakers from Yalantis shared their practical experience of working on IoT projects. 

The IoT industry in Ukraine is a relatively young and free industry. Over the past 40 years, the technology has become a powerful tool for wirelessly data exchange between different devices, enabling automated monitoring of their status.

But how can IoT be effectively utilized to solve problems in the agricultural sector, logistics, medicine, and other business sectors? First, tech enthusiasts need to grasp the ecosystem of IoT projects, including requirements, and types of devices. To this end, the meetup featured both technical and business topics, ensuring a comprehensive understanding and perspective.

"One of my favorite presales was a complex project for an Industrial IoT vendor. They were working on air supply and purification systems: air quality sensors, vibration sensors, and other performance indicators for large industrial subsystems. Though their documentation employed specific terminology, it essentially described a classic IoT system. To conduct a dialogue, build an understanding of their system and problematic links, and involve the development team, you first need to draw at least an ERD of what the client described and identify the components. In the general scheme of the IoT ecosystem, you know exactly what to look for, that there are end devices, connectivity devices, applications, data processing, and whatever names these components may be hidden behind. You understand the connections. For instance, there was no mention of connectivity devices in this client's documentation, but we knew they should be there. They used their custom gateways that worked exclusively with their devices. This greatly influenced our technical solution. Having an understanding of the ecosystem structure, you can swiftly grasp a specific customer solution and comprehend what problems they aim to solve."

Oleksandra Zhiltsova, 

The Senior Business Analyst at Yalantis.

In her presentation, Oleksandra reviewed the general structure of the IoT ecosystem and the system of product requirements. She also emphasized the topic of IoT networking as an independent research and development direction. In particular, Oleksandra reviewed a real project in the field of Industrial IoT and the internal structure of its network.

When working on IoT projects, Yalantis uses the edge computing paradigm and, in most cases, the Rust language. The second speaker discussed the advantages and disadvantages of edge computing and the Rust programming language:

"When choosing between Edge Computing and Cloud Computing, it is important to consider the context. For industrial environments where decision-making time is critical, Edge Computing is a great solution. In environments where the urgency of decision-making is not a factor, Cloud will be easier to integrate and infrastructure costs will be lower. Additionally, you need to take into account the specifics of the environment and the nature of the data to be processed. Hence, a hybrid approach, combining Cloud and Edge Computing, is often the optimal choice. It will give you a good infrastructure where decisions can be made quickly for important data and at the same time get all the benefits of a cloud solution."

Denis Gukov, 

The Head of IoT Unit at Yalantis.

The participants then discussed approaches to testing IoT solutions. 

The increasing number of connected devices presents challenges related to their testing. There is an urgent need for thorough testing of IoT systems, as even the slightest mistake can have serious consequences for the security and functionality of these devices. The speaker shared his practical experience of testing IoT systems, as well as, examples of solving frictions in this area.

"Testing IoT solutions is a highly intricate and extensive process. You need to check both the functional and non-functional characteristics at each architectural level of the system, encompassing negative scenarios and use cases. At the earliest stages of development, you need to think about the testability of the system as a whole. One of the solutions that will help in testing is to create a device simulator."

Artur Shevchenko

The Head of the QA Department at Yalantis.

Participants received gifts from the company for the best questions to the speakers. In addition to the speeches, the participants had a Q&A session and networking.

So, Yalantis Meetup: IoT edition comprised:

3 hours of content and networking

3 speakers 

2 technical and 1 business topics

more than 50 participants

Recordings of the speakers' presentations are available here.

It was the second offline meetup in Poland after the opening of Yalantis' office in Warsaw. In September 2022, the company announced the opening of an office in Poland. 

Yalantis, a Ukrainian outsourcing company, is set to celebrate its 15th anniversary in 2023. The Yalantis team consists of 500 specialists. The company has offices in Warsaw, Dnipro, Kyiv, Lviv, and Larnaca, with a portfolio of more than 200 projects. You can view current vacancies here.