Company
A small product development firm that specializes in the development and manufacture of automated, computer controlled equipment. This equipment includes "smart" poultry processing equipment, specialized communications systems and machine tool controllers.

Project
To design and implement the next generation milling machine controller on a Windows 32-bit platform using traditional stand-alone development techniques. The first stage involved identifying the functionality available in the existing DOS-based application desired in the new version and documenting it in a functional specification. Additional features were identified and included in the specification as well. Stage two involved the production of a design for the architecture of the product. Particular attention was paid to the reusability and extensibility of the framework across current and future products. Following the architecture design, development tasks and responsibilities were divided up among the two development teams based on logical boundaries identified in the design. Development of the design along with the incorporation of custom controls and navigational elements followed.

Solution
C-Sharp worked with the existing development engineers in the finalization of the preliminary specification. We were responsible for much of the C++ OOD efforts and provided most all of the architecture implementation. Due to the nature of the product, several custom controls and window (MFC) extension classes were created by both development teams working closely together to ensure consistency and reusability. Within a very short time and a concentrated joint development effort, the application was up and running with much of the user interface and navigational elements in place and functional. As is the case with most software development efforts, requirements were modified. Throughout the course of development, the original design stood up to the tests, providing for consistency and extensibility along the way.

Technologies Used
We used the following technologies to solve this problem:

• Microsoft Window 95/NT
• Microsoft Visual C++ 5.0
• Microsoft Foundation Classes (MFC)
• Runtime loading of DLL's
• Various third-party custom controls