About Mega Systems
Mega Systems is a Brazilian company that produces a business management system (ERP) focused on companies in the civil construction and manufacturing sector. Mega Sistemas has 400 employees and over 2000 clients.
Problem
In the construction industry, it is very normal for our clients to send data from the ERP to MSProject and also to consume MPP files to update the data in the ERP. Previously we used the MSProject APIs to read and write data to MPP files, but the process was very slow. We controlled the construction of large buildings where the MPP file usually had more than 7000 tasks and 5000 resources, and through the MSProject APIs, this generation process used to take around 2 hours.
Solution
Using the Aspose Tasks for .NET, we achieved the same result but within a few minutes.
In order to use Aspose.Tasks for .NET, a server application was created, which executed in the application server of the company (which used our system). The client application made a call to the server sending the data in JSON format and received the MPP file with all the content. Or, it uploaded the MPP file and as a result, it received the data in JSON format.
The communication process between the client application and the server used Google GRPC.
Experience
Finding a solution
Aspose.Tasks for .NET, as well as other components, were found through Google. So we set up a study project with the trial version to test all the components we found over the internet. In the end, we decided on Aspose.Tasks for .NET due to the ease of use, performance in generating the MPP files and the technical support obtained from Aspose.
Implementation
The development of the final solution with Aspose.Tasks for .NET took about 1 month and the Code Samples, Documentation and API References were found exceptional while obtaining the expected result. We accomplished our goals simply and fairly quickly.
The final application was a specific model developed by the Mega System to model the ERP data in the format that was used to communicate. The client application did not know the Aspose model but only the ERP model. In the server application, the ERP model was converted to the Aspose.Tasks for .NET model and the MPP file was generated. At the end of the process, the server application sent the MPP file in binary format to the client application.
Outcome
As a result of the project, we will have a much simpler deploy and without the need for MSProject validations with each new version, making our work more profitable.
Next Steps
If we need to integrate with any other MSOffice product, of course, we will initially test with Aspose products.
Summary
It was very good to use the Aspose Tasks for .NET, as we were able to develop our server application for generating MPP files fairly quickly and cheaply.
In the end, we got a simpler system to maintain, deploy and also a cheaper solution for our customers.
Henrique Ramos, Systems Analyst
Mega Sistemas Corporativos S/A
