Smart Parking Assistant: A Seamless Search, Navigate, and Park Experience

Hurdles and Challenges Encountered with React Native Assistance

1. Permission Validation and User Flow Interruption

• Ensured that location permissions were verified at every critical point without disturbing the user experience.
• With React Native assistant, we developed fallback strategies to guide users to grant permissions if initially denied, while maintaining smooth redirection.
• Prevented app flow breaks during location-dependent operations like map loading and navigation.

2. Redirection Accuracy After Search Execution

• Managed accurate redirection of users to searched locations by handling edge cases like incomplete city names, misspellings, or missing coordinates.
• Implemented logic to validate search results and refine mapping queries to prevent wrong map placements.
• Maintained a seamless transition with appropriate map centering, zoom, and animation for a smooth user experience.

3. Map Freeze and UI Responsiveness Handling

• Addressed map freezing issues caused by heavy rendering, search redirection, or location updates in quick succession.
• Optimized asynchronous handling of map operations to avoid main thread blocking.
• Improved UI responsiveness by offloading heavy tasks and maintaining smooth gestures like pan, zoom, and marker clicks.

From Friction to Focus: What the Problem Taught Us Through React Native Assistance

1. Search & Navigation Synchronization

• With React Native assistant, we built a robust system that seamlessly connected search results with real-time map redirection.
• Focused on reducing lag and improving the intuitiveness between searching a city and landing visually at the right map coordinates.

2. Permission and Access Management

• Navigated diverse permission models across platforms, requiring an adaptive solution for location services.
• Prioritized fail-safe permission requests without interrupting the overall application experience.

3. Parking Selection Constraints

• Ensured that parking validations happen at both the map display level and payment stage.
• Needed to handle invalid selections gracefully, avoiding user frustration.

4. Ticketing and Post-Booking Clarity

• Recognized the need for immediate visual feedback once a parking spot is booked.
• Designed an intuitive ticket system that reduces ambiguity about active or expired bookings.

Step by Step: Mastering Success Through Iteration & React Native Assistant

• Real-Time Location Accuracy: Optimized live location fetching and map adjustments to keep user orientation natural and predictable.

• Intelligent Permission Strategies: React Native assistance, we built a layered permission management system handling pre-request rationale, active request, and post-denial fallback routes.

• Structured Parking Management: Developed clear parking selection flows linked tightly with payment and booking status updates.
  Embedded validations to block illegal or invalid zone selections early in the interaction process.

A) Stored required payment data with state management

const [selectedPrice, setSelectedPrice] = React.useState(10);
const [selectedPaymentMethod, setSelectedPaymentMethod] = React.useState(0);
const [transactionStep, setTransactionStep] = React.useState(null);
const [currentSelectedPayment, setCurrentSelectedPayment] = React.useState(null);

switch(selectedPaymentMethod) {
        case PAYPAL:
            pricesArray = payPalPrices;
            break;
        case SATISPAY:
            pricesArray = satispayPrices;
            break;
        case CREDIT_CARD:
            pricesArray = creditCardPrices;
            break;
        default:
            break;
    }

B)  Permission handling mechanism & token management

 React.useEffect(() => {
    if (Platform.OS == ‘ios’) {
      requestIosNotificationUserPermission();
    } else {
      PermissionsAndroid.request(
        PermissionsAndroid.PERMISSIONS.POST_NOTIFICATIONS,
      );  }
    getUserToken();
}, []);

async function requestIosNotificationUserPermission() {
    const authStatus = await messaging().requestPermission();
    const enabled =
      authStatus === messaging.AuthorizationStatus.AUTHORIZED ||
      authStatus === messaging.AuthorizationStatus.PROVISIONAL;
    console.log(‘Enable ? ‘ + enabled);
  }

const getUserToken = async () => {
    try {
      const value = await AsyncStorage.getItem(‘@KEY’);
      if (value !== null) {
        userDataDispatch({type: ‘USER_LOGIN’, userToken: value});
      } else {
        setTimeout(function () {
          userDataDispatch({type: ‘LOADING_COMPLETE’});
        }, 500);
      }
    } catch (error) {
      // Error retrieving data
    }
  };

C) Login management mechanism

   const tryLogin = async() => {
        setError(”);
        var ajaxData = {
            username: email.toLowerCase(),
            password: password
        }
        setIsLoading(true);
        fetch(restApiUrlTest + ‘/login_check’, {
            method: ‘POST’,
            headers: {
                Accept: ‘application/json’,
                ‘Content-Type’: ‘application/json’
            },
            body: JSON.stringify(ajaxData)
        })
        .then(response => response.json())
        .then(response => {
            if(response.token !== undefined) {
                saveUserToken(response.token, email, password);
            } else {
                setIsLoading(false);
                setError(“Errore, nome utente o password errati!”);
            }
        })
    }

Vehicle management and payment integration example

• Managed the payment & store requires details with React hooks.
• Managed the runtime permissions and token validation mechanism.
• Managed the login authentication flow with state management.
• Real-time application’s view in iOS.

Built to Scale: Systems That Grow

• Modular Search and Map System: Architectural search, map handling, and parking flows as independent modules for faster updates and scalability.
• Context-Aware Location Services: Developing an even smarter location service layer that predicts permission needs based on app usage history and user intent.

• Dynamic Payment & Reservation Expansion: Preparing for flexible payment options and dynamic reservation windows (e.g., reserve now, park later features).

• Personalized Parking Suggestions: Future enhancement to recommend available parking based on user habits, previous selections, and time of day.
• Cross-Platform Stability Enhancements: Ongoing efforts to ensure a seamless experience across different Android and iOS devices, adapting UI flows to platform-specific guidelines.