When my friend who runs Alphaeus Manufacturing asked if I could build something to track orders and operations across his machine shop, I saw an opportunity to solve a real business problem. The challenge: he needed visibility into production flow, machine utilization, and true costs—data that would transform gut-feeling decisions into strategic ones.
I built a custom kanban system where orders with multiple parts flow through different machines. As workers drag parts between stations, they log timing and material costs—seemingly simple interactions that generate incredibly valuable analytics. Now he can see exactly how long each machine runs, which employees are most efficient, actual production times for specific parts, and true profitability by job type.
This data has real ROI: more accurate job quotes based on historical timing, identifying the most profitable work to pursue, optimizing machine schedules, and spotting bottlenecks before they become problems. It's been in daily production use for years, continuously refined based on real shop floor feedback.
Full transparency: back in 2022, I wasn't a designer—I was a developer who could build functional systems but struggled creating designs from scratch. These screenshots show that era: everything worked, but the UI was purely utilitarian. Today, with AI design tools like v0, Claude, and Midjourney, I can rapidly prototype and iterate on beautiful interfaces. What once would have taken weeks of designer collaboration now happens in hours. The difference isn't just aesthetic—better UI means higher user adoption and less training time, which directly impacts ROI.
