OU Inventory Project Management Research Prototype

FUELING HOPE AND INNOVATION: ENHANCING OU'S CAMPUS FOOD AND RESEARCH BY AKSHAY SINGH CLOTHING ASSISTANCE PROGRAM Akshay Singh, me.akshaysingh.|6@gmail.com Research Educator: Dr. Javeed Kittur First Year Engineering Experience Problem Statement The OU Food Pantry, a vital non-profit organization on campus, serves as a lifeline for staff, faculty, and students by providing essential food and clothing items to approximately 550 families each week. Despite its critical role, the pantry faces various challenges due to its manual and resource-intensive operations. This project aims to address these challenges and enhance the efficiency of the OU Food Pantry by introducing an automated system for order processing, inventory management, and a user- friendly interface for customers. Background | What is the OU Food Pantry? The OU Food Pantry is a compassionate and essential nonprofit organization nestled at the heart of our campus, dedicated to providing crucial sustenance and clothing to the diverse community of staff, esteemed faculty, and cherished students of OU. More than just a distribution center, it serves as a symbol of hope and support, offering nourishment and dignity to those facing economic hardships. This unassuming space plays a pivotal role in our university's commitment to inclusivity, ensuring that nobody within our academic family goes without life's basic necessities. Challenges Faced by the OU Food Pantry: Manual Operations Dependent on Volunteers: The pantry currently relies on the altruism and dedication of volunteers who generously give their time to undertake crucial tasks such as taking orders, filling them, organizing supplies, and monitoring stock levels. While the volunteers' commitment is unwavering, these manual processes often lead to inconsistencies, errors, and resource-intensive operations. Lack of Inventory Management: The absence of an effective inventory management system poses a significant challenge for the pantry. Without a streamlined method for tracking and predicting demand, the pantry struggles to maintain an accurate stock of essential items. This leads to situations where critical supplies run low without prior notice. Prototype & Evaluation of Design Part 1: Prototype Description The prototype for the OU Food Pantry Inventory Management system is a web-based application developed using the Shiny framework in R. It is designed to mimic a simplified version of an inventory management system. The prototype comprises two main components: a user interface (Ul) and a server component. The Ul allows users to add items to the inventory, while the server component processes these inputs and updates the inventory data. Part 2: Eval of Design - ( User-Friendly Interface: The prototype successfully offers an intuitive user interface. Users can input item names and quantities easily, which mirrors the process of adding items to the food pantry's inventory. Inventory Visualization: The inclusion of bar and pie charts effectively presents inventory data. These visualizations offer a clear overview of inventory status, aiding in decision-making. Inventory Summary: The prototype generates an inventory summary, displaying the total number of items and their cumulative quantity, which is a crucial feature for inventory management. Part 3: Evaluation of Design — (Areas for Improvement) Real-Time Data: The prototype does not integrate real-time data, a vital component for a production system. A live system should interact with incoming donations and orders in real time to maintain accurate inventory data. Experiment Purpose of the Experiment: The purpose of this experiment is to create a simulated inventory management system using the Shiny framework in R. This experiment serves as a preliminary exploration of how technology can be harnessed to address the inventory management challenges faced by the OU Food Pantry. While this particular code is a prototype, its broader goal is to demonstrate the potential benefits of an automated system for tracking inventory, managing data, and providing user-friendly access to information. The UNIVERSITY of OKLAHOMA Testing The Application Part 4: Testing The Application The prototype was tested in a controlled environment. Simulated items were added to the inventory, and the interface and visualizations were examined for accuracy and usability. The test confirmed that the prototype could successfully add items and visualize inventory data. However, it was clear that the next phase of development would involve integrating the system with live data sources to address the real challenges faced by the OU Food Pantry. Results & Figures U Food Pantry lnventory Management Research Project by Akshay Singh —— Visuaizations WiT"8CEM0ECn 6o G Om O Am ~oGEaw wm @