Hello there! At Ipsator, we’re driven by a profound passion: to build technology that not only works flawlessly but also feels effortless for every single user, no matter where they are or how they’re connected. Today, we’re thrilled to share a story that truly embodies this spirit – our work with IRCTC eCatering, ensuring a smooth digital experience for millions of travelers, often navigating the unpredictable world of train connectivity.
Picture this: you’re on a train, zipping through landscapes, your mobile network playing hide-and-seek, switching towers, and dropping packets. Yet, hunger calls. This is the reality for countless IRCTC eCatering users. For them, performance isn’t a luxury; it’s a lifeline to a needed service. Recognizing this, our mission became crystal clear: to deliver an experience so optimized that even on a flaky connection, ordering a meal would be swift and stress-free.
Serving millions is one thing; serving millions on the move, often with low bandwidth even on 4G or 5G, is another stratosphere of challenge. The typical hurdles of asset delivery were magnified:
These weren’t just technical bullet points; they were real barriers for users. Our goal was to dismantle them, ensuring the platform felt fast and responsive, especially for those on the most challenging connections.
We believe in engineering with empathy. Our multi-domain asset delivery strategy, turbocharged by Cloudflare, was conceived from the ground up with the train traveler in mind. We asked: how can we make every asset incredibly small and every server response lightning fast from the edge, serving only what is absolutely needed?
Images are key to choosing a meal, but they can also be the heaviest assets. Our Image CDN was designed for extreme efficiency, especially for the Indian market:
.webp to .avif in the image path unlocks further file size reductions.JavaScript, CSS, fonts – the application’s skeleton – needed to be virtually invisible in terms of load time. Our Static CDN ensured:
cache-control: public, max-age=31536000, immutable, these tiny files are fetched once from a nearby Cloudflare edge server and rarely again. This is vital when re-downloading due to a dropped connection is painful.Even dynamic content like PDF receipts needs to be mindful of the user’s connection. We focused on:
stale-while-revalidate: A user on a shaky connection gets the cached version instantly while Cloudflare fetches an update in the background if needed. This prioritizes immediate access.Cloudflare’s global edge network was instrumental. By caching assets closer to our users – no matter which cell tower they were connected to – we dramatically reduced response times. Their robust platform, including cutting-edge features like Zstandard compression support, allowed us to implement these fine-grained optimizations, making our vision of serving incredibly light and quick assets a reality for users on the go.
The numbers speak volumes, especially when you consider what they mean for someone on a train:
For a traveler, this means less waiting, less data consumed, and a far more pleasant interaction, even when the network is doing its worst.
This endeavor with IRCTC eCatering deepened our conviction in several key principles:
At Ipsator, we see challenges like flaky train networks not as roadblocks, but as invitations to innovate. Enhancing the IRCTC eCatering platform to be robust and speedy, even under difficult conditions, by making smart, context-aware technology choices, is a testament to our commitment to creating technology that truly serves people.
The outcome is more than just a faster app; it’s about providing a reliable service that users can count on, making their journeys a little bit smoother.
If you’re passionate about building digital experiences that stand up to real-world challenges and prioritize every user, we’d love to connect. Let’s explore how we can bring this same dedication and expertise to your vision.
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