Transportation Platform
Real-time mobility · GPS · Payments · Notifications
- Live GPS tracking
- Driver matching
- Route optimization
- Payment processing
- Push notifications
Challenge
The product required sub-second location synchronization between drivers and riders across variable network conditions, while processing payments reliably at trip completion. Existing architecture could not support concurrent real-time sessions without state inconsistencies.
Approach
Rebuilt the client around an event-driven architecture with a dedicated real-time layer. Location updates, trip state transitions, and payment triggers were decoupled into isolated modules with explicit state machines governing each trip lifecycle phase.
Engineering Decisions
01
WebSocket connection pooling with fallback
Primary real-time channel via WebSockets with automatic degradation to polling during connection instability. Reconnection logic preserved trip context without user-visible resets.
02
GPS update throttling pipeline
Location broadcasts throttled and batched based on speed and proximity thresholds, reducing server load while maintaining map accuracy within acceptable bounds.
03
Trip-state machine with idempotent payments
Every trip phase modeled as a finite state machine. Payment initiation gated on confirmed trip completion with idempotent retry logic to prevent duplicate charges.
Outcome
Delivered a production mobility platform handling concurrent real-time sessions with consistent trip state across clients. Payment flows operated reliably at scale, and the modular architecture enabled rapid feature iteration without destabilizing core tracking infrastructure.
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