Doro Bet

Inspiration

The idea for Doro Bet came from my dad.

He has a small poultry farm, and because I have watched him manage it, I have seen some of the struggles that come with running a farm. Keeping track of chickens, feed, expenses, sales, and other farm activities can become confusing, especially when everything is written down or remembered manually.

At first, I didn't think of it as a software problem. I just saw my dad struggling with the day-to-day work. But as a software engineering student, I started thinking, “Can I actually build something that could make this easier for him?”

That question became the starting point for Doro Bet.

What it does

Doro Bet is a mobile poultry farm management app designed especially for small-scale farmers. It brings essential farm activities into one place, helping farmers manage chicken batches, feed, expenses, sales, customers, and suppliers.

The app provides a simple dashboard for quickly viewing important farm information, while English and Amharic support makes it more accessible to local users.

Built with Flutter and Supabase, Doro Bet replaces scattered paper records with an organized digital system, helping farmers save time, keep better records, and make more informed decisions.

How we built it

I decided to build Doro Bet as a mobile application using Flutter. I used Supabase for the backend and database so that farm information could be stored and managed digitally.

I tried to build the app around the things a small poultry farmer actually needs rather than adding features just for the sake of having them. The goal was to have important farm information in one place and make it easier to keep track of what is happening on the farm.

I also added English and Amharic support because I wanted the app to be useful to people who may be more comfortable using Amharic.

Challenges we ran into

Building the app was definitely not as straightforward as I expected.

I ran into problems with Flutter, Supabase, database connections, authentication, security policies, localization, dependencies, and eventually deployment. There were times when the app would run perfectly but still fail to get data from the database, which was honestly frustrating.

But those problems forced me to stop just trying random fixes and actually understand what was happening between my app, the backend, and the database.

Every problem I solved gave me a better understanding of how real applications are built.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

One of the biggest things I'm proud of is that Doro Bet started from a real problem I saw in my own family and turned into a working application.

I didn't just build a project to practice Flutter. I built something with my dad's small poultry farm in mind and tried to understand what would actually be useful for him.

I'm also proud that I was able to build the project from the ground up, including the mobile interface, database, authentication, security policies, localization, and backend integration with Supabase.

Getting the Flutter application to communicate properly with the database was one of the most challenging parts of the project. There were many times when things didn't work as expected, but I kept debugging and learning until I could get the different parts working together.

Another accomplishment I'm proud of is adding English and Amharic support. I wanted Doro Bet to feel like a tool that could actually be useful in my community, rather than just a technical demonstration.

Most importantly, I'm proud that this project helped me move from simply learning software engineering concepts to actually using them to solve a problem that matters to me.

What we learned

The biggest thing I learned from this project is that building software is not just about writing code.

You first need to understand the person who has the problem.

Because I was building Doro Bet with my dad's experience in mind, I started thinking more about whether a feature would actually make his work easier instead of simply asking whether I could code it.

Technically, I learned a lot about Flutter, Dart, Supabase, PostgreSQL, authentication, Row Level Security, localization, Git/GitHub, and deployment.

I also learned how important patience is when building something from scratch. Not everything worked the first time, and sometimes solving one problem created another. But each challenge helped me become a better developer.

What's next for Doro Bet

I want to keep improving it and eventually get more feedback from real poultry farmers. There are still many things I would like to add, including better reports, useful farm insights, notifications, and other features that can help farmers make better decisions.

For me, Doro Bet is more than just a project for a hackathon. It started with watching my dad struggle with something in his everyday life, and I wanted to see if I could use what I'm learning as a software engineering student to help.

If Doro Bet can make managing even one small poultry farm a little easier, then it is already doing what I built it to do.

Built With

• android
• dart
• figma
• flutter
• git
• postgresql
• row-level-security-(rls)
• supabase
• supabase-auth