Chapter 4

How to Create a Building Inspection App in One Hour

Whether you work in commercial or residential construction, inspections are crucial in your line of work. Inspections, however, take time away from the important renovation or construction work you do. For many businesses, you can’t even bill for time spent on this work.

Are you ready to go mobile? Today, you don’t need any coding or technological expertise to create a building inspection app. You can start create a mobile app today for free. Or, send us your form and we’ll convert your first form free!

Want to build your own inspection? Follow these steps:

 

Find a Form You Want to Convert

When going from paper to mobile, we suggest starting with only a few forms first, and working your way to a paperless office.

Log in or Sign up for GoCanvas

If you have an account, sign in. If not, you can create a free trial account here.

Build Your Building Inspection App

1. In the Apps Tab click on Create App.
2. Now, select a template, in this case I am choosing blank.
3. Click Start to launch the App Builder.
4. In the App Builder, you’ll be prompted to add the first screen. Select + Add screen then name it, “Building Condition”.
5. Add the first field. Drag a Short Text field into the center screen from the left hand palette. Name the field ‘Name of School District’.
6. Drag a number field into the center screen from the right hand palette. Name the field, ‘SED District Number’.
7. Repeat Step 5 for all fields asking for text. Repeat Step 6 for all fields asking for numbers.
8. Drag a Static Text Box into the center of the screen. Write ‘Building Ownership (check one)’.
9. Drag a Checkbox into the center screen. Next to Label write, ‘Owned and Used by District’.
10. Repeat Step 9 for these checkboxes:

• Owned by district and leased to non-district entity
• Owned by district, part used by district, part leased to non-di strict entity
• Owned by non-district entity and leased to district

11. Name your app, I’m going to name it “2018 Building Condition Survey”.

 

Save and Publish Your App

At the top of the App Builder page, click Save. After saving hit Publish to Device. Hit Next and then Publish.

 

Start GoCanvas on Your Mobile Device

To use the app, simply open GoCanvas on your phone or tablet and login.
Fill Out the Building Inspection App On Your Device
Fill out “2018 Building Condition Survey” on your device and upload your filled out survey.

 

View your Data Online

If you logged out of the GoCanvas website, log in again and click on the Submissions tab. You will find the data you just filled out on your mobile device. You can now view it online, download it as a PDF, export it as a CSV/Excel file, or integrate it into a backend system.

At GoCanvas, you can also customize your PDFs to include your logo, unique layouts, as well as page breaks and many more options as well.

Hopefully this showed you how easy it is with GoCanvas to go paperless. All of the apps created with GoCanvas work across all of the devices we support, which include Android, Windows Mobile, and iOS.

We understand making the switch to mobile apps isn’t something that happens overnight. That’s why we give a free trial to all our subscribers. Test out how mobile apps work for your business. If you have any issues, our team is here to help. With GoCanvas mobile apps, do business your way.