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I reverse engineered McDonalds’ internal API

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Re: I reverse engineered McDonalds’ internal API

#171

Post by dcolkitt »

shadowgovt wrote: post #145
Dylan16807 wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Four to five hours, so let's say that happens daily and machines are out of commission 20% of the time. Currently it's early afternoon and the site says that over 8% are out. That's about halfway between "all overnight" and "all at completely random times". Are almost half of the clocks set wrong? Assuming that the actual number of broken machines is relatively small.

I'd be willing to wager that half the clocks might be wrong. It's something manager-on-duty can control, so Murphy's Law kicks in.

A standalone GPS NTP server is $750 retail. Commercial soft serve ice cream machines are at least $4000. Just building the machines with an autonomous GPS clock that doesn't need to be set, would double the revenue but only increase the upfront cost by 18%.

Re: I reverse engineered McDonalds’ internal API

#172

Post by ehsankia »

nrmitchi wrote: post #144
ehsankia wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At first I was gonna ask why does this not run on off hours, but then you mention bad clock, so the next question is, why is the % of bad clock so high, and why isn't the clock also cloud based or set in a way that can go wrong. Next up, what about redundancy, do stores only have one machine?

> Next up, what about redundancy, do stores only have one machine? From my (old) experience working at one, yes. The annoyance of having to maintain a second machine (especially when cleaning and maintenance involved a physical person cleaning things) was not worth keeping extra 9's of uptime.

Well again, looking at the graph, I'm seeing 10-20% down time, so it's not "just an extra 9"

Re: I reverse engineered McDonalds’ internal API

#173

Post by InitialLastName »

eli wrote: post #92
userbinator wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But why "broken" instead of "down for scheduled maintenance"? The latter implies continuance of service, the former leaves that open.

"down for scheduled maintenance" is phrase that's very common in the tech world but sounds weird in a restaurant.

Given the "entitled customer" incidents I've experienced, seen, and heard about, "scheduled maintenance" sounds intentional and like something "you shouldn't be doing when I want my ice cream", where "broken" sounds like something the guy behind the counter can't help.

I'd be willing to bet that "broken" is just less likely to start a fight with an enraged customer whose day was very slightly inconvenienced by their inability to consume extra junk food.

Re: I reverse engineered McDonalds’ internal API

#174

Post by monoideism »

markstos wrote: post #110

I ran the McBroken data through the Spatial Equity Data tool. It found McDonalds are slightly overrepresented in white areas while locations with broken ice cream machines skew Black and low-income. https://twitter.com/MarkStosberg/status/1319363954385297411

If you're implying that McDonald's is somehow racist for failing to maintain ice cream machines in black areas, recall that it's mostly local staff who are responsible for that.

Re: I reverse engineered McDonalds’ internal API

#175

Post by briefcomment »

et-al wrote: post #88
briefcomment wrote: post #23

This site is so clean. If the creator sees this, or if anyone else has the knowledge or pointers, I would like to know how to create a basic one page site with a map interface just like this one. I have zero programming experience for reference.

The most basic version of this would be an Google Maps embed, but you'll quickly run into styling and interaction limitations. Not the author, but McBroken looks to be built with Mapbox's Javascript library, so you'll need to break out a text editor. They have some good starter docs here: https://docs.mapbox.com/mapbox-gl-js/example/simple-map/ You can learn a lot by signing up for an API key from Mapbox and tweaking…

Thank you. Do you think the side panels (especially the dynamic one on the left) are a part of the Mapbox interface, or something separate?

Re: I reverse engineered McDonalds’ internal API

#176

Post by msandford »

ehsankia wrote: post #172
nrmitchi wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Next up, what about redundancy, do stores only have one machine? From my (old) experience working at one, yes. The annoyance of having to maintain a second machine (especially when cleaning and maintenance involved a physical person cleaning things) was not worth keeping extra 9's of uptime.

Well again, looking at the graph, I'm seeing 10-20% down time, so it's not "just an extra 9"

I think you might find that in a certain way it is. 90% to 99% is an extra nine.

/ducks

Re: I reverse engineered McDonalds’ internal API

#177

Post by ezconnect »

thisisnico wrote: post #129
ehsankia wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At first I was gonna ask why does this not run on off hours, but then you mention bad clock, so the next question is, why is the % of bad clock so high, and why isn't the clock also cloud based or set in a way that can go wrong. Next up, what about redundancy, do stores only have one machine?

Cloud based clock. Don't you mean NTP? We've had this technology for years! If it's connected to the internet, it's a pretty fundamental piece of pretty much any networked OS. You can ensure correct time this way.

GPS based clock is better no need for internet connection. Seiko and other company has been doing this for years.

Re: I reverse engineered McDonalds’ internal API

#178

Post by gonehome »

d23 wrote: post #155
joezydeco wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here's some detail, as someone that has worked with those machines before (internally and externally). In the good old days the soft serve and shake machines were taken apart every night and every piece was washed and bleach-sanitized by hand. Then it was reassembled in the morning. This would leave a lot of room for error and possible contamination in the process. And the sight of a shake machine hitting full pressu…

Since you and the OP are here, I have a random question: were the blizzards ever made with liquid plastic ingredients? It probably sounds insane, but someone from a plastics company spoke at my high school and said this was the case since it was easier to ship and needed no refrigeration. Now, decades later, I'm wondering if this was just complete nonsense or had an element of truth to it. I've been able to find noth…

Maybe you mean McFlurry (Blizzards were Dairy Queen). Basically the same thing, but not sure if whoever said that was specifically talking about Blizzards.

Re: I reverse engineered McDonalds’ internal API

#179

Post by K0balt »

dcolkitt wrote: post #171
shadowgovt wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd be willing to wager that half the clocks might be wrong. It's something manager-on-duty can control, so Murphy's Law kicks in.

A standalone GPS NTP server is $750 retail. Commercial soft serve ice cream machines are at least $4000. Just building the machines with an autonomous GPS clock that doesn't need to be set, would double the revenue but only increase the upfront cost by 18%.

If it was being integrated, the cost would be more like 5 dollars, since the ntp unit could just be an esp8266 chip that connects to the store wifi to sync the time.

Re: I reverse engineered McDonalds’ internal API

#180

Post by ada1981 »

macd wrote: post #116
duxup wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suppose ice cream isn't high on the list of services they feel they need up and running all the time, but if the machine is determining this I would think there would be some level of predictability that would allow them to schedule sanitizing and etc. It's funny that the machine tells them there's no ice cream. I visited my local library for a tour. They have an automated system that collects returned books, sorts…

There's a great short story called Manna that builds on this idea: https://marshallbrain.com/manna1

This is such a great short story!
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