Ever wanted to learn how to create an application for a smartphone? Well, there will soon be a class for that.
This spring, the Department of Computer and Information Science will offer for the first time a course that is tailored to teach students with minimal to no computer science experience how to create innovative smartphone applications for Android phones.
Stephen Fickas, the computer and information science professor who will be teaching the course, said the four-credit elective course — one of only a few smartphone classes that are being offered by universities nationwide — will be open to any University student regardless of major. Fickas said the classes will have a enrollment cap of 20 students due to the limited availability of 25 Android phones, which were donated by University alumnus Isaac Babbs and Qualcomm Service Labs, Inc., a subsidiary of California-based wireless technology and service provider Qualcomm, Inc.
“I’m extremely excited to get this program off the ground,” said Babbs, the vice president and general manager of Qualcomm Service Labs, Inc. “I think it’s great for the University of Oregon. I think it’s also great for the students and faculty to have a software development program where students are learning the tools that they can go and get jobs on in today’s market.”
Fickas said the class will use Android phones (instead of Apple’s iPhone) to develop smartphone applications because of the Android’s open application development features, which allow anyone to create downloadable applications that can range from simple to sophisticated programs.
“These days, you don’t have to have a computer science degree or know how to program or have a best friend that is a programmer that will build it for you,” Fickas said. “You can do some pretty cool things on your own if you learn how to use an app inventor.”
Although Fickas said the class isn’t necessarily geared toward creating high-tech applications that would be found in Apple’s iTunes or Apps store, he said students will learn to create applications that are tailored to their individual needs or interests.
“I think there’s a lot of cool ideas out there, and I’m not sure if computer scientists should be the only ones building the apps,” Fickas said. “I like the idea of giving the masses the ability to build their own apps, so the idea is to let them get their ideas onto the phone and not have to funnel everything to computer scientists or programmers.”
A social calendar that searches through events corresponding with given dates and times, and a text message service that automatically sends out uniform away messages to people when a person steps into a car are among several applications already created by Fickas’ students. In addition, Babbs said the skills that students learn will also make them more marketable to?potential employers.
“I’ve always been interested in ways I can work with top-tier universities to get the right tools that the industry is using today, so that when students graduate we can hire them and they can start working in that industry,” Babbs said. “Since I graduated from the University of Oregon, I was very motivated to get something started at the University, where we’re teaching students the tools that people are looking for when they hire people, such as smartphone development.”
The Department of Computer and Information Science has not been the only school on campus to create mobile applications. Last term, the University’s InfoGraphics Lab created a free official University of Oregon iPhone application that provides users with the latest news and campus events, class schedules, campus directory, photos and videos, a guide to the Week of Welcome, and the Oregon Marching Band playing “Mighty Oregon.” In addition, the application’s mobile mapping technology allows users to map out bike and parking routes, and its GPS feature allows users to locate their exact position on campus. Ken Kato, the assistant?director of the InfoGraphics Lab, said the responses have been largely positive.
So far, Kato said the application has been featured in ArcUser Magazine and has been downloaded by nearly 12,000 people from Apple’s App Store.
The lab has also created applications for field studies and surveys. However, despite the technological advances in mobile mapping, Kato said the new technology won’t replace older procedures and methods.
“I don’t know if I would be so bold as to say that it’s the way of the future, but it’s a way of the future,” Kato said.
“What’s going to be dealt with in the future is a hard one to pin down. After hearing everyone’s critiques and feedback, I will say that there’s a strong place for it, but I don’t think it’s going to replace other kinds. There’s definitely the potential for cost savings there for people taking surveys, but the cost associated with conducting research and providing respondents with that type of technology would be expensive.”