Since my previous post, I changed my project choices and am now working on one the industry projects. The instructor had sent out an email highlighting the project and I thought that this would be a great opportunity to actually tackle a real-world problem. I reasoned that I could always learn technologies on my own but this was the first opportunity in this degree program to actually communicate with external stakeholders and gain experience in the software development process.
I ended up choosing the industry project on creating an emergency response mobile app for the fire department in the Dominican Republic. I am working with one other partner and we have been collaborating with a volunteer firefighter in the department to define the project requirements. Our sponsor is planning on using this app on Android tablets that will be in every fire truck. One major factor we considered when designing the app was that the targeted users have limited experience with technology. The current process is all manual and hand-written so it will be a big change for the department to switch over to digital. The users will also be busy responding to emergencies so it is important that the app is very user-friendly and can be navigated quickly. We will be using Google’s Map SDK for Android for the map features and Google’s Firebase for the backend. We chose these technologies because they are no cost at our usage level and have plenty of documentation.
Overall, the design process will happen throughout the quarter as this is a new project for our sponsor and they are still figuring out what the needs of the app are. With any design choices, it’s important that we remember our user base and ensure that they can effectively use the app.
