BMOBI

bMobi for Android is a senior project of Information Systems Engineering seniors Sinan Deniz, Ilkin Artuc and Zekeriya Demir.

History

bMobi for Android is developed by being inspired from iPhone's bMobi application for Binghamton University. bMobi application is first released by Blackboard for iPhone user in Binghamton University. Then Blackberry version of the application is released. In late 2010, the Blackboard released the first version of bMobi for Android for Binghamton University. In this version only limited number of applications are presented to the users:

• DIRECTORY
• ATHLETICS
• COURSES
• MAPS
• NEWS

bMobi for Android

bMobi for Android is an application that gives an access to Binghamton University information you want. The application user will be able to;

• Find contact information
• Access to Athletics
• Look for Events
• Read about the News
• Look for Courses
• See the Daily Photo
• Watch Binghamton University videos on YouTube
• Access to Blackboard at Binghamton University

bMobi for Android has 8 main features that will help Android users to access any Binghamton University information they want. These 8 main categories are;

• DIRECTORY
• ATHLETICS
• EVENTS
• NEWS
• COURSES
• IMAGES
• VIDEOS
• BLACKBOARD @BU

bMobi for Android Features

DIRECTORY

bMobi for Android helps Android users to find any contact information about Binghamton University faculty, staff and students. Using the related search results the user is able to send an email to any contact. The DIRECTORY application includes 3 main screens;

• Search Interface
• Search Results
• Result Details

Search Interface

• This screen is the main screen that comes up when the DIRECTORY application is opened.
• It includes two EditText controls and a Button control that will enable the users to make a search.
• In the first EditText control which is under the "First Name" label the user will enter the first name of the contact that he/she looks for.
• In the second EditText control which is under the "Last Name" label the user will enter the last name of the contact that he/she looks for.
• After the EditText controls are filled the user should click on the "Search the Directory" button to start the search process.

Search Results

• This screen is related with showing the search results.
• The search results, if exist any, are shown in this screen.
• ListView control is used while presenting the search results to the user.

Result Details

• This screen is related with the detailed information for the contact that is chosen from the Search Results interface.
• If the search result is a faculty member/staff;

     - Name 
     - Directory Number
     - Title
     - Location
     - Department Name
     - Email

information of the faculty member/staff is shown on the screen.

• If the search result is a student;

     - Name 
     - Email

information of the student is shown on the screen.

• If the user wants to send an email to any of the contacts, the user just need to click on the email address of the desired contact and he/she will be directed to the "Send Email" screen and will be able to send an email to this person.

ATHLETICS

bMobi for Android enables Android user to access Binghamton University Athletics. The users are able to read sports news both for men' and women' teams, access schedules, and see late-breaking news. The ATHLETICS application includes the following main screens;

• Athletics Screen
• Men and Women Categories
• News and Scores
• Schedules

Athletics Screen

• This screen is the main screen that comes up when the ATHLETICS application is started.
• It has three main categories, listed on ListView control, named;

   - Men
   - Women
   - Schedules

Men and Women Categories

• Since the Men and Women categories are similar, I will explain only Men category.
• When the user clicks on Men category, the related activity is run and Men' sports categories are shown;

   - Baseball
   - Basketball
   - Cross Country
   - Golf
   - Lacrosse
   - Soccer
   - Swimming and Diving
   - Tennis
   - Track and Field
   - Wrestling

News and Scores

• After the user clicks on Men, the related sports categories are shown as explained above.
• If the user wants to read news or view the scores about Men's Basketball team, the user need to clicks on Basketball part.
• After click on Basketball part, two related parts are listed, named;

   - News
   - Scores

• If the user wants to read news about Men's Basketball team, the user needs to click on News part, and news headers related to Men's basketball

team is listed on ListView control. If the user clicks on one of the news header, the news related with this header is viewed on WebView control.

• Similarly, if the user wants to view scores about Men's Basketball team, the user needs to click on Scores part, and score headers related to Men's basketball team is listed on ListView control. If the user clicks on one of the score header, the score news related with this header is viewed on WebView control.

Schedules

• If the user wants to view schedules of Binghamton University sports' team, the user needs to click on the Schedule part on the main screen.
• After the click, sports' team name and date are shown on the header on the next activity.
• Once the user clicks on specific team, the related information about the game is shown on the next activity, including;

    - Team Name      - Visitor
    - Title          - Home Visitor
    - Date           - Location
    - Home

EVENTS

bMobi for Android enables Android users to find detailed information about all campus events, and gives user an opportunity to bookmark selected events to their Android devices for an easy late retrieval. The EVENTS application includes the following screens;

• Events Categories and Bookmarks Screen
• Bookmarks
• Event Details

Event Categories ans Bookmarks

• This is the main screen when the EVENTS application is started.
• It listed all events that will take place in the campus in specific categories;

  - All Events                        - Conferences
  - Courses / Workshops               - Career Events
  - On Stage                          - Speakers
  - General Events                    - Films

• In addition to event categories, at the bottom there is a "Bookmarks" button which directs user to the bookmarked events for an easy retrieval.

Event Details

• When the user selects one of the specified event categories, the related events with this category is shown on the next activity.
• Related event categories is grouped according to their dates and times.
• Each related event is shown on ListView control with its Event Header, Time, Date, and Location.
• When the user click on a specified event, the detailed information about it is shown on the next activity, including the following information about the event;

  - Description
  - Time
  - Location
  - Link to a web page

• When the user clicks on the link, the whole description of the event is shown in the WebView control.

Bookmarks

• When the "Bookmarks" button is clicked on the main screen of the EVENTS application, the bookmarked events will show up.
• The user is able to add events to the bookmark section by click on the yellow star which is placed in every Event Header.
• The user is also able to delete events from the bookmark section by uncheck the yellow star which is placed in every Event Header.

NEWS

bMobi for Android enables Android users to read latest news,magazine articles,and alerts published by Binghamton University. The NEWS application includes the following features in it;

  - News Headers
  - News Details
  - Bookmarks

News Headers

• This is the main screen when the NEWS application is started.
• It includes main news categories provided by Binghamton University which includes;

  - B-Line
  - Inside BU
  - News Releases
  - Ask A Scientist
  - Discover-E

• In addition to news categories, there is a "Bookmarks" button at the bottom of the page which on its click method starts a new activity which includes bookmarked news.

News Details

• When the user clicks on one of the specified news categories, the related news with this category is shown on the next activity.
• The news are presented with its new's header and a star on each ListView.
• When the click on the new's header the complete description about the web page is shown on a WebView.
• If the user wants to wants to add a specific news to his/her bookmarks the user just need to click on the yellow star located within each news header.

Bookmarks

• If the user want to see his/her bookmarks, he/she needs to click on the "Bookmarks" button which is located in the main screen.
• After click on this button, the user will be able to see its bookmarked news and easily access its detailed description by just click on it.
• If the user wants to delete bookmarked news from bookmarks section, he/she just need to uncheck the yellow button related with this news.

COURSES

bMobi for Android enables Android users to look through Binghamton University courses. Using the COURSES application users can select terms, undergraduate and graduate studies, faculties, according to the courses given, they are able to read;

  - Course Name
  - Course Description
  - Course Times
  - Course Location

Select Term

• The first screen that comes up with the COURSES application is started is SELECT TERM screen.
• The current available terms are Fall 2001 and Spring 2011.

Selected Term Courses

• When the users select one of the terms, the undergraduate and graduate faculties are listed on the next activity.
• If the user clicks on, for example, UG Watson Courses, list of undergraduate department are listed as ; EECE, ME, WTSN, ISE, CS, BE.
• If the user clicks on CS courses, list of CS courses are listed on the next activity.
• If the user clicks on, lets say CS 431 course, list o information are listed on the next activity, including;

   - In which term the course is given
   - Course Name
   - Course Description
   - Course Building / Room
   - Course Section
   - Course Time

VIDEOS

bMobi for Android enables Android users to surf, view and watch latest Binghamton University videos on its channel on YouTube. There are 2 main screens on BU on YouTube application;

     - BU Videos on YouTube
     - BU Video Description

BU Videos on YouTube

• This is the main activity of the BU on YouTube application. When the activity starts, the list of Binghamton University videos on YouTube is shown on the ListView control with their corresponding thumbnails and headers.

'BU Video Description'

• When a specific video is selected from list of Binghamton University videos, the description of the video and its thumbnail are shown in the next activity.
• Above the thumbnail, there is a button, named "Watch Video", which directs the user to the Binghamton University channel on YouTube and allows user to watch the video.

IMAGES

bMobi for Android enables Android users to check out the daily photo or browse pictures of diverse aspect of university. There 2 main screens on IMAGES application;

    - Images Main Screen
    - Image Detail

Images Main Screen

• This is the main acitivity of the IMAGES application. When the activity starts, list of Binghamton University photos are shown on the ListView control with their corresponding thumbnails and headers/

Image Detail

• When a specific photo is selected from list of Binghamton University photos, the description of the photo and its thumbnail are shown in the next activity.

Blackboard @ BU

bMobi for Android enables Android users to access directly Blackboard at Binghamton University. Instead of open a browser, and write down the link to the search bar of the browser, the users are able to directly gain access to Blackboard @BU by just clicking the Blackboard application.

Technical Documentation of the bMobi for Android Project

Android Development Environment 2.2, Eclipse Classic 3.6.2 and the latest version of Java JDK is required. Minimum configuration of development environment PC’s:

• Minimum processors requirement: 1 gigahertz (GHz) processor
• Minimum memory requirement: 256 MB RAM
• 2 GB of available hard disk space required
• Windows XP or higher operating system, Linux will be better.

DIRECTORIES part Technical Documentation

• Package name: com.android.directory
• Classes:
• updatedDirectory.java
• MyXMLHandler.java
• XMLParsing.java
• People.java
• FacultyStaffDetail.java
• FacultyStaffXMLHandler.java
• FacultyStaffXMLParsing.java
• StudentDetail.java
• StudentXMLHandler.java
• StudentXMLParsing.java

Explanation of the Classes

• updatedDirectory.java

This class is the main activity of the Directories part. It has two EditText controls and a Button control in it and enable user to enter the first name and the last name of the looking contact and send this names to the next activity, which is XMLParsing.java, which sends an URL request that includes first and the last name of the searching contact.

• People.java

This class defines a getter and setter methods for the related XML tag variables. 3 ArrayList variables in type String are defined, which are ID, FIRST_NAME, LAST_NAME, with their getter and setter methods.

• MyXMLHandler.java

This class is used for handling XML tags. The class extends DefaultHandler in order to handle XML tags. The methods startElement(), endElement(),and characters() methods are overridden in order to define my startelement tag, endelemenet tag, and get characters in form of the XML database that I'm going to access.

• XMLParsing.java

This class is used for handling XML, send URL to parse XML tags, and create handler to handle XML tags. In addition to that, this class gets results from MyXMLHandler PeopleList object and set the result to the ListView control. If the result includes "(Faculty/Staff)" string , then the new Intent object is created and FacultyStaffXMLParsing.java class activity is started, but if the result includes "(Student)" string, then the new Intent object is created and StudentXMLParsing.java class activity is started.

• StudentDetail.java

This class defines a getter and setter methods for the related XML tag variables. 2 ArrayList variables in type String are defined, which are NAME,and EMAIL with their getter and setter methods.

• StudentXMLHandler.java

This class is used for handling XML tags. The class extends DefaultHandler in order to handle XML tags. The methods startElement(), endElement(),and characters() methods are overridden in order to define my startelement tag, endelemenet tag, and get characters in form of the XML database that I'm going to access.

• StudentXMLParsing.java

This class is used for handling XML, send URL to parse XML tags, and create handler to handle XML tags. In addition to that, this class gets results from StudentXMLHandler StudentDetail object and set the result to the ListView control and TextView control.

• FacultyStaffDetail.java

This class defines a getter and setter methods for the related XML tag variables. 6 ArrayList variables in type String are defined, which are NAME, DIRECTORY_NUMBER, EMAIL, TITLE, LOCATION, and DEPT_NAME with their getter and setter methods.

• FacultyStaffXMLHandler.java

This class is used for handling XML tags. The class extends DefaultHandler in order to handle XML tags. The methods startElement(), endElement(),and characters() methods are overridden in order to define my startelement tag, endelemenet tag, and get characters in form of the XML database that I'm going to access.

• FacultyStaffXMLParsing.java

This class is used for handling XML, send URL to parse XML tags, and create handler to handle XML tags. In addition to that, this class gets results from FacultyStaffXMLHandler FacultyStaffDetail object and set the result to the ListView controls and TextView control.

ATHLETICS part Technical Documentation

• Package name: com.android.athletics
• Class names:
  • a