Six FHU Students Design iPhone App

Soon an application developed by Freed-Hardeman University computer science majors will be available from the iTunes App Store. The six students collaborated with IT Web Services to produce FHU’s first native iPhone application.

Michael Jenkins, a May 2011 graduate, was the student project manager. The other members of the team were Caleb Hutson, Cameron Czerwonka, Trevor Robertson, James Allen, and Jeff Boyd. All six were enrolled in Dr. Kenan Casey’s Advanced Topics in Computer Science course. Michael Plyler, university webmaster, was the project manager.

The goal was to create an app that would provide useful information to prospective and current students, faculty, and staff, according to Jenkins. Prospects will be able to view information about the university and contact FHU through the app. Current students will have access to information from many campus social feeds, a calendar of events, faculty and building directory, and a campus map.

Coding the app for the iPhone was the most difficult task, Jenkins said. Written in Objective-C, it called for students to master a language they had never used before. They faced what Jenkins called “a huge learning curve.” “Something we all learned was that it is actually very difficult to code some of the things that are so easy to use on the iPhone,” he said.

The project is now in its final stages of refinement and testing. Mid- to late summer is the target time for it to be available in the iTunes App Store.

Jenkins called the project “a major challenge,” but in the end, he concluded, “it was very rewarding.” “Overall,” he said, “I could not imagine a better way to spend our time in our last computer science class than to actually be making something that will be used by many people at the university.”