Idea For a New UCLA Mobile App

I am proposing an idea for a mobile app that will promote UCLA’s GIS program and offer students a chance to gain some highly marketable skills. This mobile app will be unlike any other ever created for UCLA. On the application’s most basic level, it will help students, faculty and guests find where they are going. The app will then incorporate a community editing aspect that allows the student body and university to participate by tagging events right onto the map. Developing this app will require collaboration between Computer Science and GIS students as well as some professors willing to volunteer their time and expertise.

Web/mobile technology is one of the largest trends in not only GIS but in the world. The students who build this app will gain real world experience and set themselves up for a job right after college. This would be an incredible opportunity for some motivated individuals to rise above and beyond the rest of the pack.

What Map Phone Apps Currently Exist for UCLA?

I conducted a Google search to see what location based apps for Android and iPhone exist for UCLA. I found two apps and tested them out on my handset. “UCLA Pinpoint” is an app that uses the google basemap API; however, instead of calculating the shortest route between buildings, it simply draws a straight line from Point A to Point B. This is not very helpful, good luck walking through walls!

The other app is “UCLA Mobile”, UCLA’s main app for the campus. The app features several modules that include News, Happenings Calendar, Directory, Map, BruinBus and more. The Map tab takes you to a window which allows you to “Search for Location” or “Browse Locations”. The app uses UCLA’s Interactive Map as the basemap. There is a nifty feature which allows you to ask for walking, biking or driving directions. However, when I asked for walking directions from Royce Hall to the Bruin Bear, it sent me on an epic 1,962 mile journey starting in Platteville, WI. The BruinBus tab provides students with real time estimates of next bus arrival time as well as shows bus routes on the map.

With current GIS technology, we have an opportunity to do SO MUCH BETTER. 

What Will the Proposed App Do and How Will You Build It?

This app will be a mashup, meaning that it will dynamically combine content or functions from multiple sources.

Not only could this app succeed at providing the shortest route between buildings, but it could take you right to your classroom doorstep. If you have ever tried to find your class in Math Sciences, then you know how useful this would be (hint: you enter this labyrinth on the 5^th floor).  Esri has already created a customizable app called Campus Place Finder (ArcGIS 10.1). The student development team would need to download this app’s JavaScript source code and configure it for UCLA’s campus. The development team would need to gain access to the facilities management GIS data. 

What if you could sync up the class schedule to the map? You would know what class was happening in every room at any given moment. No more walking into the wrong classroom!

The coolest part of the map would involve the community editing aspect. If you get the Den Sports Club involved, they could update all sports events. Student associations and governing bodies such as ASUCLA, SAA, SEC and USAC could provide campus event updates. The hundreds of clubs on campus could tag their events right onto the map. Imagine walking through campus and being able to see what is going on all over campus at that moment.

Have BruinAlerts be geotagged. Did a lab in Engineering IV just go up in flames or was there a robbery in John Wooden Center? These pieces of security information are location based and should be on a public map right when they occur.

Get social media involved (youtube, twitter, facebook) – did a fantastic dancing flash mob wedding proposal just occur in the middle of Bruin Plaza? Tag the video right onto the map in the very spot where it happened!

As for the app’s basemap, I digitized UCLA’s campus to integrate into the Esri World Topographic Basemap. Since I am not the authoritative data holder for UCLA, my contribution to the Esri basemap should be swapped out with official UCLA GIS data. This will require the UCLA GIS program to participate in Esri’s Community Maps Program. Over 80 college campuses have already taken advantage of this program and allowed Esri to host their basemap for them. Click on  this link to get info on how to participate in the Community Maps Program.

Another important resource to develop this app is the Mobile Web Framework (MWF) initiative, a group at UCLA dedicated to mobile development. They have biweekly developer meetings at UCLA and their expertise may prove to be integral in the development of this app. MWF collaborated with UCLA to develop “UCLA Mobile”.

        One of the first steps to developing this app would be to create something called a "wireframe" using a website such as www.balsamiq.com.  A "wireframe" is a concept design mockup, it can be used to pitch the app as well as communicate basic design requirements. 

Spreading the Word & Growing the GIS Program

A great way to market the app would be to have a student present the application during freshman orientation to each group that comes through and make the app downloadable straight from www.UCLA.edu. Placing QR codes around campus that link to the app download would generate a public conversation. Have students blog about the app, have the Daily Bruin cover it, do a press release to local TV stations. Say that people in the GIS Program did it!

QR Code

This app would showcase the possibilities of GIS and get people excited about the joining the program. While UCLA is primarily a research institute, it would be beneficial to the university to cultivate a more practical hands-on approach to the GIS Program. The theoretical overload and outdated lab tutorials that were presented to me in “Geography 7: Intro to GIS” almost made me quit GIS altogether. If the Geography department can re-brand the GIS program as forward-thinking and tech-savvy, the university will not only see more cutting edge research being performed, but it will see more students getting jobs. My suggestion to the UCLA Geography Department is that they add “Development for Web/Mobile GIS” to the curriculum. The app development could even be a big class project for a Web/mobile GIS class. Do this and people will be flocking to Geography/GIS major, it will grow faster than the department ever imagined. People will figure out that GIS is a valuable discipline and YES you can get a job! Web/mobile GIS is the wave of the future, hop on board people!



If you are a UCLA student, Faculty Member, Professor or Esri employee interested in helping develop this app, please e-mail me at kelsey.ck@ucla.edu and I will bring you into the loop!