Developing Mobile ACU

What does it take to develop such an iPhone application in house? In ACU's case, Langford and his team did all the programming work, beginning last October and finishing up in August. Because ACU's website is a large part of the Mobile ACU app, many tweaks and enhancements to the site carry over to Mobile ACU. So the application constantly gains additions and improvements, Langford says. And since the team wasn't creating an entirely new native app to run on the iPhone--it was largely optimizing the university's existing website for a mobile device--development was relatively painless.

Along the way, Roberts, Langford and the ACU team drummed up quite a bit of publicity from bloggers and gadget websites for being the first university to distribute iPhones to its students and faculty.

ACU My Mobile Account Balances

The Web-based Mobile ACU application was developed initially using Apple's Dashcode on the front end, Langford says--and it's accessed by physically typing m.acu.edu into the iPhone's Safari browser. Users can easily create a home page shortcut, though, via Safari. (Tip for iPhone users: iPhone shortcuts are created by clicking the + sign in the bottom Safari dock and selecting Add to Home Screen.)

The application also integrates with various Google services, including Google mail, calendar and apps, as well as a document management and collaboration system from Xythos. (Langford says ACU became one of the first four U.S. universities to deploy Google Web services campus-wide in April 2007, meaning the university now uses Google Apps, Gmail and Calendar as its sole document, Web-mail and calendar offerings.)

Though Langford and his team did the vast majority of programming, ACU alumni Chad Martin, a designer with WebFireCracker.com, did the Mobile ACU interface work.

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