mdandy / oftentimes2000

Location based public service announcement

MaVeN

Table of Contents

• Team Members
• Project Description
• User Archetype and Use Cases
• Shortcomings of the Current Solution
• Technologies
• References
• Compilation Notes

Team Members

• Michael Dandy - [email protected]
• Jonathan Edwards - [email protected]
• Kevin Johnstone - [email protected]
• Josh Zeder - [email protected]

Project Description

Oftentimes it’s difficult for local businesses to get the word out about their business if they are constantly overshadowed by larger, more international companies. Since many of these local businesses cannot fork over the funds to purchase advertising on billboards or pages in a magazine/newspaper, a simpler and cost-effective solution should be given to these people so that their businesses can grow. Oftentimes2000 allows these local small businesses to advertise and broadcast the location of their business to anyone who owns a smartphone. The idea is that a company can post an advertisement or a deal and “push” it to anyone who owns the application.

In addition to advertising space, public announcements are also made available through the application such as weather alerts, amber alerts, crime alerts, etc. Police department can send out a public service announcement about recently reported crime, enhancing local security. Another example, National Weather Service can broadcast tornado warnings or other weather alerts to the town more effectively by sending a push notification.

The users will have an option to pick and select what kind of categories that they want to subscribe. For example, if they want to keep up with any local deals, they should subscribe to local deals category. Therefore, the users will not be bothered by any events or advertisements that they do not like. Moreover, you can view the map which is integrated in our application in order to locate all the events that you have subscribed to.

User Archetype and Use Cases

Our users archetypes are those who are interested in finding local deal and events that may be taking place. Particularly, those people that wish there is an all-in-one application that lists all local deals, news and events. Moreover, local businesses, schools, law enforcement, and news stations will be the second set of users who would provide the content to be displayed in the application.

Let’s say a client wants to advertise a special event for the middle of the week at a certain time. They can log into the application, select the date of the event, the time, and the location, then post it a few days before the event to ensure people see it in time. After the event is finished, the event marker on the map and in the list of available events in the area will disappear. Then, if the client wishes to make another event, they can follow the same steps as above.

A customer can opens the application to check if there are deals or events occurring in the near future, they can open the application and see a list of available events and deals listed in chronological order. When they choose an event/advertisement they are taken to a screen where more detailed information is presented along with an option to view in a map.

Shortcomings of the Current Solution

There is no an all-in-one local announcement and/or advertising service. We can pick Groupon as an example. It surely offers local deals, but it does not list any local news or events. Furthermore, it doesn’t have push notification system integrated. Users have to open the app in order to find any local deals.

Another good example would be Craigslist. Craigslist is crowdsource service in which there is no limitation on who can make a post. Our app, since it is planned to be a paid service, will ensure the legitimacy of the advertiser. Also, Craigslist’s proximity is limited to high population city. Hence, if you have a business in small town, you will not be able to advertise your business in Craigslist. Another limitation is that if you want to broadcast your campus event, you cannot target the audience only to your campus residents.

Technologies

• Android OS
• GPS service
• Google Maps
• GCM (Google Cloud Messaging)
• PHP and MySQL
• HTTPRequest (Java Socket)

References

• Android OS - https://developer.android.com/reference/classes.html
• Google Maps API - https://developers.google.com/maps/documentation/android/
• GCM - https://developer.android.com/guide/google/gcm/index.html

Compilation Notes

• This application requires RibbonMenu library - https://github.com/darvds/RibbonMenu