Overview

The course primarily covers development of applications for mobile computing devices. Mobile devices range from consumer electronics such as cell phones to off-the-shelf robots to data acquisition devices. Application topics to be considered will include the application development cycle, mobile devices in a client-server or peer-to-peer relationship, wireless networking, user interfacing, mapping and GPS, and graphics.

The consumer devices targeted for development will generally be the Apple iPhone and iTouch devices. Application development for these devices requires an iMac Intel-based computer and the most recent OS X upgrade. IUS Computer Science has a new iMac lab for this course.

Programming experience is necessary at a level similar to C343. That implies experience using dynamic data structures and object oriented programming in C++ or a similar language. The primary development language will be Objective C, though Java and Python may be used for some off-device elements of an application; students may elect to use others for assignments where possible.

Some networking background will be helpful but not necessary as critical skills will be developed in the course.

Contact the instructor if you have questions about the appropriateness of your experience.

The course consists mainly of several smaller projects focused on developing foundational skills, class discussions to develop foundational concepts, and a large, individual final project.

When

Spring, 2010.

What to expect

The syllabus from Spring 2009 can be viewed here using Java and J2ME for development. That will give you some idea regarding the organization and some of the topics. Many of the same topics are important regardless of the platform, there will be considerable additional material to cover, given the user interface and graphics, and a few interesting devices (e.g. accelerometers).

The Spring 2010 course will start with a few weeks on using Objective C and the development environment.

Keep in mind that the course will be developing over the semester, the syllabus will not be completed until May 2010.

Last year's projects using cell phones included:

• GPS Phone tracking - Displayed a map showing location of a paired phone.
• Robot control - Driving a Scribbler via Bluetooth and touch screen.
• Relational database implementation
• Textbook barcode reading and price lookup
• Home control - Turn on/off home appliances, start/stop recording.

Why

How many people have a cell-phone? Mobile computing is the fastest growing sector in computing.

The course satisfies a 400-level elective required for the Bachelors of Science in Computer Science degree.

This stuff is fun!

Instructor

Ray Wisman has been on the Computer Science faculty at IUS for over twenty five years, fifteen year teaching networking and eight years teaching client-server programming. His experience in mobile computing includes cell phone applications to analyze sound frequencies and acceleration, read an overview in the conference paper.

Course Organization

We meet four hours per week on-campus for discussion.

Scheduled on-campus office hours for individual assistance.

Scheduled, staffed on-campus laboratory.

The majority of course material will be online.

The final project will be presented at the last class meeting on-campus. The project will comprise a major portion of the grade for the course.

Equipment/Software

You will often need to use equipment at IUS; unless you have an iPhone, iTouch and a Mac.

Text

I have not yet picked a text and we will likely need multiple resources, depending upon your experience, you will need more or less. Some of the better ones:

iPhone 3.0 SDK Development by Dudney and Adamson, The Pragmatic Programmers ISBN-13 978-1-93435-625-8

The iPhone Developer's Cookbook by Erica Sadun, Addison Wesley ISBN-13 978-0-321-55545-8

Beginning iPhone Development by Mark and LaMarche, Apress ISBN-13 978-1-4302-1626-1 

Programming in Objective C by Stephan G. Kochan, Developers Library ISBN 0-672-32586-1

COCOA Programming for the Mac OS X 3e by Aaron Hillegass, Addison Wesley, ISBN-13 978-0-321-50361-9