Mobile App Development for Good Causes
According to research commissioned in support of The Sunday Times App List 2012, 56.5 per cent of smartphone owners use their mobile for its apps more than using it for making phone calls or sending text messages. The research also found 54.4 per cent of smartphone owners download at least one application a week, with the average user owning around 38 apps.
Apps are revolutionising the way we live, often without us even realising. Nowadays it's commonplace to check train times on our phones (usually through an app or mobile web). Before this technology was available, the only options were to check on our desktops or to call a premium rate number if we were on the move. Apps make our lives more convenient and smartphone technology is helping to change the way we do things.
As well as helping us become more efficient, mobile applications are also being developed to help others, and to help our society as a whole.
A recent mobile application competition, the International Space Apps Challenge, introduced us to a whole host of app ideas conceptualised to help improve our society.
One of the most successful projects was Grower's Nation, an app designed to help its audience grow and harvest vegetables and crops. The developers behind this app are passionate about finding areas of unused land to grow fresh produce, and in order to know about the types of soil and climate in these areas, various sets of data were collated from the around the globe.
The data that was (and still is) being collected includes:
The developers behind the project are crowdsourcing as much data as possible to make the app as precise and accurate as it can be.
Users enter their postcode or town and are presented with a list of recommended produce to grow in their areas (this is constructed from the open source data including climate and soil types). The app will also give the user guidance on when to sow, plant and harvest their crops.
The app can be used by a huge audience including a novice who wants to start growing in their back garden to crop farmers in developing countries. For the developing areas where the internet might not be as freely accessible as it is here, the developers are considering using SMS services to send weekly roundups on key information.
The developers of Grower's Nation are still looking for ways to help make the project more useful in developing countries as well as in England.
Apps are revolutionising the way we live, often without us even realising. Nowadays it's commonplace to check train times on our phones (usually through an app or mobile web). Before this technology was available, the only options were to check on our desktops or to call a premium rate number if we were on the move. Apps make our lives more convenient and smartphone technology is helping to change the way we do things.
As well as helping us become more efficient, mobile applications are also being developed to help others, and to help our society as a whole.
A recent mobile application competition, the International Space Apps Challenge, introduced us to a whole host of app ideas conceptualised to help improve our society.
One of the most successful projects was Grower's Nation, an app designed to help its audience grow and harvest vegetables and crops. The developers behind this app are passionate about finding areas of unused land to grow fresh produce, and in order to know about the types of soil and climate in these areas, various sets of data were collated from the around the globe.
The data that was (and still is) being collected includes:
- Monthly temperatures and rainfall
- The pH, type and moisture levels of soil
- Weather forecast (from Met office data)
The developers behind the project are crowdsourcing as much data as possible to make the app as precise and accurate as it can be.
Users enter their postcode or town and are presented with a list of recommended produce to grow in their areas (this is constructed from the open source data including climate and soil types). The app will also give the user guidance on when to sow, plant and harvest their crops.
The app can be used by a huge audience including a novice who wants to start growing in their back garden to crop farmers in developing countries. For the developing areas where the internet might not be as freely accessible as it is here, the developers are considering using SMS services to send weekly roundups on key information.
The developers of Grower's Nation are still looking for ways to help make the project more useful in developing countries as well as in England.
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