Android/CloudBoost: Push Notifications With JavaSDK and GCM (Google play services)

NB: you can now read this post at my new site: http://www.egimaben.com/androidcloudboost-push-notifications-with-javasdk-and-gcm-google-play-services/
CloudBoost has made several new developments to its ecosystem in the past few weeks. Some of which include:

1. Swagger API documentation: getting your way around the raw REST API for CloudBoost is no trivial task. This is no surprise considering the complexity that has been abstracted away for the developer by this BaaS. This is why there is need for the Software Development Kits in different languages to further hide this complexity. However, for the hackers that want to dig in and inspect Request Bodies and Responses, the Swagger-UI was launched on 15th March,2016.

CloudBoost Android: CloudUser Demo

NB: you can now read this post on my new site 

In this post

We are going to look at how to take advantage of CloudBoost's CloudUser APIs to manage one of the most important parts of your app: User management.

Normally, when you are building an application with your own backend, you'd have to create a database for your users, create APIs for signup, login and logout. This can be quite cumbersome especially if you are new to user management. Additionally, you would have to create an engine for managing permissions of different categories of users to different parts of the app or a certain kind of data.

CloudBoost Android File upload and download

NB: you can now read this post at my new site

What is CloudBoost

CloudBoost is a Database as a Service.  CloudBoost's primary service is a complete database which provides an API that allows developers to store, query, search, and have real-time data on multiple clients.
CloudBoost is increasingly becoming popular among developers; partly because of the inherent power that it avails to developers and partly because Facebook announced that its own mobile Backend as a Service in the name of Parse will be closing business in early 2017. 

Developing USSD apps: Airtel Mobile money USSD app

NB: You can now read this post at my new site

I have just thought of this app right now because my MTN phone is out of battery otherwise we would have used the MTN mobile money app which is more popular in Uganda. Since I need to be navigating the menu as am developing the app, I will use my Airtel line.

If you are in Uganda, dial *185# on your Airtel line to follow along.

Developing USSD apps: ussdmenuserver-2.0.jar

NB: You can now read this post at my new site

Hey there, hope your Friday is good. Just as promised in the last post, today we shall navigate a very useful library for you who desires to build meaningful USSD apps.

ussdmenuserver.jar

After developing about 2 non-trivial USSD apps, I got a bit overwhelmed by the sheer amount of repetitive code I needed to write.

Repetitive code should be abstracted, and that's how I came up with ussdmenuserver.jar, yeah i built it, now go buy me a beer (it's Friday remember!!!)

Developing USSD apps: Test App

Developing ussd apps: test app

In this tutorial, we shall develop a basic USSD test app and dial it from mchoice-simulator.

My assumptions

• you have read the last 2 posts and have a firm background about how USSD apps work.

• you have downloaded mchoice-simulator,  run it and been able to access it's web GUI from the browser.
• you are using java programming language.  

Developing USSD apps: simulation

Developing ussd apps: simulation

What does it take to develop a USSD app???

• Are you already a developer??? 

• Do you have experience in developing and deploying web services to any web or application server
• Are you comfortable with string manipulation and programmatically dealing with URLs???

Introduction to USSD

What is USSD?

USSD in full is Unstructured Supplementary Services Data.

USSD survey- an example of a USSD app UI