Using PHP to Create a Web Based Mobile Banner Application
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My Talk from PA BUG 2012. I go through creating a web-based mobile app using Banner.
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Using PHP to Create a Web Based Mobile Banner Application
- 1. Using PHP to Create a Web-Based Mobile Banner Application By: Joe Casabona
- 2. Who Am I? • System Integrator at The University of Scranton • Web/WordPress Developer • Native of NYS/Yankee Fan • Nerd!
- 3. App Demo • Logging In • Showing Grades • Showing Schedule
- 4. • Better Integration with our current native app (by Straxis) • Access Everywhere • Supported on Android, iOS, Windows Phone, and even Blackberry (mostly)! • Faster changes/iterations Why A Web App?
- 5. • HTML/CSS • Media Queries • PHP • Mobile Connection Server • Returns data as JSON How Did We Do It?
- 6. A Quick Word on RWD • RWD = Responsive Web Design • Layouts that adapt to the device on which they are being viewed • This app is Responsive • RWD is great; know when to use it
- 7. Why RWD? • Support for Any Device • Not just for phones. • Next version will have better media queries
- 8. • All of the pages are HTML • No Javascript – Kept load times in mind. • Everything styled with CSS/CSS3 • Media Queries • Very few images HTML/CSS
- 9. • Used to talk to Mobile Connections Server • Logging In • Sending Requests • Processing JSON • JavaScript Object Notation • Standard way to represent data PHP
- 10. • PHP converts (decodes) this into an associative array! JSON Response
- 11. Mobile Connections Server • Accessible via Web Interface • As is all functionality • Login done through .htaccess • Supported by cURL
- 12. Mobile Connections Server • Functionality supplied by server: • Login/out • View Grades • View Daily Schedule
- 13. Sample URLS • Login: <YOURURL>/mobileserver/rest/security/getUserInfo • Grades: <YOURURL>/mobileserver/rest/grade/<STUDENT-ID> • Schedule: <YOURURL>/mobileserver/rest/schedule/<STUDENT- ID>/YYYY-MM-DD
- 14. Let’s Look at Some Code!
- 18. Future Proofing • Current iteration of Mobile Connections going away • My Guess: Server will remain mostly the same.
- 19. Thank You! Any Questions? Joe Casabona joseph.casabona@scranton.edu @jcasabona www.casabona.org
Editor's Notes
- Wanted singular app experience, so a 2 nd student native app was a no go. Straxis was able to build a web view within the native app to bring up our webapp. Straxis only supports iOS/Android (phones). Our app can be accessed on any device that supports web browsing. Changing a native app could take up to 2 weeks (on iOS). We can test our changes and deploy them immediately.
- Pioneered by Ethan Marcotte. See “Responsive Web Design” from A Book Apart Know when: Won’t start the native vs. web debate, but think about your constraints, and more importantly, your users. Didn’t want our Student Services restricted to only Android and iOS users.
- - Saw a talk that stated, “Decide what devices you want to support.” There are over 5,000 screen resolutions on Android alone. There are now 4 different iOS devices. Do you really want to tie down your app to only certain devices?
- - Assume the worst conditions when developing! Scott Jehl pointed out that not all users may have javascript enabled. Sometimes EDGE network is the fastest a user has. Don’t just assume they have they same set up as you!
- Use cURL to send all requests, including login Everything done over https, passwords also encrpyted on out end.
- Use cURL to send all requests, including login Everything done over https, passwords also encrpyted on out end.
- All of these URLs return JSON that can be processed. The Student ID is returned from getUserInfo, as well as some other info, like Banner roles.
- All of these URLs return JSON that can be processed. The Student ID is returned from getUserInfo, as well as some other info, like Banner roles.
- This is how I get all information. The function accepts a URL, and the username and password, which are encrypted and stored in a session. I use cURL to authenticate, as the server requires HTTP Auth Check to see request failed. If it did let ‘ em know. Otherwise convert the JSON to an array and return it for processing.
- Dev server down, so was unable to show an actual JSON -> Array sample. Best thing to do is just print array to see what it looks like (show function)
- Ellucian is releasing it’s own homegrown mobile connection app with more web-ready functionality. Hopefully you won’t need to do a lot of the digging I did There should also be a lot of added functionality Since server is already JSON, my assumption is that I won’t need to rewrite a lot of what I did, but we will see!
- Use cURL to send all requests, including login Everything done over https, passwords also encrpyted on out end.