The Jesuit Conference liked my work on the Catholic STL app for iPhone, and asked if I could help them build a similar app for both iOS and Android. It was somewhat challenging to get everything ported over to Android from iOS, but building on my experience with the Catholic News Live app for Android, I was able to get this project done on time, with an app that works very well on both platforms.
Instead of simply building a quick port of the app from iOS to Android, I first ported the open source project Catholic Diocese App (which I maintain as part of Open Source Catholic) from iOS to Android, then built the Jesuit App on top of the Catholic Diocese App for Android. This way, other dioceses and large organizations can immediately benefit from this project.
Some of the main features of the app are (1) a map that allows people to explore Jesuit locations around the world, with location search, user location highlighting, and background synchronization of location data, (2) a news list that pulls in the latest news from the Jesuit website, (3) a listing of prayers and spiritual works from the Jesuits, and (4) a section highlighting the app's development and other related information.
- Built natively for iOS and Android.
- Built upon/expanded my open source project, Catholic Diocese App.
- App integrates with Jesuit website to update news and location information.