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Build your own WhatsApp!

Sat Oct 3, 10:30 - Sat Oct 3, 13:00

Workshop 17

ABOUT

Target Audience

Self-taught individuals with a passion for computer science. Curious and autonomous young adults who wants to go the extra mile and get trained on a hot technology topic: WhatsApp!

Why this course?

Everybody knows WhatsApp: one of the most popular instant messaging apps in the world, especially within emerging markets including several African countries. Boasting a very large user base (over 800M to date) and often used as a carrier service replacement for phone calls and messaging, WhatsApp is a digital deep dive into the mobile-only era.

As the market for mobile applications keeps growing, it is getting more and more complex for developers to leverage mobile technologies: 3 different platforms, not to mention a wide array of programming languages, development tools and business models to juggle with.

Course description

This workshop offers an introduction to Web technologies (HTML, CSS, JavaScript) being used in synergy with Meteor.js. This venture-backed, open source application framework is already used in production by startups, established businesses and NGOs around the world as it facilitates the creation of powerful applications that can run on any device.

This workshop will build on learners' existing knowledge of Web technologies, which provides a great skill set for mastering other application frameworks. Students will learn how to build a Whatsapp "clone", a simple messaging app that can be used on a mobile device, through the following core features:

* Messaging and group messaging
* Notifications
* User accounts.

Learners will then walk through the process of installing the required software on their own computer and writing the application’s code. Around 100 lines of code will be required while an online platform will provide checkpoints to keep the class in sync. At the end of the course, participants will install the app on their mobile phones with an outro on how to publish an application to the Google Play Store.