OneBusAway: Improving the Usability of Public Transit Brian Ferris University of Washington Design Use Build – University of Washington

University of Washington Why am I “here”?  To tell you about my work on OneBusAway  To provide an iPhone developer perspective

University of Washington Motivations  The goal of OneBusAway is to help provide a better experience for transit riders, and to encourage more people to use public transit.  Focus on:  Real-time arrival information  Innovative technical solutions  Usability  Free as in speech and beer

University of Washington

We’ve Got You Covered

University of Washington Usage Statistics  On a weekly basis: 40k unique users  Web: 15,000  iPhone and Android: 25,000  Phone: 2,000  SMS: 800  More traffic than transit agency’s own tools

University of Washington iPhone App Access over 24 hrs

University of Washington Awards  Washington Technology Industry Association Industry Achievement Awards  Best Use of Technology in the Government, Non-Profit, or Educational Sector  Seattle 2.0 Startup Awards  Best Non-profit Startup – Nominated  Seattle Magazine – Best of Seattle 2009  Best Local iPhone App  Seattle Weekly – Best of the Web 2010  Best Local iPhone App - Nominated

University of Washington How is OneBusAway changing user perceptions and behavior with respect to public transit? We surveyed 488 OneBusAway user to find out. Impacts of OneBusAway

University of Washington Change in Satisfaction  “I no longer sit with pitted stomach wondering where is the bus. It's less stressful simply knowing it's nine minutes away, or whatever the case.”

University of Washington Change in Usage  “While my work usage was pretty much on a fixed schedule, OneBusAway has made impromptu trips much more convenient.”

University of Washington Personal Safety  18% of respondents reported feeling somewhat safer and 3% reported feeling much safer.  Safety was correlated with gender  “Having the ability to know when my bus will arrive helps me decide whether or not to stay at a bus stop that I may feel a little sketchy about or move on to a different one. Or even, stay inside of a building until the bus does arrive.”

University of Washington Open Transit Data! What makes this possible?

University of Washington Open Transit Data  OneBusAway inspired by trips to Portland  “Why can’t we have that here in Seattle?”  Transit agencies publish their transit data (GTFS)  Developer ecosystems in the Portland, Bay Area, Chicago, NYC, Boston, beyond  Different names: #opengov, #gov20, #opendata  One result: innovative apps that help the public

University of Washington Government as a platform  “Why should I rely on 3rd-party developers to provide essential tools to my riders?”  Developing or procuring tools like these yourself can be expensive, time-consuming, and outside the tech comfort zone of many agencies.  The public can do it cheaper, faster, and better  Why reinvent (and re-pay for) the wheel?

University of Washington Case Study: NYC MTA  MTA has made multiple attempts to deliver real- time bus info  34 th Street Pilot: $140M estimate to extend citywide  Looking for cheaper solution

University of Washington OneBusAway + OpenPlans + MTA  OneBusAway, in partnership with OpenPlans and MTA  Open-source vehicle tracking solution  Using open standards: GTFS + SIRI SIRI API aasdf Real-time Module

University of Washington An iPhone Development Perspective The OneBusAway iPhone App

University of Washington The OneBusAway iPhone App

University of Washington iPhone, iPad, iOS, iWhatever…  A quick note:  I’ll use iPhone, iPad, iOS pretty much interchangeably, but…  Devices:  iPhone  iPod Touch  iPad  Operating system that powers them all:  iOS

University of Washington Why iPhone app development?  Love it or hate it, it’s the biggest game in town  Verizon iPhone announcement tomorrow will only fuel the fire  Users could care less about our opinions of various platforms. They just want the app.  Either you provide it  Or someone else will

University of Washington Pay To Play  To really develop an iPhone app, you’ll need:  A Mac to run Xcode on  An iOS device to test your app on simulator only goes so far  A developer license ($100/yr) so you can: Run your app on your phone Submit your app to the app store  Adds up to real cash

University of Washington Writing an iOS App  You develop using:  Objective C – The native iOS Programming Language  Xcode – Apple’s Integrated Developer Environment

University of Washington Objective C  “Let’s strap some object oriented features onto C, as inspired by Smalltalk”  C-like, but object oriented features don’t look anything like C++  Not my favorite language, but it works…  Experience with C and object oriented language concepts will help, but only so much

University of Washington What does it look like?  Simple function declaration  - (return type) fnName:(arg_type)arg_name  Message passing: [name length]  Objective-C: Send message “length” to object “name”  Java: Call method “length” on object “name” - (NSString*) getHello:(NSString*)name { [name length]); return [NSString name]; }

University of Washington The Good and the Bad  The Good  Message system allows flexible object and type composition  But don’t shoot yourself in the foot ; )  The Bad  No garbage collection for Objective-C on iOS

University of Washington Xcode  Works well enough  I’m a raging Eclipse addict, so that colors any reasonable advice I could give here ; )

University of Washington The App Store Review Process  It’s gotten better, but…  Still largely a nerve-wracking process  My first app was rejected once  You play by Apple’s rules or you don’t play at all  Review process can take up to two weeks  Critical that you find bugs BEFORE submitting

University of Washington * I’ve never had a full-time job for longer than 3 months in my life, so take it with a grain of salt ; ) My Advice* To You

University of Washington Learn by Doing  The best way to learn a language, a framework, a tool:  Build something with it!  Find a quick project and try to make it happen:  First version will probably be junk, but don’t sweat it  Look for the things that annoy you on a day-to-day basis for ideas and inspiration

University of Washington Questions? Thanks!