NU's new app includes Blackboard, maps and sports scores.
With NUIT‘s free iPhone application now available, we asked our staffers (and a non-journo!) to thumb-test the app. Their candid thoughts, after the jump.
The application’s home screen. Search? Forget it.
Serena Dai | Buzzard editor
It’s pretty. Real pretty. And hidden inside of it is a hilarious picture of Willie the Wildcat above the Rock, which declares that “NU has the Willies.” But what am I going to do with a picture of that? Make it my wallpaper instead of my current trendy, artsy, “abstract” wallpaper? Please. My weak attempt at being trendy is at least 50 percent of the reason I even bought an iPhone. So while as an obsessive journo the directory feature makes it easier for me to stalk people, I really have no other use for it. Valiant effort! The pixels are still oh so smooth.
The application’s map function actually works well—the search function is quick, and offers suggestions as you type—and it uses a neat flyover effect to zoom to users’ selections.
Peter Jackson | NU Intel editor
You’ll wonder, when you first open NU’s new iPhone app, what its purpose is meant to be. Is it for students, professors, or the public at large? I suspect that the app’s architects never settled on a definitive answer to that question. Most of the app’s myriad flaws stem from offering a handful of functions for each audience, while failing to provide anything truly groundbreaking to any of them.
Where purpose is unclear, effective design is often impossible. Parts of this app are great, but many features are just halfway functional. (An exception: the interactive map works far better than Northwestern’s Google Maps-powered edition.) As a journalist, I use NU’s directory function all the time, and I can happily report it works equally well here. But there’s no option for what NU calls “authenticated log-in,” so you can’t use your NU account to access information not available to the general public from the app. (In the realm of directory, this means I can’t see your phone number, or where you live, just your NU e-mail.) Moreover, the library listings lack the advanced search functions available online, meaning results are an undifferentiated mess of authors, titles, and keywords.
But above all the app suffers from a lack of imagination. It utterly fails to reenvision NU’s services and content for iPhone interactivity. Caesar on your phone? Nope. Although it’s “powered by Blackboard,” it doesn’t allow class websites to push content through to users. You can’t see grades, post comments, or download documents. That’s a pretty obvious shortcoming, not the sort of thing that would make the app a must-have. What would? How about SafeRide scheduling? Integrating that would be tough, but if it came with advent of an Internet-based scheduling system for the service, it could also free up a lot of money for more cars and drivers.
The application’s sport-by-sport scoreboard. Pretty, and also kind of useless.
Jordan Stone | Unaffiliated man with iPhone
If an iPhone is a sweat shop, then its applications are its child workers. They allow the unit to function, receive little credit and will work for around a dollar.
Northwestern’s most recent attempt to separate themselves from the perennial not-top-10 gang, is to get itself a child worker. This newly available Northwestern app allows the user to update themselves on NU news, explore the campus map, and peruse the library’s card catalogue. As a deliberately disengaged member of the NU community, such features as the listing of athletic events and posting of school related images and videos are useless. The university directory seems to have the most potential, but many entries lack phone numbers.
One blatant shortcoming is that the shuttle schedules are not included—perhaps the only function I would every use if I were to keep the app. In summary, if you bleed purple and own an iPhone then I suggest you get this free from the iTunes store and reevaluate your interests. Otherwise save yourself the 10 seconds it takes to download and enjoy one less purple thing in your life.
