Smart Ofﬁce: Development of a Mobile Application for Android with

Firebase Services Oriented to GroupMe Messaging

Liliana Enciso

1,2

, Jos

e Guarnizo

, Edisson Torres

and Pablo Alejandro Quezada-Sarmiento

Grupo Investigaci

on IoT - Network Communications on Smart Environment, Universidad T

ecnica Particular de Loja, San

Cayetano Alto, Loja, Ecuador

Departamento de Ciencias de la Computaci

on y Electr

onica, Universidad T

ecnica Particular de Loja, San Cayetano Alto,

Loja, Ecuador

Escuela de Inform

atica y Multimedia, Universidad Internacional del Ecuador, Quito, Ecuador

Keywords:

GroupMe Messaging, Firebase, Chat, Android, Smart, Mobile Application.

Abstract:

The courier service GroupMe is born for the need to manage instantaneous messages for groups of persons

in particular, especially the chat the public enjoys good reputation in general. Nevertheless, it plays a funda-

mental role in the growth and Internet expansion. The applications of courier service GroupMe have taken

big part of the market and have turned into a tool of work more and more used in personal, professional,

social ambiences and into emergency situations. The mobile application under the name of the messaging

FriendsChats GroupMe: Account with a service provided by Google called Firebase, which allows you to

store the information in the cloud quickly and safely. In view of the fact that applications that offer the same

service of communication have been developed with primitive tools such as the cloud storage (no security),

for this reason it is advisable to implement Firebase, the same that provides read / write rules, avoiding new

safety rules. The project was carried out in O.S. Android with the participation of two specialists: a functional

development and another one of the interface. Implementing Firebase to Android, any information that is

entered in the database is synchronized with different devices with the application.

1 INTRODUCTION

The Messaging GroupMe is one of the ways of com-

munication with friends immediately via the Internet.

Cited in the paper (Trigo and Mart

ın, 2006). It must

be borne in mind that should not be compared with

the Email (EC), as these are very different tools for

communication. Published in (A. and G., 2017).

One of the big differences between GroupMe and

EC; is that with the GroupMe you can witness to

friends, that is to say it is known when you are con-

nected in the instant, in contrast with the EC, it would

have to wait for the recipient to go to the mailbox and

review the messages. The same thing happens in other

applications like (Enciso et al., 2018), (Enciso et al.,

2017).

Currently, GroupMe has given a shift toward mo-

bile applications, cross-platform applications or web

services that require no application to operate, obtai-

ned from the article (Guru, 2016).

GroupMe allows communication with all con-

nected systems, playing exactly in favor of those who

communicate. There are also conferences in group,

are instant and can be sent to multiple contacts at the

same time. Mentioned in the blog (Apple, 2015)

Based on studies of market, will be used these de-

vices to be able to create the application mentioned

above. Today, around 49% are Smartphone devices.

Mentioned in the report (Nielsen, 2012), the which al-

lows for greater expansion in the use of the developed

application. Published in the article (Vidal, 2012).

We analyzed the services offered Firebase, as it

is since it came on the market has been very welco-

med by many developers, because that offers reliabi-

lity, security and speed in the handling of information.

Quoted in the blog (Alvarez, 2016).

In the present is proposed to carry out a applica-

tion of GroupMe (group messages), integrating the

services of Firebase and TinyBD. Giving the struc-

ture and functioning of the databases in real time. Re-

ferente to blog (Anton, 2015).

It is not intended do an application with such mag-

nitude as WhatsApp or Messenger, applications with

a large global market; but if, an app that allows com-

454

Enciso, L., Guarnizo, J., Torres, E. and Quezada-Sarmiento, P.

Smart Ofﬁce: Development of a Mobile Application for Android with Firebase Services Oriented to GroupMe Messaging.

DOI: 10.5220/0007235204540461

In Proceedings of the 14th International Conference on Web Information Systems and Technologies (WEBIST 2018), pages 454-461

ISBN: 978-989-758-324-7

munication between a certain group of people, offe-

ring optimization in message response time, privacy

and security of storage in the cloud. Similar features,

mentioned in (KDE, 2012).

The speciﬁc objectives are, redacted in (Rodriguez

and Lagos, 2016):

• Developing a mobile application which allows the

registration of users in the internal database of the

movil. the TinyBD.

• Incorporate the services of Firebase, for the syn-

chronization of information between users.

• All information that is sent and received will be

stored in the cloud of the Firebase.

The scope of this project is the development of a

mobile application, incorporating the services of Fire-

base (reading and writing), and the application will be

developed on Android (functions and the application

interface), so that the same is correctly well done and

be pleasing to users.

2 RELATED WORK

Windows Live Messenger: Enables communication

between two or more users, with the arrival of the

Messenger it was possible to chat, speak or make vi-

deo calls between two computers. (Trigo and Conde,

2006). Using the main idea of Windows, was analy-

zed tools to help perform the same function, but of

a more secure and efﬁcient, which provide Firebase

with safety rules.

Once Messenger began to get a great market,

Vyrros Andrew development IMessage and des-

cribe: That is a messaging service developed at Ap-

ple,supports that users send more than 300 billion

messages per day using IMassage. (Trautschold and

Mazo, 2012). The problem I had was that it did not

have storage tool information in the cloud, any mes-

sage that was received, was stored in the device’s in-

ternal memory. Firebase provides ample storage size

for that customer information is always available.

Google launched its long-awaited messaging ser-

vice called Google talk: Which seeks to other people

the way you choose, you can be: email, instant mes-

saging or voice, is a service similar to that currently

offers Skype. (Mercurio and SAP, 2005). It was one

of the ﬁrst applications that were developed with the

service of Firebase, to control the rules of users, ena-

bling encryption when you register the client and the

de-encryption when retrieving customer proﬁle infor-

mation.

DoneSitios: It allows you to give beneﬁts and

solutions on the concept that know about (Ecua-

dor) as for example, education, health, tourist sites,

etc. (Bravo and Faican, 2017). There is great si-

milarity with doneSitios, since it has an informative

”chat”. for the development of the application will

implement the service of Firebase in order to develop

a similar application for the transmission of informa-

tion of a synchronously with a large group of clients.

2.1 The Uniﬁed Modeling Language

(UML)

The UML is one of the tools most exciting in the

world of systems development.

This allows us to generate designs that capture the

ideas for the development of an application. In the

ﬁgure 1. The Use Case Diagram, in which details the

functional structure of the application.

Figure 1: Description of the actions of the system.

2.2 The GroupMe

The messaging GroupMe, includes messages in real

time and allows in group communication between the

clients. In the application developed, all persons that

are registered will be able to see all messages that

have been sent and whether they will be able to ans-

wer those messages (Room, 2012). And some im-

portant developments during these times, which are

detailed in (D. and H.G., 2010):

• It was the implementation in the DISH (Programd

Logic for Automatic Teaching Operations) used at

the beginning of the decade of 1970.

• It appeared on the internet in November 1996.

• The service of GroupMe offers a window where

you write the message in plain text, icons or emo-

ticons.

• It differs from the chat and other tools of conver-

sation in which access is immediate and perma-

nent at the click of a button of the navigation of

the site.

Smart Ofﬁce: Development of a Mobile Application for Android with Firebase Services Oriented to GroupMe Messaging

455

(a) Architecture two layers of Firebase

(b) The organizational structure of FriendsChats

Figure 2: Technologies implemented.

2.3 Firebase

Firebase was founded in 2011 by Andrew Lee and Ja-

mes Tamplin, is the new and improved Mobile de-

velopment platform in the cloud. It was acquired

by Google in October 2014, and from there has gi-

ven new features. Information retrieved from the arti-

cle (A.B., 2011).

In the Figure 2.a. The functional architecture of

the Firebase, has a architecture two layers (client/-

server) starting from a customer to transmit informa-

tion to the server, which transmission is made in bi-

directional lines. Borja summarized, That the same

requires a client GroupMe that performs the service,

also is different from the email. There are messaging

programs that serve as a great help for your shipment

arrives instantly. the main features of the GroupMe,

the mentioned in the article (Bravo, 2016).

Figure 2.b. Presents the basic structure and orga-

nization of GroupMe, implementing in Firebase. It

can be seen that the data go in bi-directional and that

all message passes through the ﬁrewall to be ﬁltered.

2.4 Add Firebase to Android

2.4.1 Add the SDK

If you want to integrate libraries of Firebase to one

of your projects, you must perform some basic tasks

that help in the preparation of the project of Android

Studio(Studio, 2008).

Code 1: Complement google-services.

1 b u i l d s c r i p t {

2 d e p e n d e n c i e s {

3 c l a s s p a t h ’com . g o o g l e . gms :

goog l e −s e r v i c e s : 3 . 0 . 0 ’

4 } }

In the code 1. We describe how to include add-ons

to Android, obtained from the manual (Developers,

2016):

Line 1: Contains the main package the all of code,

which allows you to add rules to ﬁle build.gradle.

Line 2: We incorporate the dependency package

to the ﬁle.

Line 3: We include the add-in google-services.

Code 2: Complement Gradle.

1 a p p l y p l u g i n : ’ com . a n d r o i d .

a p p l i c a t i o n ’

2 a n d r o i d { }

3 d e p e n d e n c i e s {

4 co m p i l e ’com . g o o g l e . f i r e b a s e :

f i r e b a s e −c o r e : 9 . 6 . 1 ’

5 / / ADD THIS AT THE BOTTOM

6 a p p l y p l u g i n : ’com . g o o g l e . gms .

goog l e −s e r v i c e s ’

7 }

In the code 2. It is described how to include

dependencies that will be used in Android, obtained

from the manual (Developers, 2016):

Line 1: Corresponds to the ﬁle app/build.gradle.

Line 2: It is incorporated the packages of An-

droid.

Line 3: It is incorporated the dependency package

to the ﬁle.

Line 4: Compile the service of Firebase.

ınea 6: You add the line apply plugin to enable

the add-in GRADLE.

2.4.2 Safety Rules in Firebase

The rules of security are used to protect the data of the

application developed; Firebase has three types for

veriﬁcation of the security, found in the channel (De-

sarrolloWeb.com., 2016b).

We must remember that these security levels must

have the same data model you are working on the pro-

ject.

For the purpose of the application developed will

need the rules of writing and reading for users; these

ITSCO 2018 - Special Session on Internet of Things and Smart Communities

456

rules are organized in the form of a tree. Adapted

from the virtual manual of (DesarrolloWeb.com.,

2016a).

Code 3: Rules of reading and writing.

1 {

2 ” r u l e s ” : {

3 ” . r e a d ” : tr u e

4 ” . w r i t e ” : t r u e

5 }

6 }

The editions of the rules will have to be

done manually from the ofﬁcial page of Firebase

https://ﬁrebase.google.com/?hl=es-419 go to console,

once inside we will modify the rules of Firebase,

giving them true values for editing by the user, in the

co de 3, It describes the activation of the rules of

reading and writing that will own the users:

ınea 2: Pack of rule.

ınea 3: Reading rules are given a true value.

ınea 4: Reading rules are given a true value.

Once these simple steps are completed, it will no

longer be needed to return to the Firebase page. Now

we will focus on the project that was developed in

Android Studio and App Inventor. Explained in the

video (DesarrolloWeb.com., 2016a).

2.5 APP Inventor

APP Inventor is an application of Google Labs, for

the creation of applications for Android devices (Net,

2015). This application has been one of the great

innovations of the last years on the part of Google,

because it has allowed the newest programmers to

make their own applications with different objectives.

It is necessary to have an account that the appli-

cation would not serve to the creation of application

that contains a great magnitude since for reasons that

only supports a limited number of services. Retrieved

from comments by (TuAppInventor, 2016).

Some characteristics that can be exploited in the

course of their use are:

• The creation of simple applications, suitable for

any Android operating system.

• Easy importation of add-ons that we want to im-

plement.

• Dynamic blocks holding the Android code.

2.5.1 Supporting Features of App Inventor

When building applications for Android; Works with

two tools, detailed in the ofﬁcial page l (Riego, 2017):

1. App Inventor

2. App Inventor Blocks Editor

2.5.2 Operation of an Application in App

Inventor

The Android program is based on events, that is, an

action has to occur for the corresponding reaction to

take place. Recovered from (D

ıaz, 2016).

Figure 3. The diagram for the execution of the events

carried out by Android is explained.

Figure 3: Execution Diagram on Android.

In the case of programming in other languages,

such as Arduino, programming is based on a cycle in

which the code is executed in a linear fashion. Within

the cycle it is checked if the action has occurred, thus

executing what corresponds. Recovered from (D

ıaz,

2016).

Figure 4. The diagram for the execution of the

actions in Arduino is explained.

Figure 4: Execution Diagram on Arduino.

2.5.3 In the Translation of Android Studio to

App Inventor

In the App Inventor tutorial proposed by Luis D

ıaz

explains that in the development of the interface that

Smart Ofﬁce: Development of a Mobile Application for Android with Firebase Services Oriented to GroupMe Messaging

457

will own the application for the user, the developer

can make use of the Various elements of App Inven-

tor tool, from buttons and text boxes to elements that

allow modifying the way the elements are displayed

and displayed. Detail in the instructive (D

ıaz, 2016).

Figura 7.a. It details the process for developing the

application with the App Inventor tool, which compi-

les the code from the Android server, previously loa-

ded.

3 RESULTS

During the execution of the present project, an ade-

quate application has been developed to identify the

main operation of GroupMe with the services of Fire-

base.

However, the respective investigations of the tools

and services that would be used in the present project

have been carried out, which were detailed previously.

The GroupMe application was initially developed

in the Android Studio IDE, it developed the source

code, in which it was implemented and actived the de-

pendencies and the rules that will allow the adecuate

use of in the compiler.

Figure 7.b. Some of the registered users are pre-

sented in the respective tests made to the prototype

of the application. Pepe and toni, users are appreci-

ated, and at the same time the encrypted information

of each user is presented.

Figure 5. The results of the compilation are appre-

ciated with one of the users entered, once it is obtai-

ned information of the user it is said that the user rules

are activated.

Figure 5: Firebase compilation results for the import.

3.1 Translation of the Source Code

In the translation of IDE Android Studio a App In-

ventor, 3 simple steps were taken:

1. We pack the Android studio project.

2. Load into App Inventor.

3. Initialize the App Inventor server.

3.1.1 Components

Figure 6: Components retrieved from the Android server.

In ﬁgure 6, the components loaded automatically

when you create the project coupled with the packa-

ging that was previously translated from the Android

studio IDE, the image shows that the entire applica-

tion will be enclosed in a Screen, for the reason that

only work in a window.

3.1.2 Interface

For the case of the division of the sections we will use

the layouts, which are identiﬁed with the icon with

two white circles and a green strip, which can be seen

in ﬁgure 8. These are used to give styles Presented by

sections as shown in the ﬁgure. 9. In which the ﬁeld

with the label USUARIO, has two icons and a label,

which forms a single section, and this will facilitate

for the manipulation in the modeling of the applica-

tion.

3.1.3 Code for App Inventor

For the presentation of the code that has our applica-

tion we will make it in three parts and explain the use

of the services that were used for the execution of the

project:

1. TinyBD Code. - Used for storing and registering

users.

2. Firebase Code. - Used for the storage of the infor-

mation sent.

ITSCO 2018 - Special Session on Internet of Things and Smart Communities

458

(a) Funcional structure of App Inventor incorporating Android

Studio (Java).

(b) Defaul users in the creation of the data

Figure 7: App Inventor structure and default users.

Figure 8: Final interface of the application.

3. Notiﬁcaci

on Code. - Used for synchronization

with Firebase, which will notify when there is mo-

vement in the base of Firebase.

TinyBD Code: ﬁgure 10, it presented the struc-

ture Testing on mobile devices and in the same ways

Of the code, with which the application could stock

and register new users

Firebase Code: ﬁgure 11, the connection with the

Firebase service is appreciated, which will send the

data obtained from the cloud each time the notiﬁer

has a positive value.

Notiﬁcaci

on Code: ﬁgure 12, the code that is pre-

sented runs constantly until it receives a positive va-

lue, the positive value occurs when it receives infor-

Figure 9: TinyBD Code.

Figure 10: Firebase Code.

mation in the database of Firebase and will proceed to

execute the code of Firebase to proceed the synchro-

nization of the presented messages.

Smart Ofﬁce: Development of a Mobile Application for Android with Firebase Services Oriented to GroupMe Messaging

459

Figure 11: Code which notiﬁes the Firebase service that

there is activity to synchronize.

3.2 Application Execution and Testing

Once the development process is completed, the com-

pilation and construction of the application proceeded

testing on mobile devices and in the same ways in

emulators for S.O. Android.

Final application icon: The icon was appreciated

in Figure 13. Icon created and retrieved from the page

http://iconion.com/es/.

Figure 12: Application Icon.

3.2.1 Application Testing

For application testing, it was performed on the follo-

wing devices:

• Mobile device - Samsung Ace Lite 4.

• Device virtual machine (emulator) - BlueStacks 2.

Figure 14. The implementation of the application

is presented in the virtual machine, with the username

’Diana’.

Figure 13: Try number 1.

Figure 15. Corresponds to the user with the

mobile device, with the username. ’Alfonso’.

Figure 14: Try number 2.

4 CONCLUSIONS

All the objectives and requirements established

throughout the development of the project have been

fulﬁlled. The main one was to create a mobile ap-

plication for Android capable of offering the group

communication service.

The developed application allows the sending and

reception of ﬂat texts that allows the communication

between the users. For the storage of the information

it will do with the Google Serves tool called Firebase.

In addition, the application has been validated

with the device Samsung Ace Lite 4 and console emu-

lator BlueStacks. You need a connection to mobile

data or a wiﬁ connection for the synchronization be-

tween the device and the Firebase BD. All this de-

monstrates the use of new technologies that arise in

this generation. Since Google distributes some free

services for developers in a way that can be used for

studies, hobbies, or for monetary reasons.

It is important to note that FriendsChat allows pe-

ople to be in contact with each other. It also helps us

to work, work, ideas, form a meeting, and it is a very

economical and effective way.

Finally, with the culmination of the project we

learned to develop a project from beginning to end,

going through all its phases, acquired new knowledge,

or expanded many of them on Java, Android, mo-

del client-server, SQL, and other necessary skills that

have been required during all phases.

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