Interview with MacSMS creators

Tell me about yourselves

We are all third year software engineering students at McMaster University (Shubham Gupta, Gurbir Dhulla and Taranveer Virk). We became close friends since first year and have done a lot of cool projects together since. We are all very passionate about solving real world problems using software.

 

What is MacSMS?

MacSMS (@MacSMSme) is a free text-based service exclusively for the McMaster community. Currently, we provide instant access to weather information and bus schedules with more to come.

 

 

Why did you create MacSMS?

It started as a personal project to keep ourselves informed about the weather conditions on the campus. We found ourselves checking the weather online frequently because this winter has been really unpredictable. Actually it still is. We immediately fell in love with the convenience that MacSMS brought and we decided to share it. Since then, we have realized its potential and started adding more features to it.

 

How has MacSMS been received so far?

We are actually quite surprised at how positive the response has been and how quickly it has picked up. The two way interaction has really gotten people talking. Without any advertising, we recently crossed over 20k messages in about one month’s time.

 

Why are you using a text based interface? Why not an app?

The whole point is to avoid having people to download an app. The benefits of using a text based interface is that it can be accessed from virtually anywhere and without data or Wi-Fi. Depending on the complexity and the amount of features that MacSMS brings, we might develop an app to allow people to update their preferences. For the most part, we plan to stick to the fun aspect of texting.

 

 

What are the future plans for MacSMS?

We are focused on building a service that can expedite any communication that occurs within the university. For example, reminders, alerts, special sales, events (especially during frosh or frost week), etc. Any features that we add will be fun or convenient.

 

How can the community help you make MacSMS a success?

We really value every small detail and would love if the McMaster community can share what their experiences have been using MacSMS. What they like, don’t like or what they would like to see added to MacSMS. We truly appreciate all feedback, thank you!

 

McSMS will be demoed at DemoCampHamilton16 on April 2nd in the TwelvEighty pub at McMaster University.