Developing Developers- Teleios Code Jam

The latest Teleios Code Jam is scheduled to take place on Thursday 11th March 2010 at the University of the West Indies, St Augustine, Trinidad. Visit the Code Jam Competition section for more details or join the group "Teleios Code Jam 2010" on Facebook.

With a mission to write software to run the world, Teleios Systems is changing the way we view software development locally. From creating custom internet solutions for a range of industries to the creation of the MessageCentral Mobile Messaging Service Delivery Platform, Teleios is making a name in the information and communications technology sector. Another innovative step was taken with the decision to host the first local programming competition, opened to local software developers. The first Teleios Code Jam focused on the creation of innovative SMS applications.

The final phase of the competition took place on 31 October 2008 as part of the Caribbean Internet Forum’s 6th annual conference. Themed Mobile Internet for Development, the CIF conference showcased a research project facilitated by the use of the Teleios MessageCentral platform. The Code Jam Showdown was the culmination of the conference, where qualifying teams participated in the development of SMS based applications using the Teleios Software Development Kit. Using this and other resources available, participants were required to design creative, novel and potentially useful applications driven primarily by SMS.

The day of the showdown saw five teams competing in the final round. The teams at the finals included 4 from UWI and 1 from The University of the Southern Caribbean. An interesting addition was the presence of a non-competing team from Teleios comprised of the developers who work on the MessageCentral platform. Following a presentation by Microsoft -one of the sponsors of the event- on development tools, teams set to work writing code to create their applications and structure their presentations in the five hour timeframe.

Dr Michael Hosein, lecturer in the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science along with Microsoft Architect Evangelist, Neeala Maharaj-Racha and Ryan Shripat, Solutions Consultant at Teleios sat on the judging panel for the event. Chosen for their years of expertise in the area of software development, they were given the task of assessing the submissions based on their Creativity, Novelty, Solution Architecture and User Experience. This assessment would determine the grand prize winning team who would walk away with $4,000 cash, mobile phones from Bmobile, Microsoft Learning book packs, Microsoft Game Studios games and software.

The team from University of the Southern Caribbean emerged first place winners with their presentation of a National Emergency Management Application which addressed the need for handling the risk imposed by a disaster to communication. Their project involved the use of SMS to transfer information to meteorological services, protective services, disaster management personnel and affected citizens along with regular bulletins, shelter locations and community feedback options all relayed by text messages. Other entries included an SMS medical alert system, an auto theft response system and an SMS greeting service. The judges were impressed with the uniqueness of the ideas coming from the participants, and they were encouraged to take their ideas further, since many of the presentations could be crafted as solutions to businesses. 

Many of the participating student teams were happy for the opportunity to participate in the first ever local competition of this type, making mention of the experience they gained in managing a technical team. Teleios was credited with having an interesting software platform for them to work with and the availability of good supporting documentation and demonstration of the tools available for download. One team of avid programmers simply stated they participated to have fun and were excited at the thought of participating in future Code Jams.

Teleios MessageCentral is an enabling platform for mobile network operators. With connections to the mobile networks of both Bmobile and Digicel, MessageCentral enables a range of value added mobile messaging services while maintaining security and control.  The SDK then opens up the MessageCentral platform to 3rd party application developers with their own innovative ideas and development capabilities. Why do that? For Teleios, this introduces the exciting concept of creating a mobile messaging ecosystem locally, consisting of the platform, application development, content aggregation and mobile infrastructure. What this all means is a world of mobile content services that spans many technologies and businesses.

The USC team - eventual winners, had as their slogan “Driven by Passion, Powered by Intellect” which expressed the desire of Teleios to encourage the local developer community. Doing its part to facilitate the development of the local software industry has long been a key Teleios objective. The Teleios Code Jam is just one initiative in seeing that desire come to pass. It is that passion to create that Teleios hopes to stir and encourage.