Whisper

Authors

Project Overview

For our final project at Makers Academy we have built a mobile messaging app with end-to-end encryption. As we wanted to build an iOS app, we used Swift and the XCode IDE. We also used Ruby developed our own server with a websocket. This allowed our app to sustain bi-directional communication between app users in real time. This server is hosted remotely on Heroku.

The github repository for the web socket we built and used can be found here.

Working Methodologies

Agile
XP Values
Daily Stand-ups (10:00) and Retros (17:30)
Pairing (Aiming to switch driver every 15-20 minutes)
A separate git branches for each new feature
Consulting team before merging pull requests
TDD & BDD. Aiming for 100% test coverage
Focusing on communication with an open dialogue policy

Tech Stack

Swift
XCTest (App-side Unit and Feature Tests)
Firebase (database)
Ruby
Sinatra
RSpec
SimpleCov

User Stories

MVP

As a user,
So that I can use Whisper,
I need to create a username

As a user,
So that I can use Whisper,
I need to sign in with my username

As a user,
So that I can start a conversation,
I need to view a list of my current conversations

As a user,
So that I can start a conversation,
I need to be able to send a message to another user

As a user,
So that I can maintain a conversation,
I need to be able to receive a message from another user

As a user,
So I know who I got the message from
I would like to see the username of the user next to the message

Additional Features

As a user,
So that my messages are completely secure,
I want my messages to be encrypted

As a user,
So that I know my password is secure,
I want my password to be encrypted before storing it on the database

Features We Would Add Given More Time

As a user,
So that my identity is completely secure,
I want my IP address to be encrypted

As a user,
So that the identity of my contacts is completely secure,
I want all metadata to be encrypted

As a user,
So nobody else can read my conversations,
I want my message history to delete when I exit the app

As a user,
So that I am not restricted to only text messages,
I want to be able to send media messages

As a user,
So that I know when my message has been delivered,
I want to see a 'delivered' label under my messages

As a user,
So that I know when my message has been read,
I want to see a 'read' label under my message

As a user,
So I know when I sent a message,
I want to see a timestamp on the message

Running The App Locally

Clone the repository

$ git clone git@github.com:lucyborthwick/Whisper.git

Run the app by opening the project file in Xcode, running pod install and clicking the play button.

$ cd ../Whisper
$ open Whisper.xcworkspace
$ pod install

Run our tests by pressing cmd + u whilst the project is open in Xcode.

Architecture

UI

cdunham1989/Whisper