Local android application store with mobile money payments.

Abstract

The use of smart Android devices in Uganda has greatly increased over a few years due to their affordability, availability and functionality. Users interact with android devices through applications, commonly called “apps”, which are either pre-installed by the manufacturer (System Apps) or are downloaded by the user. Apps can be free, or paid, depending on the vendor. Google Play is the premier store for all Android applications, offering a vast amount of apps for entertainment, utilities, messaging, business, gaming, and other sub-categories. However, there are other app stores like Mobogenie, Samsung Galaxy Apps, Amazon App Store. Free apps generally do trivial tasks like messaging, music, video and games. Paid apps do offer more services, in terms of functionality, for example medical services, and the purchase of digital content. These apps are really cheap, they cost in the range of $0.5-$3 for a one-time purchase. However, the payment methods available on app stores cannot be used by the Android phone owner’s in Uganda, being a cash driven economy, with an extremely small percentage of users managing to own a debit/credit card, let alone the fact that even some local banks like Centenary Bank do not support the use of debit and credit cards. This project was therefore aimed at developing an Android App Store that use the mobile money service as a payment system for the purchase of paid apps. The work is arranged mainly in six chapters, Chapter one includes the introduction of the Project. Chapter two discusses the literature related to the system, Chapter three illustrates the methodologies used in coming up with the working prototype of the system, Chapter four includes system design and analysis, Chapter five contains the implementation and testing of the system and chapter six contains the sum mary of the work, discussions and recommendations.