Acpol EB

The challenge

Acpol EB wanted to give its students a fun, interactive way to practise outside the classroom, accessible from anywhere. The goal was to complement theory material with gamified practice and peer-to-peer competition, supporting iOS and Android users competing in the same session in real time. That required a robust native iOS app, with carefully designed UX and a low-latency communication layer with the backend.

The solution

AtalayaSoft took ownership of the full iOS development of Acpol EB, end-to-end, for iPhone and iPad. Francisco José García Navarro led the project as senior iOS engineer. The scope was structured in three functional blocks:

1. End-to-end iOS app development

Acting as the project's senior iOS reinforcement, AtalayaSoft owned the full product build. The scope included:

• Random short exams with automatic grading.
• Theory notes and detailed reviews of past exams.
• Individual performance statistics for tracking progress over time.
• Universal iPhone + iPad support with UI adapted to each device.
• App Store publication and maintenance throughout the product's lifetime.

2. Cross-platform real-time competition

The most technically demanding block: enabling iOS and Android students to compete in the same live session, seeing their opponent's answers and standings in real time. The solution included:

• Socket-based communication against a shared backend serving both iOS and Android.
• Real-time synchronization across heterogeneous devices, with no reliance on third-party gaming/realtime SDKs.
• Robust handling of disconnects, reconnects and intermediate match states.
• UX tuned to keep a smooth gamified experience even under variable mobile latency.

3. Product iteration and project closure

After the initial release, the product kept iterating based on real student feedback, reaching a second version with improvements to features, UX adjustments and updates for newer iOS releases. Acpol EB is no longer available on the App Store.