Apple felicitates Indian origin student for developing a COVID-19 social distancing simulator; invites to WWDC 2020

A Computer Science and Business student has been selected for the Apple Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC) 2020 after he submitted a  COVID-19 simulator for the WWDC Scholarship. This social distancing simulator attempts to show users the effects they have on public health by social distancing.

Dave Jha, a student of Lehigh University in Pennsylvania, US, shared the news of his selection on Twitter. He developed a COVID-19 Social Distancing Simulator that has the ability to toggle speed, number of people, asymptomatic conditions, social distancing, forced distancing, and a game mode. People were represented as tiny dots in the simulator.

I never imagined this would happen.

Beyond excited to share that I been selected for a @Apple WWDC20 Swift Student Challenge award. This has been a dream come true since watching WWDC keynotes in middle school.#SwiftStudentChallenge#WWDC20#WWDC2020pic.twitter.com/qkD9qfOtNr — Dave Jha (@dave_jha) June 17, 2020

Jha also uploaded a demo video showcasing the simulation. In the nearly-4-minutes long video, various features like enabling asymptomatic people, social distancing, forced distancing, etc., are demonstrated. There is also a game mode that lets you control the dot and try to avoid any contact with other people in the simulator.

Jha, who also intends on minoring in Entrepreneurship, has worked on several other projects. One of his projects includes PPE4NYC, which was developed to provide Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) during the coronavirus pandemic. The website attracted over USD 5,000 in donations and hundreds of masks to the local police and hospitals.