Looks like the Android Market Publisher Site ist finally showing the comments for Applications. As far as I can see there are not all comments shown, but I can’t tell for sure if they are limited by time or count. At least the Comments are shown for every Language.

seems like many People also like the concept of my roidizer App. Ok I’m just a copycat, the app is obviously strongly inspired by the Polarize iPhone App but in my Opinion such an App was missing on the Android Market.

The Actual Version as I write this Blog Post ist 1.1 which already has some key features I want to deliver:

• a share button
• select between different fonts
• adjust the color effect

The things I want to do next are:

• Make the Share Button work with the Gmail App (thank you Google for the great Documentation on those Intents) perhaps I use some Facebook and Twitter API Library directly instead, I don’t know yet.
• add more Fonts! If you have a Font you want in the App just contact me, if the License fits I put it in instantly otherwise I try to contact the author
• adjusting the color effect on the taken picture directly
• adjust the contrast/brightness of the Polaroid frame or choose between different ones (also contact me or send me something if you want it in the app)
• deal with crashes, memory and fragmentation issues
• add a custom image capture activity so that I don’t depend on the poor implemented Camera Capture Intent by Google (might also fix some fragmentation and memory issues)

Further in the Future and when there’s a noticeable user base I do some more improvements like zooming, cropping and moving the image manually.

I will NOT implement a shake it function which makes you look like you are jerking your phone off while taking pictures!

Now some Pictures:

• take a pictue (oh yeah there should be an Intent for that)
• do some image magic
• store the image to the gallery (there should also be an Intent for that?)

Sounds really easy does it? Ok well…

The first problem I stumbled upon was that the default capture Intent only delivers very small images, on the Milestone even much smaller than the actual screen resolution. Yeah frack that … so I tried to implement my own Capture Activity. The preview video stream showed up nicely on the screen, at least if you hold your phone straight in Landscape. Because if you turn it a bit around the image perspective was distorted. Ok back to the Intent and deal with the resolution Issue later. To use the Intent you have to supply a uri where the captured image is stored, guess that’s ok because I can delete it afterwards. OHAI, I’m the Motorola Milestone and I’m storing also a higher resolution Image to the Media Store but don’t respond within the code with any Information about that. OHAI I’m the HTC Hero and I’m not storing the image to the supplied uri, except I’m putting it in the Media Store and return the Content URI for that. Now thats what I call FRACKmentation!

Ok second Step, image magic, well I’m not that experienced with advanced image processing, so I guess to put a full resolution camera image as a Bitmap in the memory is [OutOfMemoryException]

Okay at least there’s a simple Method for inserting an image into the Media Gallery… oh the date is not set okay then .. yeah … oh .. uhm. Okay put all this stuff in some ContentValues, obtain a uri via the Ressources and store the image via streams bla bla OHAI I’m the HTC sense and don’t show any frackin images you put into the Media Store. But if you just trigger the Media Store Scanner with some wired code theres no problem. Luckily Vodafone had some devices around on the Droidcon so I could do a bit bugfixing there.

To be honest I don’t own an Android Phone, sadly I missed the Developer Labs in Berlin and also couldn’t attend the DLD. It seems to me that Google is handing out Devices to everyone except Developers. Well ok that’s fine I just borrow sometimes a G1 or a Milestone from the Office and test my Apps on them.

From the Emails I get there are Issues with the “Droid Eris” / “HTC Eris” and the “SonyEricssonE10i”. Sadly I can’t test my App on every device because I can’t afford to buy them to test a small free app.

So Google please admit that there’s an Fragmentation Problem and then frackin DO something about it.

ps. auf der Droidcon gab es in der Conference Bag noch Electric Bugs, ein kleines Video von meinem gibts bei pkc im Blog

The Intent Action is:
org.scholt.mobile.schedulebot.action.Schedule

The Available Extras are:

• org.scholt.mobile.schedulebot.extra.SCHEDULE
• org.scholt.mobile.schedulebot.extra.SCHEDULE_WITH_UPDATE

you have to supply the schedule id with this extra, the second one forces an update of all sources before diplaying the schedule.

I’m still working on the App, adding own Schedule Sources is my top priority.

• manage the schedule sources
• set the update intervall
• adjust the font size

Eventually I will add zxing support to add new URLs easily via barcode. I also want to say that it is my goal to make this app server indipendent. At this time I’m maintaining only some events in germany, but you could create the Source XML on your own and add it as source in the next version. I’m also thinking about a simple tool which allows you to create those XML files a bit faster and offer more comfort than hacking XML. The XML should be self explaining, but if you have Questions don’t hesitate to contact me.

I’m also aware of 2 Bugs, which will be fixed in the next Version:

• if you receive an schedule update the session selections are lost
• the overview list position is not correctly after selecting a session

You are welcome to post feedback, critic or ideas.

Das Projekt ist sozusagen die Weiterentwicklung von meinem MobileCamper den ich auf dem Barcamp in Hamburg letztes Jahr (bchh08) vorgestellt habe. Gleich vorweg ich bin mit dem Projekt noch nicht so weit wie ich es mir erhofft habe, allerdings ist das Programm wesentlich benutzbarer als der Prototyp vom letzten Jahr. Was fehlt ist noch:

• Die Möglichkeit die Quellfeeds im Programm zu verwalten, was ich definitiv machen werde.
• Ein Editor zum erstellen der Datenfiles. Die Datenfiles sind ganz normale XML Dateien die vom Programm geparst werden. Ich werde eventuell noch ein Java Tool schreiben, aber definitiv keine Webapp.
• Ein Ordentlicher Name für das Programm so wie ein Logo, Splash, usw. allerdings nur wenn mich da jemand unterstützen will
• Euer Feedback

Wie installieren? Auf dem entsprechendem Gerät einfach im Browser http://scholt.org/mcdd09 aufrufen und auf den Android oder J2ME Link klicken.

Hinweis (für Leute ohne Flatrate oder so) die Programme rufen den Sessionplan beim ersten start und beim durchführen des Updates aus dem Netz ab, es fällt also ein bisschen Traffic an (im ein bis höchstens zweistelligem KB Bereich pro Abruf).

Info zur J2ME Version: Das Programm ist von der Dateigröße leider etwas groß, was den Hintergrund hat das ich LWUIT (GUI Framework) und kXML (XML Parser) benutzt habe. Falls genügend Interesse an einer schlanken J2ME Version besteht werde ich evtl. mein eigenes GUI “Framework” aus der Mobile Camper Version weiterentwickeln.
Lauffähig sollte die J2ME Version theoretisch auf allen Geräten sein die Java unterstützen, also die gängigen Nokia, SonyEricsson, Samsung, LG, usw.
Praktisch ist das ganze natürlich nicht so einfach, daher probiert es aus und gebt mir bitte Feedback.

Info zur Android Version: die Applikation ist jetzt unsigniert und vor der Installation muss man vorher falls nicht schon geschehen explizit freischalten das nicht signierte Anwendungen installiert werden dürfen. Falls genügend Interesse daran besteht werde ich die app auch mal auf den Android Market stellen (wozu ich allerdings erst n developer Account brauche etc).

So dann, vielleicht sieht man sich ja dieses Wochenende auf dem mobilecamp!

Update 25.04.2009 13:47 kleiner Bugfix für die Android Version, neue Version ist: 0.1.2 beta