autograph–a Windows Phone app

 

I am proud to present my 11th Windows Phone app – autograph. You guessed it right. This is an autograph collection app. As one of my reviewers aptly put it, it is paperless memories.

Now, you don’t have to worry carrying those books around, and you don’t have to go searching for that piece of paper when you bump into Harrison Ford, or the One Direction boys. Your favorite celebrities, your friends, your family, all in one place – in the autograph app.

In-app purchases in TheHinduLife app

The new update for TheHinduLife Windows Phone app has 2 new features:


1. The ability to get rid of all the ads displayed at the bottom
2. The ability to pin any deity (or deities) to the home screen, as a live tile. The pinned tile is a Flip Tile, which can be set to 3 sizes. I am sure you will love this one.

WhatsNew - a nuget package

Inspired from Igor Ralic's ReviewBugger open source nuget package for windows phone, I set out to create a NuGet package called WhatsNew. I had posted before about the good habits of a good app in the store. Any app. Any store. One of them is notifying the user of what you did as a developer for the new update. A synopsis in few lines. I always appreciate when an app which I use tells me what to look for. Letting the users know that you had fixed the bug A which was bothering them (and you) for a while, and the feature C that you had been planning for while has been added, would be really welcoming.

So, here it is. WhatsNew, for Windows Phone. My first cut on creating a NuGet Package.  It is available HERE. You may either install using the Package Manager Console or the Manage Package Manager option in Visual Studio.

Installing WhatsNew from the Nuget package console.

Installing WhatsNew from the Package Manager

Once you install WhatsNew, two things happen.
1. A WhatsNew.cs class gets installed into your project folder.
2. Coding4Fun Toolkit assembly gets installed, and referenced. This is because WhatsNew uses Coding4Fun Toolkit's, About prompt.

WhatsNew Usage

Once you get everything set, place the below code in either your MainPage.xaml.cs constructor, or the Loaded event handler. I prefer the later.

That is all!

But, What's the catch?

Well, it's not a catch. Just that you need to see that you update the VersionNumber for every update. It is that property WhatsNew verifies to see whether to display the WhatsNew dialog or not. So VersionNumber is import. Do not forget to update it.

So, what happens next?

Nothing much. :) Once the user starts the app, for every first time use of every update, a dialog similar to the one below would appear (note the Title, Message and VersionNumber (down below) that we added in our code above.).

WhatsNew Prompt

Can I modify the WhatsNew class?

Sure you can! It is completely open source.

Thank you, Thank you!

I wouldn't have completed this without the help of these references. (And my wife and my daughter, who let me spend time this full Sunday on this endeavor.)
Igor's wonderful inspiring post.
Nuget Documentation
Scott Hanselman's post on creating Nuget Packages


Now, what are you waiting for, go download it and give your app users a better experience with this feature.
  

 

The Hindu Life - Revived

The Windows Phone app, TheHinduLife, is being revived.

• More prayers added to the prayer section
• A new Prayer Index page added for easy selection of prayers
• A tiny re-design. Its a better feel.

With this app, I have also started a habit of notifying the user(s) of the new features being added to every update.

This is a continuation... more contents to follow...

Download TheHinduLife from Windows Phone Store

Poll: Innovation is accidental, not intentional

Today, I had a discussion with one of my colleagues that every firm should let their employees spend some time in their work day to work on side projects they are passionate about. If you look at various innovation (including this blog engine - blogger) came out of side projects people were passionate about.

Innovation is accidental, not intentional.

 I thought of getting your views about it. Here is the poll. Please participate and also engage in some creative discussion on the subject.

Innovation is accidental, not intentional

Getting content inside a table cell using jQuery

I had a requirement of extracting the contents inside a table cell.
Suppose we have a table like below:

Here I am

Simple enough, the jQuery script goes like:

var tdContent = $('.someCSS').context.innerHtml();

Lo! We get the "Here I am" text.

The Honeymoon is over!

The Honeymoon is over for Windows Phone developers!! Windows Phone has now started to be seen as a serious platform by consumers. More and more people have started to compare Windows Phone to other mobile platforms. So, it is time for us developers to get serious too. 

When the WP evagelists yell at us everytime to concentrate on DESIGN, DESIGN and DESIGN, they mean it. Mom and Pop apps don't get downloaded anymore. We need some good looking, vert inviting apps, which has a very rich User Experience. 

Most of my apps have an ok UX, but not to the level I expect it to be. Before delving into developing new apps,  I have decided to get them a face-lift. First in my list was HowManyThings. The re-designed app is in the marketplace now. You can download this "here".

Apart from a great user interface, what else do we need to have in an app that will enhance the user experience?

ReviewBugger
When a WP user searches for an app, it is the reviews that they trust. More often than you think they do. Reviews are also an easiest way to get feedback from your consumers. They tell what is working and what they are frustrated with. So, it is very important for a developer to succeed to have more reviews. Most of the users forget to place a review - they have other important things to do, right? So, we should prompt/request them to review our app. In a nice way. For that I use Igor Ralic's ReviewBugger package. You can get that from Nuget. Link is http://www.nuget.org/packages/ReviewBugger/. It is well documented and very easy to implement.

My setup is, a request is displayed asking the user whether he/she would like to review the app, once the user has visited the app 10 times. 


UpdateNotification
If the user launches your app, for the first time, you would want to welcome them, thanking them for using the app, and briefly tell them what major features are there in the app. A simple message box with on "OK" button. This gets useful to the users when they are launching the app first time after an update has been applied. You could explain the new features added and what bugs you fixed. It shows that you are caring for the users, than just dumping out updates after updates (which is good in a way:)).

About page
I have seen many apps without an About page. This section does tell the user all about you and the app. I use a package called Peter Kuhn's YLAD (Your Last About Dialog). It is also available in Nuget: http://www.nuget.org/packages/YLAD/.  (What will we do without Nuget, rt?) 

I usually include the following in my About section:
--> About the app - I explain what the app is all about, briefly.
--> About Me - I give out my contact details - websites/blogs/email id. This will be helpful for the users to get in touch with me.
--> Release Notes - I mention all the versions and all the major changes and features added in each versions.
--> Credits - I give credits to the co-developers and designers that helped me in developing the app. Or for that matter, anyone who have helped.
--> Help - Any help notes. Instructions for the users, particularly if you have any advanced features.

Live Tiles
Depending on the nature of the app, if you feel this is an extra feature and is not to be part of the minimum viable product, then you could add this as a in-app purchase.
You need not add Live tiles just for the sake of it.


Do you have anything else that you do in your apps?