Advanced Multimedia Authoring

For the week of 12/5 – 12/9.

This week was crunch time and we still had a lot of problems to fix, but Michael came through and fixed virtually all of the bugs that were plaguing us the prior week. The app no longer had visual or performance issues and we were almost ready to throw it into Phonegap/Xcode again. Before that happened we had a few minor things to finish up within the app like filling out the About page and creating a few more size variations for the icons and splash pages. I also spent this week redesigning the buttons used to show/hide the markers on our map. Beyond that, we were finished.

Will is having us submit the code to him so he can import it into the most recent version of  Xcode/Phonegap since none of us have access to it. Hopefully the problems I had when importing it earlier are sorted out by our bug fixing and utilizing the newest version. If everything goes well we should have a completed app shortly.

Now that we are essentially done with the app, I have reflected a bit on the process of creating it. I think there were a few flaws in the course structure that made it more difficult than it should have. Having more time to develop and more involvement with the jquery mobile framework would have been very helpful. I’m actually pretty surprised that all three groups were able to finish what are pretty full-featured apps in such a short amount of time with a small group that had no previous experience doing such a thing. If I had to do it all over again I would’ve liked to have spent more time both designing the app and working within the mobile framework. In the end, I’m just happy that we finished what could potentially be a really useful app and I hope to see it on the App Store.

For the week of 11/28 – 12/2.

Instead of being easy, the implementation of location aware tracking of the user on the map became a big problem. For some reason I couldn’t get the various templates for doing such a thing to work within the framework I was using. After lots of trial and error using a handful of different code snippets in various ways and locations within the framework I wasn’t really getting anywhere. No matter what I did it just didn’t seem to be working, but I sent my code off to Michael to implement into the app anyway.

Interestingly enough, when Michael sent me an early example of the code I took a look at it at home and suddenly the location tracking was working. I have no idea what the cause was, and it still doesn’t seem to work in some browsers/locations, but this was good enough for the time being and it wasn’t our biggest problem.

This week was marked by lots of problems with our mobile framework code. There were lots of minor coding bugs that were hard to detect but were causing lots of annoying visual/performance issues within the app. Unfortunately, by the end of the week we still didn’t have solutions to many of our problems and we were nearing the end of our time. I attempted to put everything into Xcode/Phonegap (v. 3.2)  just to see what would happen and was presented with a couple build errors buried deep within the javascript of third-party code. Since I wasn’t really sure what I was doing and Will was out of town I had to just leave it at that and hope that we could solve all of the problems by next week.

For the week of 11/14 – 11/18.

After finally finishing cataloging all of the various map data I started delving into the Google Map API this week. While it was trivial to get a basic map created using templates provided by Will and on the internet, it quickly became apparent that I needed something more complex to accomplish what I wanted to do with the map. Since the number of data points (locations) I had gathered for the map was around 50, a simple map just passively displaying markers for all of them wasn’t possible. Instead, I had to search for a method on the internet that allowed me to control the visibility of groups of markers so a user could display or not display them at their leisure.

After several hours of looking for a method of hiding and showing predefined groups of markers with a button click I finally found one that worked. This method created category variables that markers could be classified under. It then used a variable that would grab all of the markers associated with a given variable and turn the display property on or off. After I found this method it simply came down to importing all of the location points into the framework. This was a very time consuming process as every location needed a variable associated with it that contained several pieces of information such as the category it belonged to, the icon associated with it and any links that it would contain. Additionally, variables had to be created for every icon (several dozen different icons were used) and every link.

By the end of the week I was quite happy with my progress. I had completed importing and formatting all location data into the framework, found and implemented all of the icons and created working links for the building icons. At this point the map was pretty close to being completed. I only had to implement a location aware feature for tracking the users’ location on the map which I felt would be fairly simple.

My biggest wish on this app was that we had more time to work on it. While we worked hard on it, we feel we could have produced a better app, had we more time. For example – I think the navigation (organization with drop down menus) is clunky and that we need a back button. I would have liked to do more with the design and content as well.

I’m afraid that the only thing I can say I took away from this class is a VERY basic understanding of HTML5 and an introduction to CSS3. I don’t think I learned anything in jquery, javascript, phonegap, or xcode. Why? because my contribution to the app didn’t make use of those aspects. One could say that it’s mine own fault that I didn’t develop these tools during the project, but we can only have so many people doing code.

What I also missed out on was that I didn’t get to develop skills in coding or javascript for this app. I took on design and content, because I’m good at that and wanted to give the team what I was best at, but I would have liked to learn the other aspects of building the app.

While we did our best with the time we had to complete the app, there are members of our group who don’t even want to show our app to others or take credit for it because we do feel like we could have done so much better, given more time.

I am pleased with what I put into it. I worked hard. . . . . I just wish I had more to show for it – or that I had learned more.

The last couple of weekends were spent prepping this bad boy for x-code and the itunes store. I worked on making some more images in that sepia tone, and also making the website that houses images and showcases our app. I used colors directly from the app to make it mesh well. The map was done already so I didn’t need to anything on that end which was nice. Todd spent a lot of his time working on the x-code part and he did an amazing job with that. Overall this was definitely a learning experience that I won’t forget.

Here is a link to the basic website that is show casing our app with images: www.dtc-wsuv.org/sclem/Highway30

During the Thanksgiving break, I installed a slightly newer version of Xcode, as well as Phone Gap, in order to properly test our app. This first round of testing was to determine how the layout of the images, the buttons, swiping of pages, etc. were working and what Zak and Mike needed to do to fix the coding. It took some time figuring out how to insert the coding into Phone Gap, but I eventually figured out how it worked. There did end up being issues with the size of pictures, navigation, and various pages not functioning so I sent those notes back to Zak and Mike for them to look at and hopefully fix.

At that point all of the app content was finished and all that was left to do was material to send to the store app. I finished the information for the Apple store last week, along with the various icons that were needed. Zak and Mike were still working on the app and on Thursday, they stated that there were issues with the app that they were trying to resolve. This led to contacting Luers over the weekend in the hope that we could get help with the bugs. Another task that I was given was to create the WSU Vancouver Tour App support site. I finished the site layout and it is set up to provide instructions for how to use the app, but I need to be able to take screenshots as a sort of “How to Use” before it is completely done. My goal is to do that Thursday and finish the site Thursday night.

Since Tuesday was the Second Story tour in Portland, I did not confirm the status of the app until yesterday. Now that the app’s coding has been dealt with, the goal for Thursday is to get the app in to Xcode and package the app for the possibility of sending it still to the Apple store. I don’t know if we will be able to, but it would be great if we could.

It has been quite the challenging semester, especially with a project that required developing and eventually packaging a phone app that could be used by a certain number of people. I don’t know if our app will actually be sent out to the Apple Store or, even if it does, if it will be accepted, but it is quite the accomplishment to say that I participated in the production of a phone app. Zak and Mike have been great to work with over the semester and I really appreciate their work and the skill that has been put into coding and establishing the functionality of the app.

I hope that everyone has had a great semester and I hope that everyone also has a safe, wonderful break.

The trip to Second Story was educational. It was funny to see the Mt. St. Helens project and compare it to ours. I was amazed at how most of their work is done in flash still. It makes some of these projects out there seem feasible for me to do. However, I was blown away by the amount of research and data that goes into a project of that nature. I usually don’t think of digital media projects as being much more than pretty things and the content is supplied or developed elsewhere. I thought the 3D maps were unique and I was surprised to hear they were developed from data. I live near Mt. St. Helens so I intend to go check one of these projects out soon.

I’m interested to see the final product if it lives up to our expectations. I really like the design, but I had a totally different idea in mind when we were originally planning. It’s great to see how something can develop working in a group. I have had several group projects this term and all of them evolve into something I couldn’t have conceived at the beginning. I wish we had more time to develop these projects as I think many of them could end up being professional and marketable.

it was really hard to find info on some of the lesser volcanoes in the area. The Joseph-Wood Hill park section was very difficult. The big ones were easy: Mt. St. Helens, Ranier, Adams, Hood. I think part of it is because they are considered active or dormant and not extinct. Nothing peaks interest like the threat of impending doom. I hope our app will help people understand the area better and give them a glimpse of what we get to see everyday.

I helped write the content for the volcano app. It was really interesting to learn about each volcano and it’s history in the process. I think the most interesting thing was the potential destructive power of Mt. Ranier. When/if it erupts it won’t have much of a pyroclastic cloud, but it will have a “lahar,” which is a massive mud flow described as a 30 foot deep, 50 mph, wall of concrete racing down the mountain to puget sound. People living in the area would have about 45 minutes to escape.