This is just a quick status update on Gas Up…
The basic application concept is nearing completion, and I’ve managed to get server data to the app and properly processed once there. I’ve still got a lot of server-app communication code to work out and implement, but everything is going pretty smoothly. The biggest headache I’ve had so far was getting a spinner (drop down menu) control to get data from a content provider (database access point more or less) and display it properly. With the exception of one line of code, my code was correct. The problem was that I was under the impression that the spinner needed me to provide a text view which it would use to write data; it turns out it already has one, and I had to specify it in just the right place… Needless to say, that wasted about two days of my development time…
Nonetheless, I’ll post a pair of screen shots here later.
Oh, and I’m having trouble finding people to test the application and be early adopters… Maybe it’s just that I’m not drawing much attention to this site (as in none at the moment), or perhaps it’s that I’m not using the proper marketing methods. I’d hate for this app to get uploaded to the Android Market with absolutely no data but that little amount I can put in myself… The comments and ratings will be brutal, but ultimately I don’t really care about those right now. Once the app is live, and people are hopefully entering data on a regular basis, then I’ll care.
Screen shots as promised. The first is a screen shot from my Nexus One. It’s showing an overlay icon somewhere over Mexico, but that’s beside the point. Th
e screen shot is merely to give an idea of what to expect… 🙂 With this screen shot, you see two of the three tabs that are present in the application; the third one, Donate, is currently disabled despite being complete. (There’s just no point in having the donations system enabled when the application has no data and no users.)
The application starts up on the Stations tab and theoretically will display gas stations within the viewing range of the map. Scroll the map around or zoom in and out, and the results will change. Eventually.
The second tab, Submit Price, is shown in this screen shot from the emulator. (I don’t have that screenshot app on my phone, yet, and I didn’t want to take a screen shot that would include my home address, so I used the emulator and the longitude & latitude of a gas station known to me.)
This tab includes everything you need to submit a gas price back to the system. ALWAYS SUBMIT THE PRICE WHILE YOU ARE AT THE GAS STATION! Note the address listed for “Associated Address”. This is submitted to the server as the recorded location of the gas station being entered. Unless you want to share your address with everyone, submit at the gas station! (Admittedly, no one will know it’s your particular address, but I won’t be held responsible for angry and confused gas seekers showing up at your house in the middle of the night.)