Android shot timer
Reader Cyrus asks:
what are the features you would want in a shot timer on a phone?
I am working on learning to program in andriod, and i think this would be a good project.
8 Responses to “Android shot timer”
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April 22nd, 2010 at 10:50 am
Woo-hoo!I was just looking over a post reviewing some of the timers available for the iphone & thinking how Android could really use some lovin!
While I haven’t used a shot timer yet, I had been thinking seriously about getting one, but putting it off hoping one would show up in the market. There is one which states beta, but I have not tried it yet.
Since I am not the most experienced with a timer, I’d recommend reviewing the ones out for iphone & other devices, as well as the dedicated devices out there (esp. those in use in competitions) to get a feel for what is desired & what is needed, I do know that the review I saw stated that the free versions were pretty much as good for most folks as the paid versions. Personally I’d ask you to support as many versions of Android & it’s host devises as you can, & not forget there are lots of us out here still on 1st. gen devises, many who run custom roms, I personally run Cyanogenmod on my G1 (probably the most popular custom firmware), & was browsing my RSS feeds on it when I came across this post 🙂 Also, how ’bout something like “shot timer” in the title, no dashes or other things that throw off the weak search abilities of the Android market.
I know those things sound trite, but you’d be surprised how many good apps are overlooked because the devs skipped the simple stuff.
Good luck & kudos for this project!! I can’t wait to give it a whirl!
calam
April 22nd, 2010 at 11:20 am
Thanks for the input, calam.
April 22nd, 2010 at 11:32 am
Oh, almost forgot… as stated earlier, I run a custom rom with apps to sd & a 16GB sd card(1GB avail for apps), so it wont affect me much, but most users have a space limitation issue, so if possible, if the app is large in size (more than a mb or two at most), some of the program data can be stored on the sd card, such as if it tracks & graphs logs or uses large sound files, etc.
April 22nd, 2010 at 11:43 am
The big advantage you’ll have with the Android is that the speaker doesn’t suck. I can barely hear the iPhone’s anemic speaker on a busy range through the earmuffs. Make the buzzer loud!
April 22nd, 2010 at 11:46 am
@Sebastian does your program, export your data? Would that be useful. For example, exporting the data directly to google docs or to a CSV file.
April 22nd, 2010 at 2:03 pm
I want one that compensates for the size of my penis, turns me into a point-and-click sniper taking down jetliners and armored cars at half a mile, and causes PSH when the media finds out it is in the Android store.
April 22nd, 2010 at 4:42 pm
There’s a beta of a shot timer in the Android Marketplace…
Haven’t tried it, so I can’t say how it is.
April 23rd, 2010 at 9:35 am
You’re ahead out of the gate since you’re working on a device with an actual, you know, UI. I’ve been programming for 10 years, have a mechanical engineering degree, and my CED8000 make me feel like a moron. I could never learn the up-up-down-up-right-right-left-down special moves in mortal combat either…
ANYWAY, stay basic to begin with. Nail the random start buzzer code and its start up configuration UI. Then keep a scrolling list of time between shots (splits) with a total time from buzzer at the bottom next to a big simple RESET button. Then add a PAR timer that doesn’t limit how many seconds you can configure. Get the fonts and feel worked out with that and go use it yourself for a while. Big buttons and solid sound/tone control, that doesn’t f-up the other notifications on the device, will be critical.
Find a way to store data on the SD card in a computer parsable format (JSON, YAML, TAB delimited or, ugh, XML) and you’ve got 80% of the 80/20 rule easy. If the device stores the data on SD, other groups can find a way to come a get it off the phone for display at matches or whatever. Heck, Android already supports web servers and FTP. You shouldn’t need to worry about publishing data if it ever gets that big.