Database Develop

Dishpointer app. Anyine use it?

I am currently deployed to Afghanistan with the USAF, and one of the large parts of my job is setting up satellite dishes so our guys in the little out of the way Combat outposts and forward operating bases can watch the game on sundays. Well, sometimes being out in the middle of nowhere it can be tough to get the exact alignment for a bird. I'm considering the Dishpointer app in the market, but trying to figure out of it's worth the $20 that it costs. The last place we were at we had to stay 2 extra days trying to align the dish only to find out that we couldn't get line of sight due to the mountains all around. If I had the app, which I found out about after we left, I could've been done the first day and gotten out of harms way that much sooner. (We had intel that 130 taliban were preparing to overrun the base, and we were only less than 70 guys strong.)
Anyways, back to my question. Has anyone used this? It sounds almost too good to be true from the descriptions I'm seeing. Any feedback anyone can give would be much appreciated.

Wonder if it actually works myself.

We have developed the app with exactly such cases in mind: determine line of sight issues before assembling the dish thus saving time and hassle.
The app is dead on accurate if the internal compass is accurate but you also have the option to manually correct the internal compass if for example your manual compass gives better readings (You guys have probably the best compasses out there).
Remember, you can always test the app for 24hrs and return it if, for any reason, you're not happy with it.
Any questions feel free to contact us.

Cool. I'll be trying this out on my next trip. After that I'll make sure to write a review telling everyone how it goes and maybe upload some some pics as well of a setup that I do.

[APP] auto-mate first showing of features

Hi all
I've been a member of XDA for a while (have a hero and been on the villanrom builds since they began). But I am a developer full time and so I have decided to start in Windows Phone 7. I know silverlight, I know .NET so why not.
I have started the company 'Infinite Monkey Theorem' and this is a showing of the first application.
auto-mate. This app allows you to record your cars stats at each fuel up and service to allow you to view statistics about your cars. This app will also allow you to setup service types (months or miles) and the app will schedule them for you taking into account your mileage per year. MOT and Tax renewals are stored and show when they are close.
The reason for this app is this: I drive 24,000 miles / year which means that I need to maintain the car more than just a yearly service, this app will tell me when I need to change my oil or have a minor/major service based upon the miles I drive per year and the miles I'm doing recently allowing me to budget for it accordingly.
This app syncs to the cloud so you can look over all the cars you are monitoring from your office and export the information or book a service.
This app is in beta at the moment, it is not feature complete as I need you to be able to say you have done your MOT or Tax but its almost there. Of course with it syncing to the cloud there is a cost, that I MUST pass on somehow. I looked into Ads but Microsoft in thier wisdom only allow thier ad framework in america so Im out (UK). But I'm thinking of a free version that has ads (in future) and does not sync to cloud. Thoughts on what you would/might pay for this app would be greatly appreciated.
The future of the app?
Well I am planning a pro version which is for business mileage and will export from the web site allowing business travellers to fill out expense forms. But there are lots to add to this app as well.
Take a look at the vid and let me know what you think.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tyw_ivcygk
Njoy.

id add light comercial vans upto 3.5tonnes as many courier use wm devices so many will upgrade to wp7

Love it and it looks superb. I dont know what you can and cannot do in regards to apps interacting with other features of the phone. But the option to put a reminder in the calendar or a pop up one month before the tax is due or service is due etc I think would be really beneficial (liked I said not sure if MS will let you do that though)
The only other thing I can think of is a field it enter a monetary value for the top up. So you put 44.66 litres in and it cost £70 for instance. You could maybe track this in the same way the MPG are, but as a Pence, or cent etc per mile.
In regards to price, there are alot of apps/games I have seen for say £2.99 that I refuse to pay for (bejwelled for one) but this I would pay for. Im not sure what price you were expecting but Id happily pay £2.99 for it which seems the average.
I know you have spoke about the cloud but is it possible to export the information to PDF or excel etc and then have the users email this to themselves, this would cut your costs but again I dont know whats allowed
Good Luck and I look forward to this being released.

4 or 5 euro isn't a bad prize .
if you could put in lpg and diesel blend (trucks that run on diesel and lpg ) then this app would be the hammer .
it would also be nice if you could ad your own car/truck .
lets say I have a scania R420 and I am driving on diesel and lpg , I would want to know if I am saving money .
normally a truck uses 32 litre of diesel every 100 KM
now it uses 22 litre of diesel and 10 litre of LPG
Diesel: costs 1 Euro
LPG: costs 0.50 Euro
it would be nice if your app could calculate my savings per 100 KM .
if you could make that happen you would have a winner .
Greetings Cees.

looks great! i would be willing to pay $5-7 for it without adds. I would also be willing to beta test for you as i am picking up a samsung focus on monday.
Keep up the good work, hopefully we will see this app in the market soon!

App showing in other games on my phone
I bought the app yesterday and couldn't find it. Today I noticed in other games. Should I uninstall and resync? I pinned to start for now.
thanks for what looks like a good app. Have another question. I have a csv file exported from a program I was using on my iphone. Any way of exporting or manually entering almost two years of data online vs the phone? You also mention website. Was is the url so I can check it out.
Thanks,
Johnny

Looks like a decent app but it also shows up in other gas for me

Thanks for comments
Hi all
Thanks for the comments, aint been on here in a while. Dont know why its showing in the games section, I've downloaded the trial and it shows in the normal menu, have purchase it and try it that way.
Answers:
1) Cost of fueling up will be coming in an update (not long)
2) Putting final touches to website then its live. it will be at www.infinitemonkeytheorem.co.uk You will be able to do everything you can do on the phone but see more information and view multiple car details over each other
3) Had to do some changes to the app to see the charts better, this is coming real soon.
4) will be adding fuel type soon.

barryallott said:
Hi all
Thanks for the comments, aint been on here in a while. Dont know why its showing in the games section, I've downloaded the trial and it shows in the normal menu, have purchase it and try it that way.
Answers:
1) Cost of fueling up will be coming in an update (not long)
2) Putting final touches to website then its live. it will be at www.infinitemonkeytheorem.co.uk You will be able to do everything you can do on the phone but see more information and view multiple car details over each other
3) Had to do some changes to the app to see the charts better, this is coming real soon.
4) will be adding fuel type soon.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
When I put it to my phone using a developer account its in the normal place. Strange

jgibo said:
I bought the app yesterday and couldn't find it. Today I noticed in other games. Should I uninstall and resync? I pinned to start for now.
thanks for what looks like a good app. Have another question. I have a csv file exported from a program I was using on my iphone. Any way of exporting or manually entering almost two years of data online vs the phone? You also mention website. Was is the url so I can check it out.
Thanks,
Johnny
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You could try uninstaling and resyncing, as its all stored online you just re log back in.

acky85 said:
Love it and it looks superb. I dont know what you can and cannot do in regards to apps interacting with other features of the phone. But the option to put a reminder in the calendar or a pop up one month before the tax is due or service is due etc I think would be really beneficial (liked I said not sure if MS will let you do that though)
The only other thing I can think of is a field it enter a monetary value for the top up. So you put 44.66 litres in and it cost £70 for instance. You could maybe track this in the same way the MPG are, but as a Pence, or cent etc per mile.
In regards to price, there are alot of apps/games I have seen for say £2.99 that I refuse to pay for (bejwelled for one) but this I would pay for. Im not sure what price you were expecting but Id happily pay £2.99 for it which seems the average.
I know you have spoke about the cloud but is it possible to export the information to PDF or excel etc and then have the users email this to themselves, this would cut your costs but again I dont know whats allowed
Good Luck and I look forward to this being released.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
One idea I have going is that as the data is stored online, I should be able to send a message to the phone when a service / mot /tax is due and the pic will go amber and show a 1.
The thing i'm working on right now is auto-mate (offline edition). The basic functionality of keeping track of your vehicle, store when your tax/mot is, and it will schedule the services for you, but all offline. becuase of the zero cost to me, it will be priced low. thinking £0.75...
Hope to have that out in a week.

Just checked and microsoft has put it under games, when I specifically said Tools and it was under tools originally.???
Nice one microsoft.
I could e-mail microsoft to change this but I'll just do an update which will fix it. Sorry for it being in the wrong place, not my fault.

Glad to hear. I just tried uninstall and reinstall and it didn't work. I hope I can enter my 2 years of data easily on the website. Can't see doing that on the phone. I could just get a new car and start over Those new 5.0 mustangs are nice. Add sync and I would be a happy camper

Prepare to be one happy camper, now im not saying now, im not saying in 1 week but excel import/export is always a step in the process

Just to let you know, an update was sent to microsoft over the weekend. This update will put the app back in the apps list. Include better charting, bug fixes. And ability to send error reports on some errors if they happen

Thanks for the update. Finally moved from under Games. When will the web site be up? I still haven't entered my previous data. Have been hoping to do it online and sync to phone.

Its in alpha now.... Beta next then live.

I just realized after putting in my second entry that I can't enter how much per tank or price per gallon. Any chance you will be adding this?

Yes, this is coming in an update.

Clicking on the historical button for miles/week shows the graph for MPG?
Also, whenever I enable the live tile, save the settings. The marker always goes back to disabled?

[Q] I was robbed last night!

Man what a weekend. For the last 6 months I've been working may ass off just trying to stay ahead of the game. I'm overworked and underpaid (who isn't these days) and it starting to take its toll. I'm making mistakes I would have never made before. Like last night. I fell asleep early and the dog woke me up to go out. I took her out and in my dazed way back in neglected to lock the door.
I feel like a world class jackass but not for long. I'm looking for a security system. I need something advanced and am hoping among all the techies here there's some experience and advice on where to start looking for the best system.
Things I know I want/need are sensors for all windows, motion detectors, automatic light control, some fixed cameras, some 360 degree cameras. Oh and of course I will need an android app to interact and control the system.
In my case this was my own fault for not locking my door but it really hit home how unsecure my house really is. I have barely a line of defense and its time to get with the program. Even if I had locked the door there were still a number of unsecured entry points into my home.
So does anyone have any experience with home security? Do you have any suggestions on where to start? Have you come across any systems in tech blogs and such that look promising?
I'm beginning to research into all this as we speak but this is unfamiliar territory for me. I'm a tech Guy like you but home security has never been an interest till now. If you have anything to offer as far as what to get, what to do, and what not to do it will be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

I've never tried an Android-based home security system, but I don't see why not. For example, you could install a Schlage LiNK™ system. There's also Alarm.com and ElkDroid. I suppose other home automation tools might be useful.
But, um... are you planning to take your Nook Color with you while you walk the dog? These apps require network access; if you plan to stray more than ~20m from your house, you'd probably need a portable access point. Of course, it's not a problem if you plan to monitor your home while you're at the office (with network access).
Good luck!

Thanks for the reply and links to look into. You made a good point about not having network access to my Nook on a dog walk. I guess in that situation I would use my android phone instead. But while at home since my nook is my go to device I would use it. I don't think the system needs to be android based but I would like an app that would let me monitor the security cameras, turn on and off lights, and be notified of opened doors and windows.
The system needs to be a hardwired system and if possible also be capable of wireless. Maybe I'm going to have to pick one or the other but I haven't figured that out yet. I'm probably going to start out small and cover the most important aspects first so the system would also need to be expandable.
I began searching the net yesterday for information regarding home security. Theres alot! Hopefully as I research and begin making my choices in equipment and monitoring I will update this thread to maybe help others. What ever I choose Android will be a part of the system.

Best security system you can get on a budget is a Foscam camera.

luke121 said:
Best security system you can get on a budget is a Foscam camera.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Do you mind sending me a pm about foscam? My restaurant just got broken into and I'm looking for an economic and proficient way to watch or protect.
Thank you in advance!
Sent from my unrooted Galaxy Tab.

I was robbed last night
I know the feeling well. I've been broken into twice. As a result, I called Brinks and had a system installed. But I kept forgetting to set the alarm and it was costing me $35.00 a month. So I began looking for other alternatives. In the search, I discovered all kinds of DIY things I could do to safeguard my house. So I ended up with a self defense website. You can install door and window alarms, surveillance systems, ect. There is actually a barking dog alarm that really works. A local woman had one and was able to scare an intruder off. I'm sure she thinks it was worth every penny she paid for it.

I was robbed also, about 4 years ago.
They made off with a new 24" iMac, WiFi printer, Gateway laptop, my old ass 8 year old PC with a 15" CRT monitor that I used to run Mandrake and other flavors of Linux on. They also managed to locate my backup hard drive in the kitchen.
I have worked as freelance Web Development & Design for years and lost a ton of work, clients respect and reliability.
I now have two remote backup hard drives (my moms house and my friend) with automation scripts that run nightly.
I use Dropbox on my two Android™ phones + my Nook + my desktop PC + my clients PCs.
As for home security: I no longer advertise on my vehicle, nor promote myself on the streets, I carry the minimum amount of cash, only carry one credit card, don't wear any jewelry, and talk to my children about the dangers of strangers, open the front door, etc.
Plus we have the peace of mind having electronic home security, motion sensors, door + window sensors, etc.
The geek in me wants to install a few webcams throughout the house, front yard, back, etc. and have access to view them via https via one of my websites.
But that'll have to wait.

I have 2 Panasonic Network Cameras with audio. You can monitor the cams on your Android phone with an app. There is a way to set it up for motion detection too.

Thanks for the replies. I'm still searching for the best system to meet my needs. We did check into ADT but I'd hate to pay the 35 dollars a month bill when we have the tech today that would make proffesional monitoring a waste. They do provide the equipment and install which is nice though.
Isn't there some kind of security enthusiast sites like a maximum PC or Tg daily. A site that could get me better informed of my options?

IFLATLINEI said:
Thanks for the replies. I'm still searching for the best system to meet my needs. We did check into ADT but I'd hate to pay the 35 dollars a month bill when we have the tech today that would make proffesional monitoring a waste. They do provide the equipment and install which is nice though.
Isn't there some kind of security enthusiast sites like a maximum PC or Tg daily. A site that could get me better informed of my options?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The best security I know is, no one can steal your stuff if its all on fire.

For a real serious system that is also open to DIY, I'd strongly recommend the Elk Products M1G Gold system.
A great site to learn more is from http://www.cocoontech.com
Can do extensive home automation as well if that's your wish.

Awesome! Thank you.

[APP] [Free] Weather Stats [R] 11 MAR 2012 [V] 1.0.1

I’m proud to present the new version of my weather statistics app for windows phone 7 – “Weather Stats”. Even though I had a terrible experience publishing it (for some inexplicable reason this innocent weather app got banned from China marketplace for “political reasons” and by inexplicable I literally mean inexplicable, i.e. both certification and policy team failed to give me any explanation for that failure even after a month wasted on support tickets), I’m still proud to present this new version, just released today. Many people here helped me make this app what it is now. If you had a beta version installed – it is time to uninstall it, head to marketplace and install the real final version (1.1). If you had version 1.0 installed, you will hopefully get update notification real soon. If you have not tried “Weather Stats” before – why not try it now? It is absolutely free and contains no ads!
Weather Stats is a unique app that shows weather averages across more than 26800 locations around the globe! A lot of valuable information is available for each such location. Position on the map, Wikipedia link, high and low temperatures, precipitation and now, only in this newly released update – local time, time zone, sunrise/sunset and even a length of day chart for the year! If you ever wonder about the climatological statistics for your current location or just want to know what is the best time of year to visit the city of Arctic Bay (Nunavut, Canada) - this app is for you. And honestly who doesn’t wonder about when is the best time to visit the city of Arctic Bay? Well, now you can be sure. It is terribly cold there. And it is terribly dark during winter there too.
There are other nifty features that, I hope, would be appreciated by some of you. GPS integration, quick search, offline SQL CE database and app connect integration. There is even a map with Voronoi tessellations used to interactively show the closest weather stations to your location and areas where their data would be most accurate. As always, I will appreciate if you download the app and leave some marketplace comments for it. So please head over to:
http://windowsphone.com/s?appid=00918e7e-6b8b-4976-8782-5760ced74cc4
and grab “Weather Stats” while it is hot. Or cold. It really depends on what the weather is like.

As for weather stats, I strongly recommend you to take a look to the latest WeatherLive app (it's my favorite weather app at all). In latest version author added very useful weather statistics. Comparing with yours "average" this app can tell me exact information what I'm looking for: historical min and max temperatures comparing with the current, so I can tell, for example, today was a hottest March day in Boston for (nn - this is missing) years.

sensboston said:
As for weather stats, I strongly recommend you to take a look to the latest WeatherLive app (it's my favorite weather app at all). In latest version author added very useful weather statistics. Comparing with yours "average" this app can tell me exact information what I'm looking for: historical min and max temperatures comparing with the current, so I can tell, for example, today was a hottest March day in Boston for (nn - this is missing) years.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thank you, just checked it out, "WeatherLive" is indeed quite cool, I'm not in the same league with it. But my app is free and premise is a quite a bit different too

kitya said:
Thank you, just checked it out, "WeatherLive" is indeed quite cool, I'm not in the same league with it. But my app is free and premise is a quite a bit different too
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No, as I said before, I'm not complaining and not criticizing your app. But you may reflect WeatherLive app or capture http requests to see how WeatherLive got statistical data and use the same data source (if it's free of course)

sensboston said:
No, as I said before, I'm not complaining and not criticizing your app. But you may reflect WeatherLive app or capture http requests to see how WeatherLive got statistical data and use the same data source (if it's free of course)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah, I checked that out too! "WeatherLive" is using API from "weather underground". They actually do have a program for non-commercial developers but terms are not disclosed. I might try and contact them and see what they say for my case.
Commercial apps build using their API cost developers from 520 to 5750 USD per month, depending on your number of users.

Creating a Gym Application - would like some feedback

Hi All,
I am currently creating a gym application. At the moment i have almost finished coding for Windows 8 and will then be designing images but will be moving onto Android and then Ipad. I was looking for some feedback into what you think is missing from mainstream gym applications that you would find useful. I have only attached a few screen and these are far from developed. I just used them as a base for coding.
I have attached some screenshots of current development (Windows 8) Hopefully porting over to other devices will give me more design freedom.

I was inspired to do my own, but I don't have the special mojo necessary to get it accomplished.
It all depends on how you work out, most of them will work but I listen to music while I work out and I move from machine to machine after a set number of reps and sets. My week works like this...Upper/Aerobic/Lower/aerobic/upper/aerobic/lower/rest
What I am getting at is to have a simple music control placed within the app, like where the advertisement window is, so I can skip a song, and record my weights and reps within the set.
I know it isn't part of most apps, I have tried most of them, but it's the way that I work out, one song just doesn't do it for me and I need something with more force, and to be able to have one screen to control the music, and record the data is what I was looking for and haven't found it.
Dumbells and Machines aren't in decimal settings and typically 5-10-15-20 etc. What I wanted to create was those buttons instead of having to input the numeric value. That sucks with gloves on and tedious on a small keyboard while you are shaking from the previous reps.
Just my opinion. Good luck.
---------- Post added at 02:34 PM ---------- Previous post was at 02:25 PM ----------
So to simplify my ramblings...
Music control
Button selectable weights and selectable (menu) number of reps
Large buttons for back and forward
Editable Calendar with alerts
Goal vs achievement would be nice too.
I know its asking a lot, but if I wanted to make my own, then that is what I would create.

I haven't used a gym app since my son killed most of my available time to workout, but having religiously worked out 5 days a week for the previous 10 years and doing the occasional competition (both weight lifting and body building) I can tell you what I'd want in one. For me, logs are super important to track progress not only with workouts/reps but body weight and body fat percentage. I like to try new diets, supplements and workouts and logs would help me determine the most successful combination. An area for notes would be helpful to note these, per day, per each workout, for example if I used straps one day on dead lift I would note this since I don't always use straps (or gloves, chalk, etc). I would also want to note any injuries to explain low reps/weight or whatever (even a paper cut will affect weight/reps!). I don't always remember the time-frame of my injuries once a year or 2 has passed. Maybe have an ability to save logs in comma-delimited file for Excel use?
App looks good so far!

edge929 said:
I haven't used a gym app since my son killed most of my available time to workout, but having religiously worked out 5 days a week for the previous 10 years and doing the occasional competition (both weight lifting and body building) I can tell you what I'd want in one. For me, logs are super important to track progress not only with workouts/reps but body weight and body fat percentage. I like to try new diets, supplements and workouts and logs would help me determine the most successful combination. An area for notes would be helpful to note these, per day, per each workout, for example if I used straps one day on dead lift I would note this since I don't always use straps (or gloves, chalk, etc). I would also want to note any injuries to explain low reps/weight or whatever (even a paper cut will affect weight/reps!). I don't always remember the time-frame of my injuries once a year or 2 has passed. Maybe have an ability to save logs in comma-delimited file for Excel use?
App looks good so far!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I agree with this. It's probably way more than the average gym goer would need but those of us who compete need that sort of level of detail. I would also like to see something that showed me if I hit a PR for that day for that particular lift. Being able to graph the results would also be really cool. It would have to account for gaps in training days though because I don't always do the same lift from one day to the next. I would also like to be able to put in competition results to see if there's a correlation with the particular lifts that I'm doing (and percentage of my max used on those lifts) and an increase in my competition total.
Agree that the app does look great so far.
james

Hi,
Thanks for feedback so far. Completely agree about the adding more detail when doing workouts - I often remember wanting to add something to that particular set to say that i did the excercise slightly differently or assisted etc.
The Play button is a good idea for music as i also remember with the apps that i have used having to minimise gym app then go to music etc and faff about.
Cheers for responses so far. Will look into adding those features.

If you're creating this for the average gym goer then I'd suggest spending the time to write descriptions of either all available workouts for the selected body part. Also allow people to select what type of cardio they did, jump rope, tread mill, arc trainer ect
Sent from my Nexus 7 using xda app-developers app

Depends on if you are making the app for yourself, or for profit.
For profit, you want to appeal to as many as possible. I would think the true professional bodybuilder represents a fairly small percentage of the society. A Pro and Consumer version may work, but getting 30% of the population versus 4% might be a better use of your efforts if your goal is for profit.
For yourself, I would think that you would tailor it to your workouts.
Notes are incredibly important, and usually that is done in the Pre or Post workout, I would think ease of use and ease of data entry would be an asset, and you will never appeal to everyone, every sport, every activity, when that is tried, it becomes too cumbersome to use.
KISS Keep it Simple S____

Although the logging is great, one thing that frustrates me is the lack of ability to actually do anything with the data. I would like to see various charts/graphs as well as a way to export that stuff...probably as a nice PDF document that you can sync to Dropbox or something. Basically where you can print the graphs and charts in addition to your notes and other logging information.

Updating characters as i do them
Editing characters 1 and 2 at the weekend. Then will finish more code the the additional features marked in the post. The good thing is that it uses an SQLite Database locally and also Azure cloud for backing up data. So I wont have to do much coversion from Windows 8 to Android, IPad etc

I have a charts section but the page doesn't look very good at the moment - just added it in with different reports. Will update once i have formatted them and the page is complete.