My second iPhone app went live on the App Store last night. Interestingly it was approved in under 48 hours, but took two days to appear in the store. I assume this is because Apple only add so many applications a day and there’s now a waiting list – Pinch Media have an RSS feed of new applications and the number each day is staggering.
I’m pretty pleased with this application. My first app (Photo Speed Dial) was really an exercise in learning Cocoa/Objective-C and the iPhone SDK and tools. Everything took time and there were several things that I basically did wrong, things that made certain aspects harder than they needed to be or fought against Cocoa’s MVC pattern.
Lessons learned. This time around I was able to focus entirely on the design of the application and it really showed both in development time and the end product. Inspired by the FriendFeed 24 hour app challenge my aim was to try and put together an attractive and useful app over the weekend. I didn’t quite manage that but came in at around 72 hours total.
During the development process I kept a log and screenshots. When I get time I plan to write them up as a post, mostly for my own edification and a self-reminder how useful design and planning can be even for personal projects.
Until then… Buy my app!
2008/11/09, 07:11
Hi, I bought your app, and have been trying to leave a review for 2 days now, but for some reason, iTunes will not let me post it, so I thought I’d try and contact you through here.
Love the app. It’s exactly what I was looking for for my Christmas list. I have a HUGE family and this is perfect! Love that you can organize into groups, have multiple gifts for each person, and keep track of spending. I gave the app. 4 stars in my review, because there is one problem that needs to be fixed. The keyboard covers up the notes field so that you can not see what you’re typing, making it VERY difficult to enter in that field. When auto correct kicks in, there is NO way get the word you want. Very frustrating. Fix that and I’ll give it a 5 star review as soon as iTunes wil let me.
Thanks for the great app! Keep up the good work.
2008/11/11, 12:13
Thanks for the comments.
We’re submitting an update to Apple tomorrow that includes a couple of new features and a fix for the issues with the notes field (partially obscured and autocorrect problem).
2008/11/28, 12:29
How about a MSS app for the iPhone. I know they have remote Desktop apps but nothing that links the iPhone to something like the WHS MSS. I like simplify but thing that if you have an WHS you shouldnt need to sign up for an account on their side to get it to work. I think you should be able to remain self contained. Does that make sense?