GSoC 2010 - Development of an iPhone app

[jens]

Hi,
first of all I want to introduce myself... My name is Jens Lukas from Germany, I am a 4th year student of Software Engineering at the University of Applied Science Fontys Venlo (in the Netherlands) and I currently write my bachelor thesis. Since my bachelor thesis is about developing mobile apps (iPhone, Android and Blackberry) connected to a web service, I already got some experience in iPhone development.

It would be amazing to contribute to the dreamwidth project by developing an iPhone application adding the possibility to use dreamwidth in a comfortable way on a mobile device.

I took a first look at the ljprotocol to get an impression of the functionality / data provided. As a result I want to give you a initial list of the features I think of implementing.

- Post entries / Add comments
- Read "Reading page"
- Read inbox and send messages
- Manage profile
- Push notifications for new entries on your reading page or new messages in your inbox

These are just some basic features I plan to integrate, but I gonna add more information within my proposal (also containing project plan etc.). I just want to get some feedback on my suggestions. Do you miss a feature? Is there something you think is not necessary?

So, I am looking forward to work together with the community and hope that you provide me with some wishes you got regarding the project and of course please pepper me with questions :)

Best regards,
Jens

Comments

[john]

Hi Jens, and welcome! Great to have you thinking about this.

Re: your list! You may have missed out the feature of granting access/subscribing to users. Similarly, you might want to think about a way to read and reply to comments in an elegant way, in-app. I also think that a way to comment without leaving the place you were on your droll would be awesome -- kind of the way that Facebook.app does with Liking/Commenting.

I also suggest you think about giving users a wide range of choices to turn options on/off -- push notification for new entries/new messages may be great for some people, but I imagine others might just get irritated. (I know that Facebook.app really irritates me with it, and I wish there were a "no push between 2100 and 0900" option.

Thinking about UI, I really like Echofon's pane approach, although Facebook.app's master menu approach is good too.

I'm really excited to see what you come up with! I totally recommend hanging out in IRC to get a view of DW culture, and go ahead and add people to your circle, and use the site. That'll really help you to figure out how to implement the mobile client!

[jens]

Thanks for your reply. Yes I missed out the feature of granting access / subscribing to users, which I will definitely consider in my app. Concerning the push notifications... there will be of course a settings menu, where you can configure stuff like login, push notifications etc., also the idea of disabling push notifaction for a specified time range sounds quite nice.

I think that we now got the most needed features, but I am still open for any further suggestions and maybe I will come over some additional requirements while playing around with dreamwidth.

Therefore I gonna start to think of how to build the UI. I also like the Facebook master menu instead of using tab navigation like it is done for example in the iPod app, because it leaves more space for the real content. I am going to develop some views (maybe on paper) to show you some possibilities of how to display information and navigate within the app, so we could figure out together what is best.

Anyway, does someone know who is granting access for #dw_work? Sophie already granted me access to #dw (btw my username is jens), but #dw_work might also be somehow interesting :)

[cesy]

Anyway, does someone know who is granting access for #dw_work? Sophie already granted me access to #dw (btw my username is jens), but #dw_work might also be somehow interesting :)

Most of the regulars hang out in both channels, so just ask in #dw and the next mod who sees it can give you access.

Other features that I use pretty often, so might be worth considering including in the app: editing comments, editing entries, switching account.

Welcome to Dreamwidth!

[damned_colonial]

One thing I would suggest is considering making the app also iPad friendly. iPhone apps will work on the iPad, but the larger screen real estate means there are some UI considerations.

I for one will be getting an iPad in two weeks' time and plan to use it as one of my main DW reading tools.

[jens]

It might be quite nice to use DW on the iPad and I will consider aspects for the iPad, but I currently not planning to get one, so it will be difficult to check how it looks on the iPad. Hopefully there will be an iPad simulator in XCode, this will make it much easier.

If I get accepted, would you be so kind and be a beta tester for me? :)

[damned_colonial]

Gladly! And I'm sure there's a developer kit with emulator etc. People are already developing apps for it, and it hasn't been released yet.

[thorfinn]

Yes, there is definitely an iPad simulator in the current XCode. I would also be happy to beta test (but only for iPhone, since I'm not planning to get an iPad).

As far as push notifications go - I think it would be best to tie any such features in with Jabber/XMPP notifications generally - which is not yet scheduled for implementation as far as I am aware.

[jamoche]

I'm getting an iPad, and I'm a Cocoa developer though I've never done any iPhone work. I'd be willing to beta-test.

[jens]

I will put you on my list :)
Finally got the iPad simulator coming with the new SDK version, gonna read through the Human Interface Guidelines and informations on Universal Applications.

[exor674]

Multiple account support would be a big plus.

[jens]

Ok gonna take it all into consideration. Need to do some planning to make some time estimation, but most of the things mentioned should definitely be possible to consider, but don't hesitate to throw in some more ideas :)

Anyway thanks for the friendly welcome :)