Luas times app

Coyote · 09-02-2011 4:03am

just updated it now. every thing looks find on my desire HD
could not check how the times would look as no luas running right now.

errlloyd · 09-02-2011 2:48pm

Awesome work my friend, got many compliments from the lads yesterday while sitting finishing off my pint and timing my walk to the Luas to perfection.

Due to the absence of a Luas app in general you could consider expanding it to have the whole shabang, maps tab, operating times and frequency and fares. (All of that as just information nothing active).

But **** it, if you never touched this again you still would have done us a fantastic service!!

Mushy · 09-02-2011 2:51pm

First time usingin pratice, on south circular road, checked next one was in 3 mins, quicken the pace and no silly waiting. Perfect app, thanks again

09-02-2011 4:10pm

Cool, thanks guys. If it is still working for you all then the back-end changes must be OK. Next step is probably to get some filtering and nearest stop type stuff in there.

kenmc · 09-02-2011 5:17pm

Works fine on Hero/2.1. Nicely done

10-02-2011 12:07am

Just stuck out another update. You should mainly see a distance in the drop-down list beside the stop name. Not massively useful in itself but if it works out it essentially means the geolocation backend of the app is running OK.

Just going with coarse location as it is probably good enough for the purpose and doesn't need GPS.

Coyote · 10-02-2011 1:33am

just updated all seems to be working fine, the distant seems about right no need for gps(nice to see developers thinking about battery). it's a nice idea to show how far from a station. An other idea to allow people to have the stations listed by distant from your location

TeaServer · 10-02-2011 9:42pm

Tried it out and it looks and works great. I agree with the suggestion to have the option to list by proximity.

Keep up the work!

10-02-2011 9:49pm

Cheers TeaServer, actually working on that at the moment. There are a couple of features that go together logically: option to default to closest stop, sort stop list by proximity and have a preference to filter the list according to the stops you want.

12-02-2011 6:10pm

New version out. Has some of the sorting / nearest stop features people were asking for. Available at the same place: https://market.android.com/details?id=com.mbcdev.nextluas

Coyote · 12-02-2011 9:55pm

very nice update main screen has less stuff now as no need for picking the line every time, some thoughts: in the settings you might think about changing the text of "select nearest stop" to select nearest station" and "auto stop switch" to "auto switch station"

I would not call this a fault but just to let you know if you use the "menu/change line" button to change from your default line and then go to the settings when you leave it asks you "switch to new default" - "you have changed your default line switch to new line now?" "OK" or "no" if you click OK you go back to your default that you set at start-up/settings if you click no you stay on the other line. but here is the thing you have not changed your default line(it stays the same if you restart the app) so the text might need changing to something like "reset back to default line" "yes" or "no"

the auto sort by distance works well.
just one other idea in the long run it might be nice to have a map showing where the luas lines.
great work on the app Luas should be paying you for it

Coyote

12-02-2011 11:47pm

Coyote wrote: »

very nice update main screen has less stuff now as no need for picking the line every time, some thoughts: in the settings you might think about changing the text of "select nearest stop" to select nearest station" and "auto stop switch" to "auto switch station"

I would not call this a fault but just to let you know if you use the "menu/change line" button to change from your default line and then go to the settings when you leave it asks you "switch to new default" - "you have changed your default line switch to new line now?" "OK" or "no" if you click OK you go back to your default that you set at start-up/settings if you click no you stay on the other line. but here is the thing you have not changed your default line(it stays the same if you restart the app) so the text might need changing to something like "reset back to default line" "yes" or "no"

the auto sort by distance works well.
just one other idea in the long run it might be nice to have a map showing where the luas lines.
great work on the app Luas should be paying you for it

Coyote

Thanks for the feedback! makes sense. I caught the other issue you mentioned a few minutes after releasing the app. I think I'll change the text to something like you said as it would cause less confusion.

I might stick out a paid version at some point in the future with a few more features so you could pay me if you liked to

Victor · 13-02-2011 1:03am

Coyote wrote: »

very nice update main screen has less stuff now as no need for picking the line every time, some thoughts: in the settings you might think about changing the text of "select nearest stop" to select nearest station" and "auto stop switch" to "auto switch station"

The language used by RPA/Luas is "stop", even for Metro.

What of creating a combined Luas/DART/Commuter app? http://irishrail.ie/your_journey/results_mobileInfo.html

13-02-2011 1:13am

Think the dart is covered by next train Ireland. Would be happy to stick a button to launch that app in if the author is ok with it. Don't think it would be an idea to reinvent the wheel and do it in the luas app

26-02-2011 10:21pm

Just stuck out another update. I have tweaked the geolocation stuff for more frequent updates. I noticed the power requirements for the app were way too high if you left it running in the background too so I'm now turning off geolocation updates when they're not really needed.

There's also a new feature to allow you to filter the stops. In preferences you'll be able to select only the stops you want to show for each line. A whole lot changed from 1.5 so please submit bug reports if the app crashed on you please

kearneybobs · 26-02-2011 10:34pm

Quality app you have there. Nice updates. Dare I say it, but why aren't you charging for this app? I'd pay some change for it.

27-02-2011 8:03pm

briankearon666 wrote: »

Quality app you have there. Nice updates. Dare I say it, but why aren't you charging for this app? I'd pay some change for it.

It was always in the plan but I was more concerned with getting it up an running first

I have put ads in the free version and made a 'pro' version for €0.99. Right now it is functionally identical to the free one but I have a few ideas to put in it to give it more value.

The paid version is here: https://market.android.com/details?id=com.mbcdev.nextluaspro

kearneybobs · 27-02-2011 8:14pm

baz8080 wrote: »

It was always in the plan but I was more concerned with getting it up an running first I have put ads in the free version and made a 'pro' version for €0.99. Right now it is functionally identical to the free one but I have a few ideas to put in it to give it more value.

The paid version is here: https://market.android.com/details?id=com.mbcdev.nextluaspro

You've just earned yourself 99c for your hard work. Thanks.

27-02-2011 9:00pm

Thank you!, much appreciated

08-03-2011 7:30pm

Just wanted to mention that the times seem to be a little bit out on luas.ie which is having a knock-on effect with the app. Some stops are fine but others like James' seem to be out by a couple of minutes. Hopefully the luas.ie people will sort it out soon.

15-03-2011 10:34pm

Times should be OK again now. If you spot them wrong again let me know or else just email Luas customer service. They sorted it out fairly quickly once I let them know about the problem.

edanto · 18-03-2011 6:06pm

Well done on this by the way! Great little app. Looking forward to showing it off to people.

Does anyone know if the luas generally runs on schedule or if there would be discrepancies, say, more than 5% of the time? [just wondering how important the real time data is]

18-03-2011 6:13pm

Cheers!,

The luas usually rocks up pretty much when the times on the board say it will. They pass physical markers which change the times on the screen accordingly.

The only issue you're likely to have is when the times on the luas website go out of sync with the times on the boards at the stops. This happened last week and the times were about 3-4 minutes off. If that happens the times will be wrong in the app too because I get the times from the luas site.

In these cases you're best off to send them a quick note via their contact form and they will fix it.

BopNiblets · 19-03-2011 8:14pm

Used this the odd time, it was only really off once, dunno why but I went out for the luas with a minute or two but the next arrival time was different by about 5 or 6 mins and one hadn't left or anything, must have been just up near the point, delays or something.

I'd say a great feature would have a Widget that launches the app that shows the very next arrival!
Mockup:

19-03-2011 8:56pm

Thanks BobNiplets. I had that idea too but I mostly dismissed it because I thought it would be too heavy a burden on system resources. To be of use I'd have to be making a network connection every 2 minutes or so and that might be a battery hogger.

I got a mac recently so I might try to make an iphone version soon. It would probably be paid only seeing as it costs 100 quid a year to be in the dev program.

There are also a couple of minor bugs to sort out in the Android version so I will probably prioritise fixing them over new features at this moment in time.

BopNiblets · 20-03-2011 12:22am

baz8080 wrote: »

Thanks BobNiplets. I had that idea too but I mostly dismissed it because I thought it would be too heavy a burden on system resources. To be of use I'd have to be making a network connection every 2 minutes or so and that might be a battery hogger.

I suppose, I'm not sure how your app accesses the data and I suppose it's dynamic anyway, i.e. no way to preload the next 10 or 20 arrival times I guess?
Put it down as a "nice-to-have" feature!

I'm thinking of doing an Android app myself for college project, using Adobe Flex for Mobile, something with Google Maps (they might give you a license key for Flash Builder 4.5 if you say you're a student or unemployed dev)
Did you use Appinventor for the Luas app baz? And how did you find it?

20-03-2011 12:30am

BopNiblets wrote: »

I suppose, I'm not sure how your app accesses the data and I suppose it's dynamic anyway, i.e. no way to preload the next 10 or 20 arrival times I guess?
Put it down as a "nice-to-have" feature!

I'm thinking of doing an Android app myself for college project, using Adobe Flex for Mobile, something with Google Maps (they might give you a license key for Flash Builder 4.5 if you say you're a student or unemployed dev)
Did you use Appinventor for the Luas app baz? And how did you find it?

Yep, it is purely dynamic and based on individual Luas trams. The app is just your run of the mill Android app and I made it with Eclipse and the ADT plugin.

24-03-2011 5:41pm

Hi guys. App might have to go away soon. The RPA will probably be dropping the banhammer on it.

kearneybobs · 24-03-2011 5:42pm

You serious? For what reason? Remote kill or just take it off the store??

24-03-2011 5:50pm

Not really sure yet. They have a problem with money being made with their trademark. Have taken the pro one offline and the free version only has house ads now, ie just a link to my other app. It has made about a fiver so the loss of earnings is no big deal. Pity thoughbut that's how they feel.

Luas times app

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