Checkargos Android (at last)

witnessmenow

Hey Guys,

I've finally gotten around to creating an Android version of Checkargos. Its on the play store now

Link





Its free to download and has no ads.

Its pretty basic, just a stock search of all stores. I would love to hear peoples input on what they would like to see next from the app. I plan to update it every couple of weeks so I am open to suggestions.

Any issues or comments, please let me know.

For anyone interested the code is on github . The app interacts with checkargos.com so you will need to look at both to see fully whats going on.

I can finally have a look at Basqs IOS app now, I have been putting it off looking at it for fear I would just copy the UI :pac:

Dozen Wicked Words

Thanks for that. Terrific site in the first place and now the app, cheers.

daytob

Great work , cheers thanks!

iPhone.

Fair play to ya, congrats on your new baby!!

shannon82

just installed it thanks

spongbob

witnessmenow, are you getting my pm's

m4rkiz

i use checkargos.com a lot, but my pc is faster and have larger screen than my android device - so i would prefer to have an option to check only couple of stores with this app - i.e. i live in Kilkenny and 99.9% of the time i really don't care if argos in Letterkenny does or doesn't have something that im looking for, so checking only stores that i want would speed things up and would save some bandwidth both for me & argos website

Kenno90

Make sure you post this up on the android forum for more praise, Cheers Man,

and a special thanks for putting the code up

Atomic Pineapple

Kenno90 wrote: »

Make sure you post this up on the android forum for more praise, Cheers Man,

and a special thanks for putting the code up

Someone else has posted it in the must have apps over there already.

MidlandsM

thanks op, handy to have on the phone, esp on the way up to xmas!

witnessmenow

m4rkiz wrote: »

i use checkargos.com a lot, but my pc is faster and have larger screen than my android device - so i would prefer to have an option to check only couple of stores with this app - i.e. i live in Kilkenny and 99.9% of the time i really don't care if argos in Letterkenny does or doesn't have something that im looking for, so checking only stores that i want would speed things up and would save some bandwidth both for me & argos website

Thanks, Good suggestion, its something I was already considering but its nice to see a demand for it.

Thanks to whoever posted it in the android forum

I also was looking at Basqs app last night, he has a few very un-fair reviews that would also apply to my app

• That you need to know the product ID - Valid
• The item being in stock when you check it doesn't necessarily mean the item will be stock when you get to the store!

bogman

Excellent app, please add

Cork Queens Old Castle to the list of stores

Basq

witnessmenow wrote: »

Thanks, Good suggestion, its something I was already considering but its nice to see a demand for it.

Just a few things to consider since I'm also in the process of rolling them in my app. No harm in sharing ideas:

- choosing a Home Store (as mentioned) and give nearest locations by geolocation.
- UK search also (if possible).
- recent / popular searches
- have also implemented a lookup / validation of code when the 7 digit number is entered (no need to click search)

Screenshots of some of it implemented:

witnessmenow wrote: »

I also was looking at Basqs app last night, he has a few very un-fair reviews that would also apply to my app

• That you need to know the product ID - Valid
• The item being in stock when you check it doesn't necessarily mean the item will be stock when you get to the store!

Not much can be done about having to know the product ID.. and since that is mentioned in the description of the application, I'm putting that review down to pure idiocy. Sorry to be blunt, and no offence to the reviewer but c'mon.. read the description of the application and don't bother downloading if you don't get it.

daytob

Basq wrote: »

Not much can be done about having to know the product ID.. and since that is mentioned in the description of the application, I'm putting that review down to pure idiocy. Sorry to be blunt, and no offence to the reviewer but c'mon.. read the description of the application and don't bother downloading if you don't get it.

Thats the problem, some people want you to walk them through it and when they get it wrong they blame you, or worse give you a bad rating. you should be able to send them an electric shock through their phone for being stupid

Basq

^ I do love the idea that people were frustrated when the item wasn't in stock when they went to their local Argos though! I'll take lots of one star reviews if I get an image of someone demanding that staff wheel out the "bread bin" that they saw in stock on "their smartphone device".

Argos clearly has their Irish base as a low priority - they haven't even a mobile-optimized site for Argos.ie yet.

witnessmenow

Basq wrote: »

witnessmenow wrote: »

Thanks, Good suggestion, its something I was already considering but its nice to see a demand for it.

Just a few things to consider since I'm also in the process of rolling them in my app. No harm in sharing ideas:

- choosing a Home Store (as mentioned) and give nearest locations by geolocation.
- UK search also (if possible).
- recent / popular searches
- have also implemented a lookup / validation of code when the 7 digit number is entered (no need to click search)

Screenshots of some of it implemented:

witnessmenow wrote: »

I also was looking at Basqs app last night, he has a few very un-fair reviews that would also apply to my app

• That you need to know the product ID - Valid
• The item being in stock when you check it doesn't necessarily mean the item will be stock when you get to the store!

Not much can be done about having to know the product ID.. and since that is mentioned in the description of the application, I'm putting that review down to pure idiocy. Sorry to be blunt, and no offence to the reviewer but c'mon.. read the description of the application and don't bother downloading if you don't get it.

Looks good. More ideas to borrow

I think the needing the product code to do anything is a valid one, even your popular searches will probably cover that though. Basically some one will grab the app of the market and want to try it out straight away, but doesn't have a code so they kinda forget about it. It's just to have something for them to try, so they can see how the app works.

The stock level thing, I have a friend who is buddies with the guy who wrote the Dublin bus app and people left reviews for him complaining that the buses were not on time etc...
You are bound to get some of those kinda reviews, but maybe there are some things that we can do to help people along. One idea I had was putting a reserve button on the screen, that popped up a message explaining what to do and then directed them to argos site. I'd have to see how it felt.

There is example of getting the stock from Northern Ireland in the check argos. Com github (stock check background functions or something) it's not really much different iirc. Would be the same for the UK, just needs the 600+ UK store ideas!


Other ideas I'm considering

Low data mode- where the app makes one request and the site will gather all stock levels(it would be as slow as the beta site).Not sure this worth doing, it's pretty low data usage anyways as website only returns json.

Favorite stores - basically a user could create a group of stores and search for stock against them.

Text search - would be a decent chunk of work in this on the website end but I'm hoping that the code from the clearance section can be reused

Clearance section - same as site currently has, needs to be refactored

Northern Ireland stores.

Notifications of price changes and stock changes

That's all for the moment, but that will certainly keep me busy!

witnessmenow

bogman wrote: »

Escellent app, please add

Cork Queens Old Castle to the list of stores

There is a store missing? Oops! I get the list of stores of argos website on application load! Either its not there or I have a bug. I'll look into it thanks

EDIT: Bug in my code, fixed now. No need to update app (it was a bug on the website). I assumed all store ids were 3 or 4 digits long, Cork old castle and Tralee are only 2

daytob

it crashed a few times on me just now

witnessmenow

daytob wrote: »

it crashed a few times on me just now

I've seen it crash once or twice myself. I'm aware of a couple of places that need strengthening , but if you could hit the report button when it crashes it will help alot to find all areas . Sorry for the inconvienice

Basq

witnessmenow wrote: »

Would be the same for the UK, just needs the 600+ UK store ideas!

Did a bit of data scraping earlier this year and have a table of all UK stores. Let me know if you want the SQL dump.

bogman

witnessmenow wrote: »

(it was a bug on the website

Excellent, thanks for adding those stores, works really well, thanks for the app :pac:

witnessmenow

Basq wrote: »

Did a bit of data scraping earlier this year and have a table of all UK stores. Let me know if you want the SQL dump.

That would be great, thanks!

god's toy

Wonderful app! Just what I wished would be done.
Given we have the parcel motel now a cross border look up tool would be cool! but hey, as it is now I love it!