Tracks

Hi everyone,

I’m a long-time Tracks user, and recently got an Android phone.  One of the first things I did was write an Android app for Tracks.

You can find the app here: http://xvx.ca/code/tracks-android/.  I’m hoping to have it in the Android Market soon, just getting some issues sorted out there.  For now, you can get an APK from the website or the source from GitHub.

Please feel free to report (or fix!) bugs, and make suggestions.  It’s certainly not perfect, but it’s a start.

cool

I’ll try it for sure when it hits the marketplace!

Reinier

I just installed the apk. Works great. Small remarks:
* if you start the app for the first time it goes to the settings page. It took me a while to figure out that I could continue with the ‘back’ button. Perhaps an ok button?
* the order of the contexts is not the same as on the webpage. You could use the order field of context to sort
* I cannot read or scroll through my notes of a todo

Cool stuff though

Thanks for the feedback, I’ve put those things on my todo list.  I thought I had fixed the context ordering earlier, but I see the same results as you.

Just installed it, works great on my phone. (Samsung Galaxy S)

Some suggestions from my side:

- Support for https would be nice
- Allow for shortcuts on home screen. (Even if it’s just “Add Task”)

Personally I would change the way contexts are displayed ( Using sub-screens combined with left/right swipes ), but that might be just me.

Great work, and make sure you have a “donate” version in the app market.

HTTPS is on my todo list.  I think it will be a simple addition.  Shortcuts are something I hadn’t thought of, but I like the idea.

The app is now in the Android Market.  If you’re on an Android device you can use this URL to get it: market://search?q=pname:ca.xvx.tracks .  Or search for Tracks for Android.  If you install it, please report any Force Closes you encounter, as this will help me improve it.

As suggested, I will post a donation version as well, once my Google Checkout Merchant account gets all set up.

I’ve fixed a few of the issues mentioned here, and some I found myself as well.  There is a new (version 1.1) APK in the market and on the website.

Got it through the Market now, nice looking icon you added. Didn’t have time to see the bugs posted here yet, hopefully I will never see them now.

I’m adding the QR code for the market to this post, for all android users with the barcode scanner installed

Thanks for the QR code!  I never use them, so I had forgotten about that.

There is now a donation version in the market for $1.99CAD for anyone interested.  QR Code attached.

I just uploaded version 1.2, which adds support for HTTPS and alternate ports, and fixes a few bugs.  If you installed from the market (donation or non-donation) you should get an update notification.

Two questions:

1. In the server address do I need to type ‘http://’? I tried with http but there was an ‘fetch error’.

2. It does not seem to be working if tracks is installed on a sub-domain like so: http://tracks.example.com It sa.ys ‘Fetching data’ and then ‘Parsing data’ and after that nothing shows in the screen. In light of point 1 above I did not include http in the server address.

sxv163 - 01 February 2011 03:28 PM

Two questions:

1. In the server address do I need to type ‘http://’? I tried with http but there was an ‘fetch error’.

2. It does not seem to be working if tracks is installed on a sub-domain like so: http://tracks.example.com It sa.ys ‘Fetching data’ and then ‘Parsing data’ and after that nothing shows in the screen. In light of point 1 above I did not include http in the server address.

1. No, you should not include http://, just the server address itself.

2. My Tracks instance is on a subdomain, and it is working for me, so the problem is probably more subtle.  I’m going to release a new version with a few bug fixes today, so please try that and see if it works.  If not, let me know and we can explore further.

I updated your app to the 1.4 version and it still does not work. On browsing your source code I notice that the code seems to be designed for working with the apache server. Does it matter that my server is lighttpd? If it helps in debugging I am using the latest tracks version. Let me know if you need anything from me that may help debug the problem. Is there a log file that is stored on the phone that may help?

I’m running lighttpd as well, actually; it’s just the client libraries that are provided by Apache.

If you have the Android dev tools, you could send me the output of adb logcat.  Or, if you give me an account on your server to test with, I can look into it that way.

Thanks for the feedback!

Here is the adb logcat output:

02-01 15:48:03.973: INFO/ActivityManager(10399): Displayed activity ca.xvx.tracks/.SettingsActivity: 427 ms (total 427 ms)
02-01 15:48:11.059: VERBOSE/TaskListActivity(11175): Returned from settings
02-01 15:48:11.090: DEBUG/TracksCommunicator(11175): Fetching tasks
02-01 15:48:11.090: VERBOSE/HttpConnection(11175): Get: http://tracks.example.com:80/contexts.xml
02-01 15:48:11.137: DEBUG/dalvikvm(11175): GC_FOR_MALLOC freed 1867 objects / 130432 bytes in 42ms
02-01 15:48:11.395: DEBUG/Sensors(10399): accelerometer gesture: 0x84020000
02-01 15:48:12.223: VERBOSE/HttpConnection(11175): Get: http://tracks.example.com:80/projects.xml
02-01 15:48:12.473: DEBUG/dalvikvm(11175): GC_FOR_MALLOC freed 1202 objects / 862344 bytes in 43ms
02-01 15:48:12.645: VERBOSE/HttpConnection(11175): Get: http://tracks.example.com:80/todos.xml
02-01 15:48:15.973: DEBUG/dalvikvm(11175): GC_FOR_MALLOC freed 357 objects / 13336 bytes in 63ms
02-01 15:48:22.381: DEBUG/Sensors(10399): accelerometer gesture: 0x01000401
02-01 15:48:23.006: DEBUG/Sensors(10399): accelerometer gesture: 0x84010000

I tried accessing the contexts.xml, todos.xml and projects.xml file from the browser and it asks for login credentials and does download the relevant xml file when asked for it. Hopefully, it helps a bit?