FYI

This blog was created as a platform for my Android apps, namely NTW Text Editor and Pendulum Chaos so far. But I admit I neglect it and often digress, a lot :'(

Nevertheless, if you are interested in this sort of things, you can glean some conceptual insights into how NTW was conceived in my earliest posts

Saturday 25 February 2012

Pendulum Chaos showcase video

First time using movie maker, so pardon the lack of sophistication :o
I wonder if it can go viral....

Thursday 23 February 2012

How do I increase download rates of my apps.....

I'm thinking how to increase the download rates of my apps. A youtube video would probably work for Pendulum Chaos, but NTW is sort of problematic. Thing is, the power of NTW will not really be appreciated by casual users. And I'm not very good at making super beautifully designed graphics and stuff... I'm afraid I've always been rather utilitarian.

So here's some ideas I brainstormed up for my 2 apps

Pendulum Chaos
- Allow users to write script files to control exactly how the blurriness and color is calculated, set limits, make use of bmps as their pendulums instead, make special background effects etc etc. But problem is the calculation of blurriness and color already has over a LOT of variables that can be tweaks even using just my current 2 color equation, so I dunno man.... Will people actually want such a feature? Would the difficulty level be to high for them and/or too high for me to program?

- Allow users to record videos of the wave that can be converted to Live wallpaper that can be uploaded/downloaded freely via my sorely neglected guinea-pig website. This is cool, but I have to look into it first.... I have never programmed live wallpaper before.

NTW
- Enable users to share their txt files via a network folder that connects to a NTW dedicated server somewhere. The general idea is to share the novels/recipes/etc you're writing. Exactly how this could be implemented is still a big question. I could open a special sugarsync folder just for NTW and share the username and password around? Or make it integrated as part of NTW's own file explorer. But I think people will prefer to share via Facebook, twitter or their own blogs and such, so maybe this is a bad idea afterall

- Make NTW open Java/C/Matlab/HTML etc code with customizable coloring options. This should elevate NTW to the ultimate level of geekiness I think :D :D :D. But I dun think many people will want to write code on their Android device :(

 - Pay for advertisements! But but but .... I'm poor and cheapskate :'(


Lastly, what I fail to mention thus far is, I really need to find a way to better monetize my apps. Maybe I should write apps related to SMS, soft keyboards, GPS, golf and phone calls.... People who care about these features tend to be more fervent than others and should be willing to pay for them, right???

Pendulum Chaos

My second app! This is a small app to appreciate the beauty of pendulum waves.




Pendulum Chaos is a simulation of a pendulum wave. By setting up a series of pendulums of carefully selected lengths, a pendulum wave effect is generated.

GET IT HERE!

For the fellow geeks out there, the basic equation I used is theta(t)=theta0*cos(t/sqrt(L/g)).
The pendulum lengths are calculated with L(i)=g(1/(2PI*I(i)))^2.

You can also find cool videos of actual pendulum waves on youtube! These videos are also what prompted me to write this app. :D




How to use?
It's all pretty self-explanatory. You control the number of pendulums, initial swing angle, overall speed, pendulum size and colours.
I even allowed swing angles of up to 360 degrees to get effects impossible in an experimental setup.
Experiment with them yourself to get some really nice graphics!

Tips
Use similar shades of color, perhaps of light and dark brightness levels, and allow some transparency to your colors, then slow down the simulation speed to really appreciate the wave effect.

If you have any questions, you can email me at erikdevikingsheep@gmail.com or just post something on my blog.

Monday 6 February 2012

v1.61 is out :D

Yay! v1.60 was released without any need for major debugging afterwards 
Let's hope v1.61 can do the same.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I present to you NTW v1.61!

- Sort NTW's shelf by file name, date, type etc!

- HTML view at long last! And with text justification (i.e. alignment of both left and right) 
However, HTML mode works only as a view mode, but you can easily switch between raw text and html modes to edit it on the fly.

Note: File with non ".html" extensions are displayed using a default template whose font size, spacing and colors will follow your theme settings. If you know how to use HTML tags, you can insert them in yourself to manipulate the look of specific words and sentences, and even display pictures! However, the text that your custom tags wrap around must not contain any newlines.

Files with ".html" extensions are displayed using the file's specifications. Some display hiccups may be present due to NTW's chunking system, but the file itself will still be saved exactly as it is in the raw text mode.

- No more weird truncation between each chunk. Loading of each chunk will now preferentially start and end with newlines, spaces, ".", or ","

- Disabled long press during view only mode.

- Tweaks to copy/cut/paste, select text functions

- Made some icons more informative.

- Minor tweaks and corrections

Feedback, anyone?