First of all, my lotto checker app has surpassed 3000 downloads.
Secondly, I saw the following image posted on the Android development blog. It appears that the number of apps downloaded from the android market place has almost doubled since June. That's some pretty impressive growth
So I've taken a bit of a break from my lotto checker app, because I want to start messing about with SQL and XML parsing. I'm going to design and build a tool for storing items taken from an xml file in an SQLite database so that I when it comes to developing the motoring app I posted about the other day, I'll be able to come up with a more solid design, the build should be much quicker and I can focus a lot more of my efforts on testing.
I'm now at the point with the lotto checker where I need to tinker about with the input a bit more to perfect it, at which point the app will be complete. I' was thinking about writing a custom keyboard class based on a grid layout with image buttons.
Something that I only really found out quite interested me after I got my archos was the android live wall papers. I've just been looking at this tutorial and it looks like a quick and easy enough project to do in the near future, once I'm finished with this one. I'll be able to apply some of my 2D game physics knowledge to try make a bit of cash or even just stick it up on the android market for free or something.
After about a week I've finally got back to messing about with Android. I'm still making my way through the tutorials, developer documentation and sample source code but I feel like I'm making some progress. I've just bought a second hand Archos 101 (android 2.3.1) tablet from a previous college lecturer which I will use as a test device.
Obviously when developing for a tablet there are some things you have to consider, for instance the larger screen. I think I can use this to my advantage by ensuring the gui I create is robust and will work well on multiple devices. All of the tutorials so far that I have gone through implement the GUI using XML which will aid development of this app across different phones.
I've also got my hands on a book called "Starting Android Tablet Application Development" which is aimed at people beginning developing with Android. I've only really had a glace through the first couple of pages of the book, and what I've read so far has been more insightful than the Android documentation. I have to say I'm looking forward to really getting in to this project now.
I've been reading for a bit and I like the way Android operates. The activity tasks and back stack and the activity life cycle is something I will probably find myself coming back to look at in the future. The more I read the more I'm finding it similar to J2ME which is a good thing.
The four main component classes that you extend (Activities, Services, Content Providers and Broadcast Recievers) will make the design a lot easier and the ap better structured. For now I can see the use of both the Activity and Service classes and later on if I want to integrate some kind of image processing element I forsee the use of the Broadcast Receiver. I'm looking at code examples now whilst I make my way through the documentation.