Hello Purr App
This week I designed my first app using a website called App Inventor 2. The app was intended to be basic and introductory, which it was, and I'm glad we started out slow. I experienced some frustration with this assignment, but with that frustration also came growth. I thought the MIT interface was user friendly. I am still very much a beginner with this website, but I'm looking forward to being able to complete more tasks and diversify my skills when creating apps. For instance, I would like to learn how to center my text and button on the screen. I only ran into one snag while designing the app and that was with audio files. My sound wasn't playing and I was getting an error message when tapping the image. I found that I was uploading the files in the wrong window. I also discovered that both MP3 and WAV files are recognized by App Inventor.
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Paint Pot App
I had some learning experiences with the app design as well as the textbook reading this week. Thankfully, the app design is still basic and ramping up slowly, which gives me time to develop my skills and fine tune my work. When dealing with technology, it's always interesting and there's always a problem to solve. Everything was fairly straightforward with the design of this app, but I did run into a problem when I tried to go "off the grid" and add some features that weren't explained in detail in the book tutorial. I wanted to add a slider to enable the user to choose from a range of line widths instead of just two. The problem was, I ran out of space while developing my app. My phone still had plenty of empty space below the buttons, which is where I wanted to insert the slider to adjust the line width, but the buttons were not fully shown on the display screen of the App Inventor2 website. I couldn't work with them because I didn't have access to them.
I appreciated the design principles we read about in chapter 15 of our text that I think will come in handy when developing the more in-depth apps down the road. |
Screenshot of the Paint Pot app I developed.
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Mole Mash App
This week we were tasked with designing the traditional Mole Mash game! We programmed a mole to pop up at a random place on the screen. If the user is able to tap the mole before he disappears, they are awarded with a point in the "hits" column. If a user taps and misses the mole, a point is added to the "misses" score. For my modifications this week, I added a different background that included a a grassy field below a blue sky. I then needed to adjust the coding so the mole only popped up in the grassy field and not the sky. I also increased the speed that the mole appeared and disappeared, changing the difficulty of the game.
The frustrations I experienced were in not being able to code a second sprite (such as a bomb) to appear and end the game if tapped. The only option that was showing up for me was "if any sprite touched" so I couldn't figure out how to code the sprites to have different roles. The next fail was with my stop button. I wanted to be able to stop the game, because otherwise it just runs endlessly. You actually have to exit the game to get it to "end." My colleagues gave me some great suggestions of how to write the code to make the game stop when you push the button. I'm looking forward to experimenting with that code.
The frustrations I experienced were in not being able to code a second sprite (such as a bomb) to appear and end the game if tapped. The only option that was showing up for me was "if any sprite touched" so I couldn't figure out how to code the sprites to have different roles. The next fail was with my stop button. I wanted to be able to stop the game, because otherwise it just runs endlessly. You actually have to exit the game to get it to "end." My colleagues gave me some great suggestions of how to write the code to make the game stop when you push the button. I'm looking forward to experimenting with that code.
No Texting While Driving App
This week's design was different than in weeks past because instead of designing a game, we were designing an app to keep the driver of a car from answering or responding to texts while driving. The design was meant for safety and so felt much more intentional. When the no texting while driving app is activated, the phone will read an incoming text aloud to the recipient. Then, a designated text will automatically be sent in response to the original text including the location of the driver. The modifications I chose were in regards to the appearance of the app.
I've been a fan of testing the app after each section of code so I can trouble shoot as I go, but with the design of this app I wasn't able to test until the entire app had been written. It solidified the principle of "test as you go" because it was so much more difficult and time-consuming to break down the code when there were many more lines of code. |
Ladybug Chase App
I thought it was pretty cool coding the Ladybug Chase app this week, although it included some intense coding! This app involved 3 sprites, (all three of which change between costumes) two canvases, and sound affects. Each sprite moved at a different speed and performs a different function. The ladybug is the key player in the game and she has to stay alive. She does this by fulfilling two requirements: 1) eating aphids to gain energy and 2) avoiding the frog, who eats her if they come into contact.
My aesthetic modifications this week include adding a meadow of flowers to the field canvas, enlarging the restart button and adjusting the interface colors. I also added coding to make the aphid and the frog disappear when the game ends and reappear when a new game begins. I also added a crunch sound each time the aphid gets eaten. If I were to perfect this, I would find a way to shorten the crunch sound clip. As it is, the crunching goes on for a long time after the aphid has been eaten. I increased the speed of the frog because a lot of times he was getting stuck near the aphid and he wouldn’t move away quickly enough for me to get in there and eat the aphids for energy points. |
Portugal Map Tour
Where's My Car?
This week I developed an app that uses a GPS tracker to remind you where your car is parked. As you get out of your parked car, the push of a button marks the location of your car. When you're ready to return to your car, you push another button on the app and step by step directions guide you back to your parked car. I modified the look of this app to give a cleaner, more organized appearance. I wanted the user to be able to distinguish easily between the two sections of the app which both perform different functions since they have similar components (address, GPS coordinates and a button.)
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Oregon Trail Quiz
This week we completed a quiz app. We learned some new components of the app inventor software that allows the user to interact with the app. I was quite nervous when looking at the instructions and the screenshots of the code prior to beginning my work on the app this week. Surprisingly, it turned out to be pretty straightforward. The only major problem I encountered was when I misnamed one of my components. When I went to drag it out from the initialization block, the selection I needed wasn't available. It took me a moment to figure out my mistake, but it was easily remedied by renaming the component correctly.
I customized the app by designing an Oregon Trail quiz. I am hopeful that the 4th grade students who study Oregon Trail as part of their social studies curriculum could benefit from this app. I also added sound affects to indicate when a user gets the question right or wrong. Overall, designing this app was a learning experience for me. |
App Design Proposal
For this assignment I completed the App Design Proposal (ADP), a form provided by our professor to get us designing the app we will create for our final project. This proposal included design features such as: the name, category and user group for our app. In addition to planning the design, interface and function of the app, we considered how we would test the app once initial design was complete. I have determined that I will ask the 4th grade teachers at our school as well as 4th grade students to software and quality control test my app. Based on the feedback I received from my instructor and peers on my ADP, I would like to include additional features like, drawing features or gamification. In this way I can incorporate skills I learned while designing other apps earlier in the course.
Interface and Component Design
This is a picture of my final app on my Android device.
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This week I spent a lot of time making adjustments to the interface of my app. I experimented with the horizontal and vertical arrangements in the Component Designer in an attempt to create space between items on the screen (buttons, labels, and images.) My goal was to improve the look of my app.
I also learned a new skill: how to create the appearance of more than one screen. I did this by creating three main vertical arrangements to represent three separate screens. Then, I applied code to the buttons that direct you to each screen. The code sets screens as visible or non visible. Finally, I added a new section to my app that allows the user to practice locating the counties of Idaho before taking the quiz. Users will use a key, provided for them on the screen, and color certain apps a certain color. After they have colored the counties, they can use the Answer Key screen to check their work. When they are ready, they can advance to the quiz and test their knowledge! |