Google drops out of JavaOne

Very disappointed to hear that google has cancelled all their talks at JavaOne. Kinda has that "I'm going to take my football and go home" feeling to it.

In the post, Josh Bloch says:

Like many of you, every year we look forward to the workshops, conferences and events related to open source software. In our view, these are among the best ways we can engage the community, by sharing our experiences and learning from yours. So we’re sad to announce that we won't be able to present at JavaOne this year. We wish that we could, but Oracle’s recent lawsuit against Google and open source has made it impossible for us to freely share our thoughts about the future of Java and open source generally. This is a painful realization for us, as we've participated in every JavaOne since 2004, and I personally have spoken at all but the first in 1996.

We understand that this may disappoint and inconvenience many of you, but we look forward to presenting at other venues soon. We’re proud to participate in the open source Java community, and look forward to finding additional ways to engage and contribute.

By Joshua Bloch, Google Open Source Programs Office

I'm aware of the patent infringement action, but don't remember Oracle suing the open source community. A little whiny.

I have seen Josh speak many times at JavaOne and his talks will definitely be missed. The puzzlers talk was great. I also see that Crazy Bob Lee dropped out in support. A quick twitter search shows a lot of activity.

For the record, I will be at JavaOne.

BBB

Todo Q now compatible with DroidX

Apparently there is a bug in the DroidX maps implementation. Recently I started getting bug reports in the maps area of my app, which is usually very stable. The app would crash, but w/o a FC dialog.

Luckily I was able find an article by another developer and release a patch as v1.1.21.

Hard to believe this basic class in Android is broken in the DroidX. I heard this is a leftover from 1.6 that didn't get ported, but have no proof.

Thanks go to Jonathan W. for helping me find & debug this issue.

Here's the stacktrace. Maybe it will help some other poor developer looking for this bug.

om.billybobbain.android.todoqueue.ToDoMap$1@45e159c0
08-05 08:50:44.839  4493  4493 W dalvikvm: threadid=3: thread exiting with uncaught exception (group=0x4001e278)
08-05 08:50:44.847  4493  4493 E AndroidRuntime: java.lang.ClassCastException: android.graphics.drawable.BitmapDrawable
08-05 08:50:44.847  4493  4493 E AndroidRuntime:  at com.google.android.maps.MyLocationOverlay.drawMyLocation(MyLocationOverlay.java:561)

Todo Q is only $1.99 on the android market.

Repeating Tasks Use Case

Repeating Tasks are a common request for Todo Q & something I've been working on for a while. The implementation will allow the easy addition new or custom repeat rules. The following is a raw document I created and just decided to release. I welcome input on alternate repeat rules and or strategies that I might have missed.

Use Case: Repeating Tasks

Tasks can be marked as repeatable with a custom time period.

The user can select one of the following values in the dropdown:
Every Day
Every Week
Every Month
Every Year
Custom

The application will then store this value & use it when a task is completed
to schedule the next one. Custom repeating tasks require additional user input.

Custom Repeating Tasks

Daily
D1-Every day
D2-Every weekday
D3-Every N days

Weekly
W1-Every Sun/Mon/etc
W2-Every N weeks on {d1, d2, ..., dN}

Monthly
M1-Day X of every N months
M2-The first/second/etc Sun/Mon/etc of every N months

Yearly
Y1-Every year on MM/DD
Y2-The first/second/etc/ Sun/Mon/etc of Jan/Feb/etc


No end date
End after N occurrences
End by X date

Repeat Rules

D1 - no inputs
D2 - no inputs
D3 - how many days

W1 - which day of week Sun/Mon/etc
W2 - how many week apart, which days of week

M1 - which day of month, how many months apart
M2 - which one, which day of week, how many months apart

Y1 - which date MM/DD
Y2 - which on, which day of week, what month

RRTYPE
RRVALUE


RepeatRule
String ruleType
String ruleValue

DateTime calculateNext(RepeatRule rule, DateTime time)

---

Please comment below or email me if you have suggestions for the repeating tasks implementation.

Todo Q is available for $1.99 on the android market.

bbb

Todo Q for Android is now available in French and German

Todo Q for Android has been localized to French and German. The screenshots below are from my eclipse development environment. Comments and better translations welcome.

French



German



Todo Q is available on the android market for $1.99.

bbb

Todo Q now runs on Froyo

Todo Q v1.1.18 was just released supports the "unofficial" Froyo build. I used the MyDroidWorld instructions to update a spare droid for testing. (thanks for the link Nathan!)

Todo Q is available for $1.99 on the android market.

bbb

Android Market Crash Reports, Release Info, and Froyo

Just a quick update.

The android market crash reports have already helped me find a bug in Todo Q.

Recent releases have also fixed a couple of bugs in address lookup and added features to control the custom icons and category assignment.

The only other thing on my mind right now is Froyo. Seems the Calendar provider changes are breaking applications everywhere. Time to go back to gdata. Ugh. (bug on google code)

Todo Q is only $1.99 on the android market. Give it a try today.

bbb

Update 1:

This bug comment says the provider URI was updated.
Content provider URI
Old (2.1 and before): content://calendar/
New (2.2): content://com.android.calendar/

New Features in Todo Q for Android

Todo Q was updated recently to make entering & reviewing tasks easier. The new button bar has buttons to quickly add tasks, toggle the display of completed tasks, open settings, and open maps.



The widget was also updated to a 3x2 and displays up to 4 items.



Todo Q is available for only $1.99 on the market.

BBB

Todo Q v.1.1.11 for Android has Faster Task Completion

Todo Q v1.1.11 was recently released to the android market. The main enhancement was the addition of star-style checkboxes on the task list that can be used to complete a task. The long-click menu still exists, but the star-style checkboxes make it much more intuitive.



Currently working on a button bar for the list with common functions such as add task, show completed tasks, settings, and filter by location. On a longer term, trying to rework the location services to support additional location providers and improve battery life. These are harder problems, but definitely worth solving.

Todo Q is available for only $1.99 on the android market.

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Todo Q v1.1.10 for Android Released with Widget

Todo Q v1.1.10 includes several new features designed to make managing tasks easier.

• improved help with new content and screenshots
• new widget showing next task with time and location
• improved foursquare venue lookup provider (beta) (see video)

My first task this morning is to replace my video card. It looks like I'm late already.



Clicking the widget opens the task list. (principle of least astonishment)



Todo Q is available for only $1.99 on the android market.

BBB

Todo Q Screencast

Just ran across this really cool androidscreencast project on google code. Only a few frames a second, but I sort of like the effect.

Here's a capture of me walking through the app.



screencast

This uses the beta foursquare lookup to find the grocery store. What do you want to see me demo next?

Sorry, no audio at this time. Ya'll don't wanna hear my Texas twang anyway.

BBB

As the World Turns

Eek! It looks like I let my frustration leak onto the blog. Sorry.

I REALLY want Todo Q to sync with google tasks, but need a reliable method.

I appreciate the input & haven't given up on it.

BBB

Blame Google, Not Me

I'm getting beat up over the lack of google task sync. Flames for me instead of the software missing the API. If there was an API for google tasks, it would be integrated. I refuse to resort to screen scraping or use a backdoor that might end up in lost customer data.

Sorry, that's just the way I am.

Thanks.

BBB

Todo Q v1.1.9 for Android Released

Todo Q v1.1.9 for Android adds a few new features to the the task editor. A new "All Day?" checkbox was added to allow the creation of all day events. The task editor also replaced the "Add to Calendar?" checkbox with a dropdown listing the calendars known to the account. You can now assign a task to any of your calendars, instead of only the default defined in settings. The default still affects the imported calendar. (for now)

Here's a shot of the task editor showing the "All Day?" checkbox is selected. This hides the normally visible start & end time buttons. The calendar dropdown is visible at the bottom showing the Billy Bain calendar is selected.



Since the last blog update, Todo v1.1.8 was also released with the following features.

• using a contact address on a task to avoid retyping
• a new preference to force use of the gps to autofilter the list
• a very beta foursquare lookup enabled via a new global preference
• and a few bug fixes

Todo Q is available for only $1.99 on the android market. BBB

Droid 2.1 update makes Todo Q maps say pinch me!

My droid was updated to 2.1-update 1 this morning. I ran a quick test of Todo Q and everything seems to work normally. When testing the maps in Todo Q, I was surprised to find that "pinch to zoom" worked flawlessly. (!) I figured it would require additional work, but I guess they built it right into the component. Good job Google.

Todo Q is available for 1.99 in the android market.

BBB