The review

Through the brutal 2,5 day development cycle of the prototype our group displayed a fantastic ability to communicate, support and generally coexist in a high stress environment on very little food and sleep. This culture has luckily endured through the development of Strongbird 2.0. There has not been a single heated conflict. Everyone has contributed on his part of the code. We compliment each other, both in personality and through our insight into Android specifically, and coding in general.

This development cycle has seen it's ups and downs in term of productivity. We have at times underestimated how much harder it would be to implement and merge the new UI features from ICS with the way the code from the prototype worked. Features that were considered trivial to implement, ended up hogging way more than their share of time and energy.

There has also been great difficulties dealing with the apps gallery - especially in regard to memory management, threading, refreshing inside fragments and working around the constraints of the Android environment(scoping issues).

We also spent considerable amounts of time trying to implement and utilize the official Facebook API in conjunction with the application to share progress and sessions. This was scrapped due to being unable to even compile using the library.

Most of the testing of the Strongbird 2.0 code relied on tested code from the prototype.

At the tail-end of the cycle we wish we had known how much time we would have to invest to implement the UI the way we wanted. The consequence of failing to predict this is a serious delay in testing and some really ugly code in certain places. Thankfully we spent time debuging and testing the prototype even after the due date to at least ensure that the code we reused would be rock solid.

How did we do with our goals for Strongbird 2.0?

• Completely revamp the UI to take advantage of the new ICS features. DONE
• Conform with the StrongLifts profile and palette. DONE
• Produce a cleaner, simpler, and more intuitive interface. DONE
• Up the usage of styles. DONE
• Total refactoring of all the major systems to allow easier debugging. SEMIDONE
• Improve the StrongLifts logic/hub to enhance and simplify interaction with the rest of the application. DONE
• Add internal gallery to allow tracking of the physical transformation of the user. DONE
• Better adherence to the Android design guidelines. DONE
• Allow easier and more in-depth stat-tracking without information overload. DONE
• Enhance UI focus on important features. Downplay less important. DONE
• Add small tips to each activity/screen. We aim not to need this, but better safe than sorry. DONE
• Add link to the default music player to shorten the road between the user and his chosen motivational anthem. DONE
• Revamp and simplify Guides to further connect the user with the StrongLifts resources. DONE
• Improve threading to reduce wait times. DONE

We will be publishing the apps on Google Play as a Beta-version as it still needs some bug squashing to get it up to full release standard. Then we will get back in touch with Mr. Mehdi regarding a continued business collaboration.