Not sure how to proceed with new changes.

[darkzeroman]

I've been working on changes here.

I've changed a good deal of the code and I'm not sure if a pull request is the way to proceed.

A quick summary of the changes:

• One of the biggest changes I have made is changed the backend to use an API I've made with the following format:

http://desolate-escarpment-6039.herokuapp.com/bus/get?route=red&direction=clockwise&stop=fitten

There were a few reasons for this. Because we're screen scraping due to a lack of NextBus API for GT (and GT Mob's API does not include Emory route), it's easier to deal with changes if I can make my own API as a middle man. This is much easier than trying to debug the issue from the phone. The current calls made from the code would sometimes error out for edge cases, which are must easier to take care of using my own API.

I think this would be fine for production since the calls are not intensive and the free plan from Heroku should be fine.

• Added GSON library for JSON parsing. There is a hit on performance since it takes longer to parse, but it's minimal.
• Fixed a few bugs that were occurring because many things were static.
• Multiple changes made to the JSON data and updated the times for the routes.
• My current goal is to fix the "Other Routes." The biggest issue is that one stop sometimes has two different names for two different stops.

I have not been able to test out the live map feature since I don't have an Android phone currently. Once I get my hands on one, I will try to make sure it's running properly.

[dougblack]

Not near a computer right now so I'm replying from my phone.

A pull request would probably be best. The app will still need to be updated through my own developer portal to maintain the current user base and allow us to notify them of new updates, so I can't just turn over control entirely to you.

I like the intermediate API idea. Does your heroku app make calls to nextbus only when you make a request or does it request every few seconds and just send the most recent results to any requests? Just curious.

I like what you've done so far! Good job.

[darkzeroman]

There isn't any caching since I figure the traffic is not heavy enough to justify that.

I've fixed the issue with selecting other arrivals on the same stop. I still have a problem I'm not sure how to deal with. The first is that some stops might be shared for a route in different directions. Like, the transit hub which is used by the night route for both the Clough and Fitten directions. Or like below:

I was thinking maybe there should be an expandable list for a route with two or more directions? The way it is shown currently is not clean but it works.

Also, what color do you think the Emory route should be? I'm bad at choosing colors.

[dougblack]

Personally I like the screenshot you posted above more than having an expandable list. Less taps is better.

To make the Other Routes screen look a little less busy, you could try making the direction text smaller, right aligned, and a light gray so it looks faded. I'm no UI expert but I bet that could look nice. Copying the gray colors used in the StopView would probably be best.

I would say that we should use the official Emory blue/purple color but that would probably clash with our Night and Blue routes. I think a whitish color would work best, even though it won't stand out very well.

[darkzeroman]

Hey,

I worked on this for a few more hours today and wanted to give you an update. I'm going to flesh out a few more features like:

• notification when the api is down (android's timeout for URL connections is finicky and I need to find a solution).
• implement more preference listeners in the activities to listen for changes.

I'm a terrible UI person and really have no skills in deciding what works and doesn't. I am getting a little frustrated because I suck at choosing colors and designs, maybe I can find some UI guy to help me make some design decisions because I am not making much progress on it.

I've completed the Favorites, which looks like the following:

If only active routes is set in the preferences, inactive routes are grayed out. Appearance isn't good, but it functions.

The following is what the activity looks like normally. Clicking on the star enters the favorites activity.

The following is what the app looks like when adding a stop/route/direction to a favorites:

And now clicking on the star... Similar message when defavorite-ing something.

I've also changed the "Other Arrivals" page. Because of the current implementation, right aligned text is not possible. To do that, it's necessary to make a new layout file and not use a drawable resource.

Issues to work out:

• The "enter favorites" icon and "this is a favorite route/path/direction" are the same. I'm not sure what to do to make them different.
• Make sure the maps code is working. It's not possible to do on the emulator, so I will have to get a phone somehow.

If you see any possible issues, be sure to reply.

[keveleigh]

These are looking good! I was planning on working on this stuff as well, but it looks like you beat me to it. I have a few Android devices (running 4.2.1, 2.3.4, and 1.6) which I'd be willing to use to test this app on if neither of you are able to. I'd also be more than willing to work on a few things if you guys want to collaborate a bit! I was thinking a widget might be handy for some people, perhaps always displaying a certain route/stop's next arrival time or something.

[darkzeroman]

@keveleigh I'm working off my own repository at the moment. Available here.

If you wanted to work on it, I would recommend going through the source code to get a feel for it. So you can understand how the data is stored and how you could build on that. Feel free to make changes and submit a pull request. Also, look through my README for a quick summary.

If you are good at design, the favorite_row.xml would love your attention. The Data class is a work in progress that is messy and I know it.

[dougblack]

@darkzeroman Looks great! Sorry I haven't been responding lately, I'm currently out of town for job interviews.

When you want the changes to go live, just send a pull and let me know!

[keveleigh]

@darkzeroman I took a look at the favorite_row.xml file and experimented with a few layouts. I really like this one, personally. In my opinion, the first letter of the route and the color to the left should be enough to identify the route. I felt that it really cleaned up each cell and also compressed it a bit horizontally for smaller screens. Please let me know what you think! I'm absolutely open to being shot down.

Also, when deploying to my phone, attempting to go to the map force closes the app just like it does in the emulator.

[dougblack]

@keveleigh I like the look! Three things:

• Do we need the large letter? We get away with using exclusively color in most sections of the app to identify the currently selected stop, why not on this screen as well? (A genuine question, if you both like the large letter then we'll keep it.)
• The TextView alignments look little off. The "Recreation Center" TextView isn't quite lined up with the "Fitten Hall" TextView. Similarly, the direction TextViews don't look like they line up with their stop TextView counterparts.
• There's a lot of white text. Have you experimented with fading out the direction to add a little more dynamism to the view? If you've already tried it and it looked bad, then never mind.

Keep it up guys! The update already looks awesome.

[keveleigh]

@dougblack Thanks!

• That's a good point. I was working off the original layout for the favorites page which had the full name of each route along with the stop. I didn't want to make too many drastic changes and felt like I should keep some portion of the route name. Personally, I have no problem removing the letter. Now that you've brought it up, I agree that the color should be enough.
• You're absolutely right. I didn't look at the screenshot close enough and didn't account for the different widths of the big letters. Of course, removing the letters entirely should fix this issue. The directions not lining up with the stop was an intentional design choice originally, but I've changed them to line up now. I think I prefer it this way.
• I actually hadn't considered this. I'll definitely implement it and see how it looks!

[darkzeroman]

I think the large letter isn't a bad idea.

Remember, there is an "Other Routes" page which must show which routes share the currently selected stop. That screen currently looks like: If we think removing the route name from the favorites page is a good idea, we should also remove it from this page. But I don't think the "Other Routes" would look good with the route name taken out. What would happen for Red/Blue which don't have multiple directions. That would mean in the proposed implementation only a bar would remain.

But having just a bar might be an issue for color blind users? I would personally would have liked to see the route/direction/stop information, but I realize it's way too much to fit in a small space. A good compromise would be to have the first letter show. They are unique. And I think @keveleigh's design is pretty slick.

@keveleigh Yeah, I'm pretty sure all the changes I made to the backend will mean the Maps feature won't even work anymore. The issue is that the map overlay doesn't work in the emulator and I don't have a device, but I should be getting my hands on one soon. Once I do, I can make sure the Maps feature works as expected.

One of my friends recommended that maybe we could move the color of the route to the background of the letter. That might be something you can play around with @keveleigh.

[keveleigh]

Here's the current state of the favorites screen based on the changes recommended by @dougblack. I still need to look at lining up the stop and direction text a little more consistently.

@darkzeroman I'm open to either implementation (with or without a reference to the route name). I can certainly look more into moving the color of the route to the letter. That was one thing I began looking into just before we decided to try removing the letter altogether.

I changed the bar between the header and the list to the official Georgia Tech old gold hex value. It was just red before, so I'm open to suggestions for new colors or changing it back to the way it was. I also removed the bold font from the words in the list. I felt that it didn't match the way the stops are listed on the main page. Any thoughts?

[darkzeroman]

@keveleigh If you can, let's see what it looks like with the letter and color. All the other changes you made are fine with me.

[keveleigh]

I haven't found a decent way to change the color behind the letter yet, but I'm still looking. I decided to experiment a bit with the color of the letter, and I kind of like the way it looks.

Here's where I currently am with changing the color of the background behind the letter. I think I have a way to make it look a little better, but these are two ways it looks now.

I've noticed a few things during my testing.

• When I end the application process on my phone and relaunch the app, the favorites list clears. I don't mean re-sending the app from my computer; I mean just ending and relaunching the app all from my phone. I'm not sure if this is just where you are with the implementation of that, but that's an issue I've noticed.
• It doesn't seem like the fading for inactive routes works anymore. I may have broken that on accident (and you don't have my code yet), so I'll definitely look into it myself.

[darkzeroman]

@keveleigh

• I have a misplaced line in the code that causes the favorites to not show up. I'm not sure which version you are working from, but the line that has to be moved is shown below.

I wouldn't really recommend doing a merge right now, because I've been making lots of changes to the backend, mostly making sure everything follows a consistent naming pattern, and that could bring up lots of merging issues.

So instead, I would change the following line in the Data.java file.

    private static void loadFavoritesData() {
        try {
            FileInputStream fis = ctx.openFileInput("favorites.txt");
            Reader reader = new InputStreamReader(fis);
            Data.favorites = new Gson().fromJson(reader, Favorites.class);
        } catch (Exception e) {
            System.out.println(e);
            Data.favorites = new Favorites();
        }
                // Data.favorites = new Favorites(); was previously here
    }

I'll look into the faded stuff.

[darkzeroman]

@keveleigh Any updates on the UI? I think we should atleast put something together so the updated NextBus can be shipped.

[keveleigh]

@darkzeroman I will post an update tonight. Sorry I haven't posted one yet.

[keveleigh]

@darkzeroman The best update I can give at the moment is that I'm still working getting the letter to appear inside a square of the corresponding color. I can't seem to get the letter to center both horizontally and vertically. This is currently the best finished option, in my opinion, from my post above:

I will continue working on the other layout and should have it finished tomorrow (2/26).

[darkzeroman]

@keveleigh I like it.

[darkzeroman]

@keveleigh

Just upload what you have done to your repo. I'll take care of the rest.

I can easily change the one you've made for the others.

[darkzeroman]

Pinging @keveleigh , pinging @keveleigh !

[keveleigh]

@darkzeroman So sorry! I'll upload right now! How would you like me to go about doing that?

[darkzeroman]

Just make a branch in your repository and commit it there.

[keveleigh]

This is my first time working with git. I had my environment and files set up incorrectly and accidentally deleted a few of my files while trying to figure out how to branch, push, and do other core git functions. I'm working on getting it set back up correctly. My bad guys.

[keveleigh]

Hopefully I did this correctly. I have a "favoriteslayout" branch which has all my latest code, though I believe I accidentally updated my master to the same thing. The only files I changed are favorite_row.xml, favoritesAdapter.java, favoritesActivity.java, and colors.xml. The rest of the "changed files" are just from when I copied @darkzeroman's files from his fork into mine. I'm sure there was an easier way to do that, but yeah. Please let me know if you have any questions. Also, I was working with older versions of your files darkzeroman, so hopefully nothing I did messed any of your latest changes up.

[darkzeroman]

Thanks, @keveleigh

[keveleigh]

Glad I was able to help! Hopefully I'll be able to contribute a few larger things soon.

[keveleigh]

Also, just a heads up about stuff I've noticed while using the version of GT Nextbus I had.

• The Favorites list can be rotated horizontally on screen rotation, but the rest of the app stays vertical.
• Rarely, the time updates don't seem to be super reliable. Sometimes the time will display as soon as I open the stop page, but other times it takes a few refreshes and "Error, Server Down?" messages.