Lunchbox Becomes Lunches

Introduction

Back at the start of December 2009 I wrote an article about Lunchbox. Since then nothing really progressed on the project. My designer got diverted onto other work for me and the application was just sitting in limbo. Last night that changed and Lunches will hopefully soon be on the App Store.

The Problem

As I get closer and closer to being an indie developer it has become more and more important that I go through the entire iPhone application development life-cycle. The element that I had always failed to complete was the App Store approval process and actually having something available in the App Store.

The code for Lunches has been pretty much done for months now and it was being ignored for a couple of fairly insubstantial reasons. The first was that I had decided that I was waiting for my designer to create some in-application images and an application icon despite knowing that I had diverted him onto other work. The second was that I knew that I needed to alter the application to fix some broken logic. However, when it came down to it, neither of these were solid enough reasons to delay things any further.

The Missing Artwork

Lunches needed two graphical elements: some in-application images for a segmented control that denote a packed lunch, a school lunch and no lunch and also an application icon. The latter was solved by a friend who managed to create a basic icon for me in a few minutes in exchange for me treating him to something from his Amazon Wishlist. It’s not perfect and once Otter Software has cash in the coffers I’ll be getting something a bit more refined but it will do for a version 1 release of a self-funded project.

For the segmented control graphics I turned to Acorn and Glyphish and eddit. I used Acorn to create a somewhat rough-and-ready image of a sandwich with a bite taken out of it. The Glyphish icon set provided a knife and fork and eddit gave me a none image. Again, like the application icon, they’re not perfect but they will do until I can fund something more refined and suitable.

Lunches version 1

The Broken Logic

Version 1 of Lunches contains two fairly significant flaws. The first is that you can only track lunches for one person. This suits me since I only have one child but obviously this does not apply to everyone (the average in the UK is somewhere around 1.8 children per family). The second is that it is currently not possible to skip weeks when there are school holidays. Because the application only deals with the current and next week it is not possible to store details for a couple of weeks ahead when there is a half-term holiday.

Releasing an application with both of these restrictions is not ideal but faced with some fairly substantial changes to the application I decided to simply ship an initial version with the restrictions and then re-engineer the application to fix them for version 2.

The Name Change

One thing that was completely out of my hands was changing the name from Lunchbox to Lunches. When I submitted the application for approval I was notified that Lunchbox was already in use so after a couple attempts I found that Lunches was available and took it. This introduced other problems however because I then had to make changes to the application itself, not and ideal thing to be doing at the last minute. However Lunchbox is now Lunches and I am confident that the changes I made to the application didn’t break anything.

The web Site

Seemingly as ever, my web site is in a state of flux. I recently launched a proper version of the site although it was missing a fairly significant section, that of Our software. At the moment I am putting some pages together for some Mac applications but I needed to create a page for Lunches so, courtesy of RapidWeaver I managed to knock something together that will, I hope, suffice until I can lavish some more love and attention on it. You can see the semi-temporary page at http://www.ottersoftware.com/oursoftware/lunches/.

A Few Final Things

When I submitted the application I decided to make it free. This was based on the flawed functionality and the fact that I’d minimised my costs for version 1 regarding the graphics. I’m not happy charging for something I feel is flawed so, for now at least, you can download Lunches once it is available and have a play without it costing you anything.

I obviously have two main things to fix for version 2 but I also have plans for an application that encompasses more than just lunch management. It may be that Lunches never makes it past version 1 and is superseded by a more comprehensive application, another good reason not to charge for it.

Lunches will be my first application in the App Store and it is great to finally be going through the last stages of an iPhone application life-cycle. It may be of absolutely no use to anyone but me and my ex-wife but then again I primarily built it for me and I am looking on being able to release it is as an added bonus.