Ampersand Dev Blog

I shot a deer and need a place to store the carcass. Can I use your bathtub? Will also need a lot of ice.

With the release of iOS 4 and the iPhone 4 with the high res Retina Display, we have been working on an update, mainly to upgrade all of the graphics to look great on the Retina Display. This has proven to be more of a task than originally though, the main problem is with the app shell, which is the main thing holding back the release. Not only does it upgrade the graphics, it also fixes many bugs, adds some new features, and has a nice interface. Here are some screen shots(testing in Safari, not the full app):

We have been working on a few little Twitter Tools as we have come to call them. We have currently released 3, and there are no plans for new ones, just upgrade to the current ones. We are contemplating making a simple way to just tweet a time to SwimLink and it will automatically add the time to your SwimLink account.

TimeConverter is a quick way to convert times from pool type to other pool types. Just tweet the pool type, event, and time and TimeConverter will return the converted times within a minute. This is a great tool when you need a quick conversion and you don’t necessarily want to add it to SwimLink or use another more cumbersome service. Flight Info is another pretty simple service.

Tweet the flight, fltinfo and within about a minute it will return the info for the flight. If it has multiple segments it will just have a brief overview of the segments, and you can reply with the specific segment and it will return more detailed info. You can also just tweet the flight number with the segment you want at the end, and it will return the specific info, this will always happen when a flight just has one segment.

Lastly, we have recently released fltprices, which is a quick way to get the best price for a trip between two airports. It just takes a tweet with the airports (IATA) and the dates of travel, and within a minute or two Flight Prices will reply with the best result. We are working to add a website where you can see more than just the best result, and you will be able to choose other factors, like airline, time, etc.

SwimLink version 1.1.1 has been approved and is now for sale in the AppStore and as a free upgrade for current SwimLink users. This add multiple swimmer support, a multitude of bug fixes, and a few little things that have been requested. We are working on SwimLink 1.2, which will include a built-in timer, with support for splits. We are not sure if we will have standalone splits capable in 1.2, but it is absolutely in the roadmap.

SwimLink for Coaches is something we are actively looking at developing, and will be meant for use by just coaches.

Model A: SwimLink for Coaches would be $.99, but coaches wouldn’t be able to enter times.

Model B: SwimLink for Coaches would be $1.99, and would be a fully featured of SwimLink, and SwimLink for Coaches.

SwimLink for Coaches

SwimLink for Coaches would provide an easy way for coaches to see the times of all of their swimmers. Just like friend requests, a swimmer would get an invite from a coach, and once accepted, would become a swimmer for that coach. “Coach Power” would allow a coach to see all times of that swimmer. Another great thing will be the ability to push workouts to swimmers.  If a swimmer has an appointment or such and they cannot make it to practice, the coach could push the workout to that swimmers account, and with a tap they will be able to start the workout. There are other features we are working on, but these will be the two most powerful features when it launches.

We are currently working on SwimLink 1.2. We have already pushed the graphs in to 1.1, leaving a few updates left for 1.2.

Multiple Swimmers – This has been the most requested feature for SwimLink.  This will allow you to add multiple swimmers under one account, this way a parent can easily add a few kids, and will easily be able to sort by all swimmers, or any specific swimmer.  If no specific swimmer is selected, any goal, time, or meet will show the swimmer, so you can quickly see all of the times at once, while still knowing who swam it.

Workout Mode – This will be an easy way to track all of your workouts.  There are two great uses for this, first, it will be easy to see what your yardage is.  Second, if you have a waterproof case, or just put you iPhone/iPod Touch in a waterproof bag, you can use SwimLink throughout your workout.  Just enter your workout, and SwimLink will automatically guide you through your workout, it will show you what is next, as well as a nice timer to show you when to go.

SwimLink 1.1 is now in the AppStore, it adds support for friends, edit/delete for meets, times, and goals, and other minor bug fixes.  SwimLink currently has a 4.2 star rating, with 16 ratings, the average rating given by the 12 reviews is about 4.5 stars. We are working on some great new features, like multiple swimmers per account, graphs of all times for an event, and are putting the finishing touches on SwimLink.net, where you can do everything you can on the iPhone in your web browser.

Over the past few days we have been working on Kayak integration into SpeedyFlyer, this will allow you to quickly see the cheapest 10 flights at any time, from any two places, using the Kayak API. When searching for all the flights between two places, there will automatically be a button to fing the cheapest flights between the two places (it will default to two weeks from then, with a one week stay, this is easily changeable). This will also be a standalone feature.

Vegas Mobile is now in the AppStore, it costs $.99, you can download it here. We have submitted version 1.0.2, which breaks the Dining section up into 5 lists, for easier navigation and smoother transitions. This update is yet to be approved, and we are expecting approval sometime in the days following New Years Day. Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

We are currently working on integrating with Twitter and Facebook. While neither of these are guaranteed, we hope that Twitter will be an easy on to get working. Right now it will just post new times to your Twitter feed, we may have some other features coming to that as well.