JoeApps

Weekly Post #4

Joe — Sat, 15 Oct 2011 00:28:34 +0000

Did you mean weekly or bi-weekly? Well it seems my weekly posts are not so weekly. ;)

It has been a little more than two weeks since my previous post. And a lot has happened since then.

To name a few things: Steve Jobs passed away, iOS 5 was released, and the iPhone 4S has started shipping with record numbers…again. Looks like Steve is still making history even after death.

Steve Jobs will serve as an inspiration to many including myself in future creations.

So what are you up to?I seem to get asked this question a lot lately.

I have been working on a lot of things behind the scenes to make life easier for me in the future. I will admit it is disheartening at the same time that I don’t have anything publicly visible to show for it yet. But that is the real reason for this post! I have something I feel I should announce.

PhotoVinci

I am in the design phase of an app called PhotoVinci! I hope to have it released by or before Christmas.

If you would like to be a part of the beta testing let me know here. In the future I will have a link to the apps website which will include a sign-up form for the beta.

Next time I make a post on PhotoVinci, I should have an icon and a feature list to share!

Until then, for those of you lucky enough to get one, enjoy using iOS 5 with your shiny new iPhone 4S! ; )

- Joe

Weekly Post #3

Joe — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 15:09:15 +0000

Hello!

Definitely late giving this post, but I have been pretty busy lately. I have two short things to mention for this post. First, the post on “Learning Cocos2D” will have to wait until I am done with the book. It will allow me to make a more complete review and testimonial which I believe will be helpful to others interested in buying the book. Second, I am starting a new project called PhotoVinci! You will be able to take a picture, draw on it, and share it with your friends. I want it to be an enjoyable experience from design to use and have a few features no one else does. Hopefully I can give updates on my progress with the application as I design & develop it.

Until next time,

Joe

Weekly Post #2

Joe — Sat, 17 Sep 2011 15:07:09 +0000

Just checking in to let you know I am going to make an interesting post with in the next few days. I have finally got my hands on “Learning Cocos2D Book” by Ray Wenderlich (@rwenderlich) and Rod Strougo (@rodstrougo). I am now 6 chapters in and very impressed with it! Ole the Viking is a beast! Takes out tons of robots and eats sandwiches! Ha.

Until next time,

Joe

Weekly Post #1

Joe — Fri, 09 Sep 2011 03:32:15 +0000

Hi!

It is obvious I haven’t payed much attention to the site, and I hope to change that ~~in the future~~ NOW! I believe that a post a week, whatever that may be, should help me get in the swing of things. I can’t guarantee the subject yet, but here is a possible list:

What I did this week. (Developer related or not.)
App Updates
iOS Developer Resources
New Ideas
What I want to accomplish next. (week, month, year)
Not much to say, but I had a pizza. It was good.
Problem/Solution – dev
Problem/Solution -> pizza!
Recommendations
App Reviews
How To’s
Tutorials
New Apps
etc.

So as you can tell, I am trying to keep it open (etc.) just as long as I can knock a post out each week. Once, I get more comfortable, and have a better schedule set up for myself, I might make two! posts per week. Lol. Baby steps.

Anyways, before I leave I just want to say that I have made a few minor updates. Man Laws Lite has recently been re-released and an update has been sent in for review. A minor update has also been sent in for Man Laws. Sorry no new laws just yet… :( Because of the way the laws are displayed, it makes it hard for me to update them. So I am hopefully going to fix this issue before too long as I have a TON of new laws building up in the queue. I plan on making the laws update automatically in the future so people can access them right away! Can’t wait! Sure will make my life a whole lot easier and the app a whole lot more enjoyable.

Until next time,

Joe

JoeApps Members Get More!

Joe — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 02:39:32 +0000

Welcome back! In the coming months I hope to expand the site to release new regular and premium categories of content available to members of the site for free. Just make sure you follow me on Twitter and Facebook! The categories to be included are “In Development”, “Tutorials”, “Promotional”, and a “General” category. This list is by no means final, but should give you an idea of where the site is heading. I am also throwing around the idea of including an Open Source category in which I include all of the great Open Source App Development I come across. I may even start up some open source development of my own!

First, I would like to explain the “General” category as it will be available to everyone and should be very interesting. Sometimes I find myself wanting to tell the world about something I think is awesome, but it doesn’t really have anything to do with JoeApps directly. That’s exactly what this category will include! I may post a review of a good action movie I have recently seen. You know, one in which you find yourself coming out of the movie theater feeling like Rambo. So you peel out of the parking lot and make a high speed film turn into a high speed chase between you and the cops…Oops! Yeah…about that…maybe that was a little exaggerated…maybe not. Now on to what I feel to be the premium content!

For developers who like to follow step-by-step tutorials in order to learn how to use a new Apple^® API, the “Tutorials” category will be for you! I will most likely place this in the menu-bar at the top of the page under “Developer” available to members of the site. So get registered and when I post my first tutorial you can go straight to it! Unlike a lot of tutorials on the internet I would like to make each of mine well documented and full of supplemental materials. That means source-code! It also means that if I feel a video will help show the process I use from start to finish then I will make one. Another thing is that a lot of developers have a hard time with understanding the documentation. Apple’s documentation is very extensive and should be a very helpful resource for everyone. So I hope to show references to it or the header files I use during the development process as well. I hope this will help you use the docs more in the future! So again, I hope my tutorials will be a good reference for new API’s introduced by Apple. And remember to register at the site to gain access to them because you will also be gaining access to the PRIMO ROAST!

What I just now randomly named the “PRIMO ROAST” is the “In Development” and “Promotional” categories. This is the reason why you will want to join this site if you are not a developer or even if you are a developer, but don’t care two-bits about tutorials. So to the point, starting with the “In Development” category, I will be giving insider looks at apps I am currently developing that are nearing the end of the process. This will give you a good idea of the up-in-coming release of a new piece of Digitally Fly™ Awesomeness! This will also help me as you can give me feedback of what you think! I hope to provide video, and images to supplement each sneak peek. As an added bonus to the “In Development” category, a registered member will have access to the “Promotional” category. From here you may find that you can download a copy of an app that I haven’t even released on the App Store^® yet! What!? I will be offering free iPhone, iPod touch, iPad, and Mac apps! How you may ask? Well if you have never used a promo code for an app before, I suggest you start searching for them now. They allow the developer to promote their application by giving codes that users, reviewers, podcasters, news sites and channels can use to download the app for free! I think this is a great way to help kick start the marketing of an application and I am all for it. There is however a limit to this greatness. Only so many codes are available for each version of an application. So, you will need to get them while they’re hot! I will most likely be providing around 20 or so promo codes per app release for your downloading pleasure. I however ask that when you use one to make a comment saying that it has been exhausted so others don’t try to use it only to find that it is unavailable. I will update the page accordingly.

So that is what I hope to provide in the near future. Tell yo kids! TELL YO WIFE!

- Joe

Verizon Wireless & Apple Team Up to Deliver iPhone 4 on Verizon

Joe — Tue, 11 Jan 2011 22:35:39 +0000

Verizon Wireless & Apple Team Up to Deliver iPhone 4 on Verizon

I think it is about time I actually get an iPhone. I have been needing to upgrade my phone for the past 4 years anyways. Check out the link above for Apple’s press release on the matter.

- Joe

New Apple TV Sales to Top One Million This Week

Joe — Mon, 03 Jan 2011 00:55:34 +0000

New Apple TV Sales to Top One Million This Week

CUPERTINO, California—December 21, 2010—Apple® today announced that it expects sales of its new Apple TV® to top one million units later this week. The new Apple TV offers the simplest way to watch your favorite HD movies and TV shows, stream content from Netflix, YouTube, Flickr and MobileMe℠, all on your HD TV for the breakthrough price of just $99. iTunes® users are now renting and purchasing over 400,000 TV episodes and over 150,000 movies per day.

Now with AirPlay®, recently available in iOS 4.2, users can wirelessly stream their music, video and photos from iPad™, iPhone® and iPod touch® to their new Apple TV, making it the perfect iOS accessory. Users can also control Apple TV with their iPad, iPhone or iPod touch using the Remote app, available as a free app on the App Store℠.

Apple designs Macs, the best personal computers in the world, along with OS X, iLife, iWork, and professional software. Apple leads the digital music revolution with its iPods and iTunes online store. Apple is reinventing the mobile phone with its revolutionary iPhone and App Store, and has recently introduced its magical iPad which is defining the future of mobile media and computing devices.

Press Contacts:

Tom Neumayr

Apple

tneumayr@apple.com

(408) 974-1972

Randi Wolfson

Apple

randi@apple.com

(408) 862-1225

NOTE TO EDITORS: For additional information visit Apple’s PR website, or call Apple’s Media Helpline at (408) 974-2042.

Apple, the Apple logo, Mac, Mac OS, Macintosh, Apple TV, MobileMe, iTunes, AirPlay, iPhone, iPad, iPod touch and App Store are trademarks of Apple. Other company and product names may be trademarks of their respective owners.

via New Apple TV Sales to Top One Million This Week.

Apple’s Mac App Store to Open on January 6

Joe — Mon, 03 Jan 2011 00:52:38 +0000

Apple’s Mac App Store to Open on January 6

CUPERTINO, California—December 16, 2010—Apple® today announced that the Mac® App Store℠ will open for business on Thursday, January 6. By bringing the revolutionary App Store experience to Mac OS® X, the Mac App Store makes discovering, installing and updating Mac apps easier than ever. The Mac App Store will be available in 90 countries at launch and will feature paid and free apps in categories like Education, Games, Graphics & Design, Lifestyle, Productivity and Utilities.

“The App Store revolutionized mobile apps,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “We hope to do the same for PC apps with the Mac App Store by making finding and buying PC apps easy and fun. We can’t wait to get started on January 6.”

The Mac App Store lets you browse new and noteworthy apps, find out what’s hot, view staff favorites, search categories and read customer ratings and reviews. Like on iPhone®, iPod touch® and iPad™, you can purchase, download and install apps in just one click and start using them immediately. Purchased apps can run on all of your personal Macs and updates are delivered directly through the Mac App Store so it’s easy to keep all of your apps up to date. The Mac App Store is available to Mac OS X Snow Leopard® users as a free download through Software Update.

Mac developers set the price for their apps, keep 70 percent of the sales revenue, are not charged for free apps and do not have to pay hosting, marketing or credit card fees. To find out more about developing for the Mac App Store visit developer.apple.com/programs/mac.

Press Contacts:

Bill Evans

Apple

bevans@apple.com

(408) 974-0610

Colin Smith

Apple

colins@apple.com

(408) 862-1171

NOTE TO EDITORS: For additional information visit Apple’s PR website, or call Apple’s Media Helpline at (408) 974-2042.

Apple, the Apple logo, Mac, Mac OS, Macintosh, App Store, iPhone, iPod touch, iPad and Snow Leopard are trademarks of Apple. Other company and product names may be trademarks of their respective owners.

via Apple’s Mac App Store to Open on January 6.

Time Crunch For Christmas

Joe — Sat, 27 Nov 2010 05:44:07 +0000

Just thought I would update you on what is going on around here. I haven’t been able to post any new content today because I have been so bogged down by other work. I still hope to start some tutorial posts in the near future as well as the other pages i mention in my JoeApps Members post. So things may be slow around the website until I have some more free time.

Keep an eye on the page though because as I get closer to its completion I may start posting some sneak peeks of the app codenamed “COLOR”.

The Amazing Mac App Store! Is it really amazing?

Joe — Sat, 20 Nov 2010 05:06:28 +0000

Arment founder of Instapaper and former lead developer for Tumblr, has displayed his views on the up-in-coming Mac App Store as “Not for today’s Mac developers.” Marco insightfully predicts how the new outlet for Mac software, while very attractive for an indie like me, will not drive today’s developers to the App Store. He raises many good points after stating, “a lot of existing Mac developers have pointed out major issues or unknowns that need to be addressed.” Each point raised shows to be a possible deal-breaker for today’s Mac developers.

What I find most interesting is how Marco displayed the ratio of “Today’s Mac apps” to “Future Mac App Store apps.” Future Mac App Store apps will far outweigh the number of current Mac apps out there today. As a fellow iOS developer having experienced the effects of the current iTunes App Store I tend to agree with him. While the current Mac software offered in brick-and-mortar places as well as online will continue to be sold that way, I believe future software will be offered entirely from the Mac App Store.

From a consumer standpoint the Mac App Store will be great! Like the iOS apps, Mac apps will be easily accessible, and most likely have a pricing structure a little more expensive than the iPad’s. Also there will be tons of apps to choose from. Something Apple loves to brag about because they end up making out like bandits while the developers get lost in the never ending river of crap…I mean…new apps. I’m not bitter.

From a small business standpoint it is the only thing to do. Not only do you lose the physical overhead from having to box and transport the software, but you gain access to a global market. This dramatically increases the number of possible consumers to sell to. Just how much of an increase is this? Well it depends. Not everyone speaks the same language, so apps that have been localized will most likely have more international sales. Wil Shipley, software developer for Delicious Monster, sheds some light on this subject in part 17 of his Pimp My Code series. He states, “I have seen between 20% and 25% of total revenue coming from non-English speaking countries. That’s, like, real money. You’ll want that.” I can say that I have experienced around the same percentages. It is hard to argue that developers would not use the Mac App Store in the future, as this increase in potential customers would come at little to no cost to them.

So will the Mac App Store be amazing? I’m sure it will, for consumers, developers, and NEW software. However, more specifically for today’s Mac apps, rather than today’s Mac developers, it will probably not be real special. It is inconvenient for today’s Mac developers to move their software into the Mac App Store as Marco Arment has pointed out. But it will be a great outlet for future software developed by today’s Mac developers and iOS developers who want to make their own Mac apps.

To quote Marco, “As both a Mac user and an iOS developer, I’m incredibly excited for the potential of this market.”

Joe — Sun, 07 Nov 2010 03:54:57 +0000

PrankCaller is the first and only app on the iTunes Store to offer simulated telephone operator responses and tones. Packed full of potential this app will never cease to amaze you. Use it on your friends, enemies, and even those nasty telemarketers. Fool the unsuspecting victim into thinking your number has been disconnected. Laugh it up while your friend calls back over and over again trying to figure out if he/she has to dial a one or not. You also have the option to select from four different types of music and then place the caller on hold. If you are crafty enough, you can even perform your own operator message by pressing the “Personal Operator” button.

View In iTunes

Extra Features:
4 Tones including a busy signal
7 Very entertaining voicemail messages

Future Features in Consideration:
Record your own soundboard (including the option to record your “Personal Operator” message built-in)

Instructions (iPhone):
1. Either receive a random call, or initiate the call yourself by texting Ex. “Call me as soon as you can!”
2. Answer Call (Note: Make sure it is on speaker phone)
3. Press Home button and open PrankCaller
4. Choose Operator Response, Tone, or Voicemail Message in order to prank the unsuspecting victim

Note: Select music choice before placing caller on hold.

Settings (info):
System Sound – Turn off if you don’t want the caller to hear it while switching pages. This setting is saved for the next time you use the application.

Instructions (iPod):
Same as the iPhone except that you need a cell phone or regular phone. For best results play around with having the phone on speaker or not to see which is better. Many phones microphone quality differs between the two.

* I appreciate any suggestions and will try to implement them in the application as soon as possible!

Credits:
Jazz and Soul by Peter John Ross

Great addition to apps such as iDracula, Pocket God, Blocked, Yo Mama, iShoot, fart machines and many other entertaining applications! No game could match the joy of flipping people out of their minds!

What’s New in Version 1.2

Fixed Compatibility with new iPhone OS 3.0

iPhone Screenshots

Customer Reviews

AMAZING IF U USE IT RIGHT

by it doesnt matter what my name is..I got this and at first it sucked but then i learned it has to be on speaker for it to work. Totally worth it

I’ve been waiting for this one

by N1CH0L4SFinally!!! Every unknown, blocked, or annoying caller can finally get the boot when they realize the number their calling has been disconnected. I love it! More fun and wacky messages in the next update would make it even better.

Great app.

by tripgripIt opens really fast on the 3GS and I keep the app icon right next to my phone button at the bottom of the phone.

Man Laws for iPhone and iPod touch

Joe — Sun, 07 Nov 2010 03:31:19 +0000

Break out the cigars and leather bound books that smell of rich mahogany because you are a man! Enjoy some jokes you can tell to your friends while in the man cave and laugh as they are strikingly close to the truth! Drink some Red Bull and pull an all-nighter while you dive into Man Laws. For iPhone and iPod touch! It is a great way to fill the gaps while you and the boys are watching sports or just shootin’ the breeze. Enjoy, Drink, LIVE MANLY!!!

View In iTunes

Features include:
- Bragging Rights!
- Landscape mode to scroll laws one by one.
- The ability to look down upon lesser men who won’t nut up!
- Email to A Friend feature.
- Trade secrets in dealing with those missing a Y chromosome.
- Save to your Photos Album.
- A nice smack in the face to those who just happen to pick it up and read through it. **Be careful with this around your woman!
- Set as Wallpaper feature (In Photos app).
- Index Feature (Must have! Allows for fast referencing in the case of emergencies such as your wife or girlfriend asking “Does this make me look fat?”)
- Hundreds more laws (New in every update!)
- Future Updates That Will Rock Your WORLD!
- Contributed Laws Priority*

What’s New in Version 1.6

Over 200 new laws!!!
New feature in landscape mode. Press center of screen to bring up alert sheet. Press Enter number to enter the man law number you want to look at. (HINT: Look at the index for #’s)