Saturday, June 13, 2009

Fan Faire iPhone Web App


I've been working on an iPhone Web App for our upcoming SOE Fan Faire in Las Vegas. The goal of the app is to give iPhone users an easy-to-access reference for all information they might need while attending Fan Faire.

The app will have the following information:
- Full schedule of all events and panels browsable by game.
- A map of Bally's convention center
- Twitter feed from our @soefanfaire twitter account for up-to-the minute news
- Extensive list of restaurants around Bally's and Paris hotels.
- Travel information for getting around Vegas

I threw together the basics of the web app within a couple of evenings of work. Now I'm working on the polish features that make it really useful.

Being able to filter the schedule by game is a cool feature and will help attendees find panels without scrolling through the entire list of events.

Originally the list of restaurants was going to be very basic but my wife encouraged me to go the extra step and provide more info about the restaurants. So each restaurant now has a detail page that shows their location, hours, type of cuisine, cost and description. Clicking the phone number will initiate dialing on your iPhone. There's even a button to take you to the restaurants website if you're interested in browsing their menu. (Thanks Tiffany for typing all that data in!)

The news section fetches the RSS feed from twitter and displays the last several entries in a list. If the twitter entry contains a URL, clicking the row will open the browser to the web page.

There are still some things I need to finish before I can call it done but its coming together nicely. If you'd like to see it while its in development, you can check it out at http://www.gregsplace.com/fanfaire. Keep in mind it will only work in the Safari browser because it makes heavy use of their iPhone extensions.

Let me know what you think!

15 comments:

Winwin said...

That's exciting!:) /big hugs/ You two rock.

Calthine said...

That is VERY cool. Wish I had an iPhone instead of just an iPod...

Greg Spence said...

With the new pricing you can get an 8gb iPhone for only $99 bucks now! :)

Calthine said...

Yes, but I can't afford the data plan to go with it!

Wrapye said...

Engadget did an analysis of phone plans for the iPhone, G1, Storm and Pre. Pre won out, but you're still serious change unless you take the lowest cost package available.

Okay, since you are doing interface projects for various devices in your own time, how about a custom mapping for the Optimus Maximus? :) And no, you can't borrow mine to develop on.

Greg Spence said...

Oh, that's cool. I wasn't sure what the Optimus Maximus was until I Googled it. But I saw a very early picture of that keyboard about 2-3 years ago and have often wondered if it was ever going to hit the market. I think its a cool device and would love to make an interface for it. I just need to get them to send me one. :)

As far as the other phone types, we'll just have to see how things shake down after a couple of years, but I think the iPhone has a huge advantage over the other ones and they may not be able to catch up.

tyrbo said...

Pretty cool Greg!
If only I had an iPhone.. and was going to Fan Faire... hmmm...

Skirmish said...

apologies for the verbose post...

Hi Greg, it looks good, but I am in the same boat as Tyrbo, no iPhone and not trip to FanFair.

But I did have an entirely unrelated question for you. What kind of hours do you pull?

For some context, I am a programmer at 2K working on Bioshock 2 and we are mid-crunch. That said most days are only about 10 hours atm and I am in for about 4-6 hours over the weekend. Outside of crunch I have usually kept to about 8-9 hour days.

I've worked on a few games now, but no MMORPGs, and being an EQ2 player I have thought about your work many times, though I always imagined you guys would be in some form of crunch phase.

I am enjoying many of the features you've worked on (voice, GHs, appearance slots etc). Very much looking forward to GU52 hitting Runnyeye today.

Cheers
Adam

Rye said...

Hi Greg,

As always too long.
I have to say this "Apple App/Web App" is now bookmarked. I will use it, will need it, and I will thank you!

Not to mention that I will talk to the powers that be in my little IT world; and say "Why can we not do, what Greg Spence can do?" Hats off, thanks for the hard work on those little side projects, and see you at Fan Faire!

Ryessin (Najena)

PS: No more Worp Cores... Now Where?
PPS: Thank your wife for me too.

Greg Spence said...

Hey Adam! I loved Bioshock and can't wait for Bioshock 2! That's really cool! As far as our hours go, they sound similar to yours when we're crunching, but fortunately we haven't had to do a lot of crunching lately. Although many of us still spend quite a bit of our own time working on projects and troubleshooting from home. Its hard to put the work down when you enjoy it so much! :)

Rye, thanks for the comments! :) Yes, I'll miss the Warp Cores but I'm sure we can find a substitute at Bally's! :)

Skirmish said...

Yeah thanks Greg....err any chance you can hold off on the new features and other awesomeness in EQ2 until we get Bio2 to cert?

Good to hear you are working decent hours.

I've never been a big player of any of the games I've worked on. How has joining the dev team changed your playing?

KC said...

Yarr that looks awesome. Good work as usual greg!

KC said...

@skirmish
Hey Skirmish! I saw your post and was like. Whoa!
Im an artist at DE working on Bioshock2 Multiplayer! Small world huh lol :)

Skirmish said...

Hey KC that is awesome, and you are an EQ2er as well. I am on the SP tech team in Australia. Shoot me an ingame tell at Runnyeye.Skirmish/Kharnage/Khavalier.

If only we could convince 2K to make an MMO hey?

Anonymous said...

Интересно написано....но многое остается непонятнымb