Actifit Android V0.5.1 Beta Development Updates

Repository

https://github.com/mcfarhat/actifit

Introduction

As we concluded all the work required to release our official Fitbit supporting version v0.5.1, we herein present some of the work involved, including Fitbit Activity Indicator, new STEEM payout setting, UX improvements as well as other enhancements and bug fixes.

Technology Stack

The mobile app is built on Android native (JAVA).

Work Done:

The work involved changes for release 0.5.1 Beta, detailed below. Commit Links are following:
Commit Link
Commit Link

New Fitbit Indicator on Activity History

In order to properly identify activity tracked via sensors v/s one tracked via Fitbit, we had to make a database change to support storing the data tracking source. Hence in this version, we had to include a database upgrade within our Android version, whereby existing installs will not suffer a data loss with the new filed, while fresh installs will have the new field already supported by default.
As of now, new field has been appended properly under both onUpgrade and onCreate events, but also proper values are being stored within this field upon relevant tracking action (movement) with default phone sensors, and post submission upon both phone sensors and Fitbit cases.
The result of this is that now the Activity History screen highlights that a particular activity was tracked via Fitbit. If it was not, no indicator is shown.
In parallel, we are also now sending the relevant dataTrackingSource as JSON Metadata along the report to be stored on the Steem blockchain for future uses.

New option for STEEM post payout

We have implemented a new setting allowing the user to decide whether they want to get their STEEM payouts as the default approach - 50% SBD - 50% STEEM, or via a power up mode with 100% SP.
This setting is now being stored on the sharedPreferences, and has been added to the list of JSON Metadata being sent back, according to the new param reportSTEEMPayMode. This is now handled by the report creation API that will update the post meta upon creation accordingly.

Move Post to Steem Button

Several users complained about the "Post to Steem" button being in the way, and sometimes causing them to post too soon. In fact, it was eating up space, so we decided to create a new Toolbar component on Post to Steem screen, and embed the button for easier and smoother UX.

Auto-save Post Content

Another item that involved a nuisance to users was losing their content due to mistakenly clicking the back button while typing their report text. For this purpose, we implemented an auto-save functionality that, while the user is typing, is concurrently storing the values under app's sharedPreferences. If the user leaves the screen for one reason or another, the post content will remain there. It will only be cleared once the user successfully submits their report.

Minor Enhancements & Bug Fixes

Several other items have been implemented in this round, including:

• Switching from editor.commit to editor.apply, as the latter works much better as asynchronous mode and prevents handups to the app.
• Added 'Shoveling' under the list of supported activities.
• Fix for crashing issue on devices not supporting proper background color on notifications

Roadmap

Further continuous improvements will be done on the actifit app, including distance tracking, map component, calorie consumption, more wearable integration, iOS version updates, further security implementations and much more...

How to contribute?

You can chat to us on the official actifit discord, or to me in discord private @mcfarhat#6013.
Contributions are accepted as pull requests to the official github repo.
We are having continuous tasks assigned to different contributors to our project. More official tasks are continuously announced :)

GitHub Account

https://github.com/mcfarhat