Help with Fishing App!

[Farley1981]

Hello all.

I'm new to this forums as i have only just found you lot

i've just got the HTC desire phone on the orange network, what agreat phone im really liking it the only down side is i cant find a fishing app.

I'm a keen Sea Fisherman, and would love an app to help me store GPS waypoints and able to enter some data into the app, but like i said this is way beyound me

I'm looking for someone to help me design this app and release it on the market for a couple of quid. i could get this app well know due to the amount of fishing forums i use and people i know.

What i'm looking for in this app would be:

Some way to find your GPS loc and mark it in the program.
Able to enter data like what you cought, what bait was used, what time of day was it ie.. night fishing or day fishing, was it from the rocks or beach or peir, what rigs you used, and how big the fish was, and upload with a photo of your catch.

I know this is a lot thats why its way over my head, thats where one of you come into this

If no onw can help do you know of any company that would design this app for me?

Thank you all so much.

Robert.

 

[marchold]

This sounds like a really EZ app to write. I am in the middle of a big project, this game about a bunny. Normally I would not take on a new project while in the middle of another. But if this one would sell, and you would help promote it for me, I might make a few bucks.

Let me clarify so we are 100% clear on what you are talking about, if I got this wrong please correct me.

3 Screens
1, Main Screen
2, New Fish Screen
3, Fish History Screen

The main screen would have 2 buttons on it:
<New Fish Screen> <Fish History Screen>
and a background photo which you would provide me.

The New Fish Screen would have
GPS Lon/Lat numbers from GPS receiver entered in to 2 fields.
A what bait was used field.
A what time of day was field auto entered with the current time of day.
2 radio buttons day & night
3 radio buttons for was it from: the rocks, beach, peir.
text input field for what rigs were used.
a numeric input field for how big the fish was in pounds.
a button to attach a photo that looks for recent photos from your photo album.
a button to launch the default camera app.
a button to save this record

The records would be saved to a database on the phone.



The Fish History Screen would have a list of all the fish in the database, because the screen is small I can only list a few of the fields here. So I will need you to specify which fields, maybe just the time and day. When you tap on one of the list items a new screen opens up witch would display all the information entered in the new fish screen, this screen would look very similar to the new fish screen but would allow you to look at a google map of your catch. Would you need all the catch locations on a map as well as the list in text format?

If you can specify exactly the details of what you need in terms of exactly what data will be stored and how it will be retrieved. I may be able to write this app for you real quick.

 

[Farley1981]

Thank you for replying to my post.

Everything you have said is how it would work, is there anyway for all the info that some one enters to be viewed by other people?

What im thinking is if some one wants to go fishing say sunday but not sure where he then using our app to see where been catching from other users that have entered there data?

this way we could have a database of all the info for others to see.

and where you have a radio button for the beach, rocks, peir could you have a drop down box with them on? cos it would be good to add freshwater lakes in there to so we can target a wider user base?

Thank you

 

[marchold]

Making the data to be viewable by other people means that it must be stored somewhere other than on the phone itself. Which makes the app a little more complicated. I could do this with a online database. My web hosting company will let me do this but because I have never actually done it before it would take me more than a couple of days.

 

[Farley1981]

I think by having this done it would then appeal to a wider audience and would sell a lot more, it would be like having your own fishing guide in your pocket. This would appeal to new people starting up fishing or even for the veteran fishermen.

Is there anyway for a user to click on the where to fish button and a search box opens they type in where they want to fish, and then say google maps opens and targets that loc with pin points of peoples data they have entered. click on of the pins would then take you to there info they have entered?

This would be the main focus of the app, i know many people that have asked for this to be done.

I for one would use this all the time

I think its about time fishing came in to the gadget world.

I'm going to sit down today and come up with a design of the layout with a background screen for you.

Thanks
Robert

 

[Rinor]

marchold is right, before starting to build a Droid App, you would need a website somewhere to keep all this information so it could be share.

I would be ready to build this website, but before putting too much effort into this we would need people being ready to fill up the database with lots of information, if no information is entered the system won't be used.

Do you have current data that you could put into the system? longitude, lattitude with description, pictures, ... and do you know people who would be ready to do the same?

let me know

 

[TheDude782]

Maybe you could integrate this program with Google Maps or Google Earth? With the layers on Google Maps you can select terrain and actually see depth of the ocean at certain areas.

 

[marchold]

marchold is right, before starting to build a Droid App, you would need a website somewhere to keep all this information so it could be share.

I would be ready to build this website, but before putting too much effort into this we would need people being ready to fill up the database with lots of information, if no information is entered the system won't be used.

Do you have current data that you could put into the system? longitude, lattitude with description, pictures, ... and do you know people who would be ready to do the same?

let me know

getting data is a chicken and egg kind of thing. People need the app to enter data, the app needs data for people to use it.

For this reason the app would need to be free for quite some time until it was widely used.

My web hosting company lets me set up mySQL data bases. So I was thinking it should not be too hard, I have not done that before.

 

[GatorsUF]

I think this sound amazing. I have some number that I would be willing to donate. I think a private option would also need to be available. Not everyone wants to give out their best numbers. How long will this take to develop? I would love to help test it out.

Also the google maps thing is a great idea except unless you can store the map on your phone you will kill your battery if you are able to get a signal 15-20 miles offshore, but most likely won't have a signal. So integration of garmin topo maps, or similar, might be a good idea so a data connection isn't required.

 

[marchold]

I think this sound amazing. I have some number that I would be willing to donate. I think a private option would also need to be available. Not everyone wants to give out their best numbers. How long will this take to develop? I would love to help test it out.

Also the google maps thing is a great idea except unless you can store the map on your phone you will kill your battery if you are able to get a signal 15-20 miles offshore, but most likely won't have a signal. So integration of garmin topo maps, or similar, might be a good idea so a data connection isn't required.

Thanks for the offer to test, its over a month out from being done. Right now the plan is to have a mySQL database hosted on my web server. With a local database stored on the phone.

I have not given much thought to garmin integration, do you have one of those fancy navigation androids?

 

[GatorsUF]

Oh awesome. Whats it called?

I will have a droid incredible in a few days, and a fishing gps was one of the main tasks I want it for. I fish offshore in Sarasota, FL and go out 10-100 miles offshore. When you are out that far cell phone signal is not an option so stored maps with possibly depth charts or at best a topo of the bottom would be awesome.

I will definately download your app and check it out once it's done.

 

[marchold]

So I have been working on this kind of slowly.
I stumbled upon Jimmy Houston's FishNotes. Has anybody tried this app? It looks like it might do what this app was going to do and more?

Should I continue? Or does Jimmy Houston's app do it all?

 

[FishNotes]

Hi Folks, this post is a little old, but yes. FishNotes does everything mentioned here and much much more. It contains 72 different data points of collection. It does work without a cell signal, provides the ability to share data amongst friends and includes a full web based management interface if you choose to edit the records from a computer as well. We also include a full/backup restore of all your records in case you loose your phone or upgrade to a new one.

Here is a sample fishing report that one of our users optionally made public.Fishnotes. More valuable then bait, Android, iPad & iPhone Platforms

And finally, you can export your data for your own offline storage.
I would be happy to talk to you offline; maybe their is something we can do together.