Tag Archives: developing mobile apps
App Development & Design in 2016 Overview | 8-Bit Avrin Apps
2016 was the first year since releasing my first app in 2011 that I didn't release a new app. Instead, most of my app development time was spent working on updates, some major and some minor. I began the year finishing the big update to Ultra Fortune Ball, which was the first app that I ever developed and released. The other major updates I worked on and released were for Ultra Soccer Match Soundboard, Professor Piggy Bank, Quiz of Medicine, Motivational Quotes to Inspire, Chinatown Fortune Cookie, and my suite of Word Owls Word Search apps. I also released somewhat minor updates for several other apps which included; Saving Bunnies, 8-Bit Eagle Smash, Zompy Jumpy, Detective Deep, Strike the Goal, & Jumbo Egg Hunt.
I really like working on new apps, but I also really like improving my older apps especially when the updates are voluntary. A few of the minor updates I did were mainly because of the new Apple App Store Review Guidelines but all of the other ones were updates that I wanted to work on and made exclusive time for. I like having the ability and authority of providing users with free improvements that can enhance their experience. Some of my most downloaded apps received great updates in 2016 so it feels good knowing that thousands and thousands of people out there are using better versions of my apps. As a creator, improving something that you've created is also just an overall great feeling too.
When I began developing apps it was just a hobby. However, as I started to get better and release more apps my download numbers increased which resulted in more income. Now I'm not rich and money still isn't the main reason why I develop apps, but it is nice getting additional income from a creative endeavor. So this year with Apple iAds dissolving I decided to take a more serious look at monetization with my free apps and try different ad networks. After researching, implementing, testing, and viewing results I decided to go with Google Admob as my main ad provider and then Chartboost and Revmob as secondary ad providers. I had an issue were Admob wasn't working well enough on my Amazon apps so I decided to use Chartboost as my main ad network with Revmob as secondary for those. Anyways that's enough talk about monetization.
Below I'll list my top downloaded apps and top countries that downloaded my apps. After that I'll write a summary of what I worked on each month and what I plan on working on in 2017 and upload some images of some consumer app reviews I received in 2016.
Top 5 Free Downloads
Top 5 Paid Downloads
Top 5 Countries for Downloads
Broad summaries of what I worked on each month….
January: Worked on and finished the big update for Ultra Fortune Ball.
February: Worked on screenshots and promo graphics for Ultra Fortune Ball. Worked on and finished an update for Quiz of Medicine. Tested and implemented new ad networks….this also continued off & on throughout the year with some of my other free apps.
March: Ported a free version of Ultra Fortune Ball to the Amazon App Store. Did a lot of work on the major Ultra Soccer Match Soundboard update. Started working on an Easter edition of Word Owl's Word Search….haven't worked on it since though….no sure I'm going to continue due to lack of time and other projects.
April: Finished the update to Ultra Soccer Match Soundboard and put together new screenshots for it. Worked on an update for Chinatown Fortune Cookie.
May: Continued working on the Chinatown Fortune Cookie update. Started working on the big Professor Piggy Bank update. Created a new main promo image for Ultra Soccer Match Soundboard.
June: Continued working on the updates for Professor Piggy Bank. Finished the update to Chinatown Fortune Cookie. Started working on an update for Motivational Quotes to Inspire.
July: Worked on and finished app updates for Motivational Quotes to Inspire & Saving Bunnies. Ported Savings Bunnies to the Google Play and Amazon app stores.
August: Worked on & finished updates for 8-Bit Eagle Smash, Professor Piggy Bank, Quiz of Medicine, Ultra Fortune Ball, & Zompy Jumpy. Started working on a new Finance app.
September: Worked on & finished updates for Word Owl's Word Search Kindergarten, 1st, 2nd, 3rd Grades, Christmas, & Halloween editions. Did a small increment of work on the Finance app.
October: Worked on gathering more data for the finance app. Updated some of my free apps on Amazon to change ad network providers. Continued working on the finance app.
November: Continued work on the finance app. Worked on and finished minor updates to Detective Deep & Strike the Goal on iOS because of Apple new review guidelines. Ported Word Owl's Word Search 1st Grade & Christmas editions to Google Play.
December: Made a promo gameplay video for Word Owl's Word Search Christmas Edition. Worked on and finished an update for Jumbo Egg Hunt on iOS due to the new Apple review guidelines. Continued researching and organizing data for my finance app.
In 2017 I plan on finishing and releasing two apps. One of them will be the finance app I've been working on and the I'm not exactly sure about the other one. There are a lot of app ideas in my head, but I'm not sure which one I'm going to pull out to start working on after the finance app. In 2017 I also plan on working on an awesome new start-up. It's app related but it will be seperate from Avrin Ross/8-Bit Avrin Apps….more details on that later and eventually it will have its own site too for even more details. I'm very excited about this start-up and my goals for it. So far all my apps developed by Avrin Ross of 8-Bit Avrin Apps belong to a range of various genres, but my next company will be more focused and branded overall.
2016 was definitely the year of updates for me, and I'm glad I used the majority of my little app development time to work on them, but I'm also very much looking forward to working on new stuff. I plan on organizing my time better in 2017 so that I cut a bit down on my little leisure time and increase my app development time. Family is incredibly important to me so I'm still not going to take away much time from them for my apps no matter how hectic app dev lands may get.
Massive thank you to everyone who downloaded one of my apps! Every single one of them had a lot of work put into creating it. I hope you enjoyed them! If not, I'm sorry, but on the bright side you only wasted a little time and maybe like .99 cents if it wasn't free, so not a big deal at all. Judging from the number of downloads in combination with only a few negative reviews though I'm guessing most users are satisfied overall so that's awesome. Speaking of reviews, most people don't leave reviews but below are some of the positive consumer reviews left in 2016 for some of my apps. Thank you to everyone who left a positive review and the people who helped spread the word about my apps too. Until next time ∞
2016 reviews on Google Play
2015 Overview – 2014 Overview – 2013 Overview – 2012 Overview
Tags: 2014 mobile app overview, app development success, Atlanta, Avrin Ross, being an independent app developer, Chattanooga, creating mobile apps, developing mobile apps, entrepreneur, how to guide, independent app developer, indie app developer, indie app success stories, mobile app developer, reviews for indie apps, small business app development, solopreneur, successful app devleoper, top downloaded apps by, updating mobile apps process, year in review
Categories General, Monthly Progress, Updates, Yearly Overview
November Mobile App Development Report
Development work in November was mostly devoted to working on the new finance app I've been working on & off with. I continued to gather and check information for different categories and arrange them in separate lists. I also decided on which exact categories to have in the app, which makes information compiling more productive. In December & January I'll continue working with a large amount of data for this app. No guarantees, but I plan on releasing this app in the first or early second quarter of 2017. I'll be reusing a lot of the code that I used in my Quiz of Medicine & RX Quiz of Pharmacy apps so that will save me a lot of time after completing the massive data section. I haven't touched the design aspect of it yet so the timeframe of app completion will then depend on how quickly that progresses. I have a few rough ideas in mind on how I want it to look, but I want to complete the data portion before diving into design this time.
I ported Word Owl's Word Search First Grade & Christmas editions to Google Play last month. With the release of great new devices, improvements to the developer console, a huge user base, and increasing download numbers for some of my apps, I've decided to focus more on the Google Play store. Apple iOS will still be my main target, and Amazon will stay at second in importance, but now Google Play will be a very strong third target for my apps. I already make an Android based build when I'm releasing an app on Amazon so when I make a build for Google Play I won't have to change a lot. I won't be releasing every one of my apps on Google Play because I still have some issues with the store, but going forward I will be focusing more energy there with new apps and possibly some of my older apps. Until next time ∞
Tags: Amazon, Android, app developer, app development, data heavy apps, developing mobile apps, Google Play, multiple app stores, porting to Google Play, solo app development, word search apps on Google Play, wordsearch games on Google Play
Categories General, Monthly Progress
March Mobile App Development Report
App progress in March mostly consisted of work on a big update for Ultra Soccer Match Soundboard. The main feature of this update is the addition of 32 countries in the Anthems section which means 32 more flags & national anthems. With the Euro 2016 & Copa America 2016 tournaments approaching I wanted to make sure this app had all those teams in it. So I compared the list of current countries in the app with the countries participating in those tournaments and added the ones missing to a new list to be added. With the added countries the total came to 50 something but instead of stopping there I eventually thought it would be neat to double the complete total to 64. It also looked better design wise to just have two full pages of 32 teams. So I ended up going in reverse a bit to get the total up to 64 because I had already started the process of gathering flags & anthems. To achieve this new total goal I started adding other countries like Canada, Cuba, Puerto Rico & etc. Some of the countries didn't have highly renowned soccer/football teams but I'm sure those countries still have tons of fans.
Throughout March I worked with new flags by making flag buttons and mostly full screen flags that looked good on tablet & phone screens. The full screen flags part took a bit extra attention since it involved some trial and error on height and width adjustments. I wanted to make sure the flags appeared as full as possible without cutting out too much on smaller screens. I adjusted flag sizes in Pixelmator and added a 3D button effect to the smaller ones in Inkscape for the Anthems selection page. I also worked on the Anthems page text and layout by adding the new countries while rearranging the previous countries since I wanted to make the finished interface in alphabetical order. Then after finishing the flags I went around and gathered national anthems for all of the countries. Throughout the process of working on flags and anthems I went back into the code within the app and added the new anthems and flags for the corresponding countries.
Adding a 3D button effect to smaller flags in Inkscape.
Also one night a few days before Easter I started working on a Word Owl Easter edition game. I mainly just figured out the new main colors and edited all letter blocks with those new colors. I knew there would be no way to finish the app on time for Easter but I just felt like working on it for a bit. I didn't decide to make an Easter version until kind of last minute in relation to the holiday approaching, but I'll finish it sometime this year and wait to release next year about a month before Easter.
Working on new letter block colors in Pixelmator.
Well that's it for now. Only a few more minutes in this day so I'm going to hurry and post this while it's still the 8th because……..8-Bit Avrin! Until next time ∞
Tags: app design tools, app user interface design, apps, Avrin Ross, blog, Copa America apps, design, designing mobile apps, developing mobile apps, Euro 2016 apps, graphic design software, independent, indie, indie app developer, indie app developer thoughts, mobile app design, user interface
August Mobile App Development Report
New apps are on the horizon, but first a couple of updates….
Crunchy Numbers Math Arcade received a minor update that improved the tweet feature to automatically input the hashtag(#CrunchyNumbersMathArcade) for the game in the editable tweet text box. The process of uploading the new build(and of course waiting on review period) took longer than the work in the actual update itself. Most players never tweet scores and I don't think many people will use it in this game, but I wanted to do it because this is one of my favorite apps I've developed so it gets spoiled.
Motivational Quotes to inspire received a nice update. More info on it can be found on the Motivational Quotes to Inspire 1.5 Update post. One of the main changes in the new version was a minor update to the Settings section layout as seen below.
In August I also worked a lot of my new pharmacy quiz app which included a lot of research, heavy work with tables, & UI design. I've started to use the Paper app along with the Pencil stylus to mock up UI designs. Working on an interfaces in a drawing app is really neat. I can quickly change things to roughly see how it will look on different devices and also test if it's user friendly for the users hands. One of the first main menu iterations can be seen below, the finished version is still incomplete. There's been a lot of work going into this app. I've been able to use a bit of data and some code from Quiz of Medicine, but a lot of the new app is being built from of the ground up. This new medical app will focus on the top 200 drugs in 2015 for the medicine portion of the quizzes whereas Quiz of Medicine focused on featuring over 400 different medications. My new pharmacy app will include brands, generics, indications and drug class quiz types like Quiz of Medicine, but it will also include a couple of new quiz types as well. This will be a very focused well rounded pharmacy app for students and various people in different medical positions.
During August I also started to compile a list of words for my new Word Owl's Word Search app. This will be the Halloween Edition so the overall design and words will be of course be Halloween themed. This app will be completely kid friendly so there will be no horror images or shocking words. I'll be putting my medical app aside and working on this app more in September because I plan on releasing it during the first week of October.
Somehow I thought I was going to be finished with the pharmacy app during August and then jumping right into the Halloween word search app after, but other plans got in the way of those plans……..and I've been really distracted by Rocket League during my app development time! Rocket League is a very fun game that features two of my favorite things; racing and soccer! The game was free in July on PS Plus and I had never heard of it before downloading it, but definitely glad that I did. Ok, back to working on the word search! Until next time ∞
Tags: all ages, Android, Apple, behind the scenes, children, developing apps for, developing mobile apps, independent app developer blog, indie app developer, indie app developer blog, iOS, iphone, kids, minority app developers, photos, Windows, working on mobile apps