4 episodes
Murphy Can App Murphy Randle
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- Technology
Murphy Randle is a professional full-stack Web programmer who has begun writing an iOS app on the side. Listen in to find out what it's like for him as he learns what it takes to make and release an app as an indie developer burning the candle at both ends.
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That button is looking good
A quick update tonight. Murphy updated the main screen style, adding the list of "thank you"s in. He talks a bit about input method ideas and asks for feedback from listeners at https://anchor.fm/murphy-can-app
Screenshots of progress:
https://tppr.me/CRwrE
https://tppr.me/jyg3Z -
Learning to See
Murphy talks about getting design inspiration from other apps, finds and adds a new font, and adds art to the home screen.
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The input screen works, but it's drab.
Murphy works on the input screen for saving new reminders. He gets it working, but it doesn't look great.
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Design is Hard
# What to expect from this podcast:
- Short episodes released often.
- No editing at all.
- No cursing.
- My thoughts and experiences while I’m developing this app on the side.
# About the app:
- A simple app to help people be more aware of gratitude.
- Written in ReasonML.
- Written using React Native.
- Developed on top of Expo.
# Talking points in this episode:
- UX design is hard.
- I started with a UI library, but it didn’t solve my design problems. I didn’t know where to put things on the screen.
- Kind of like handing someone a pencil and expecting them to be good at drawing, or a coloring book and expecting them to be able to paint a lovely picture on top of it.
- I purchased the book [Refactoring UI: The Book](https://refactoringui.com/book/) and read it. Mind blown.
- The last three or four days I’ve spent experimenting and refining the look of the screen that shows recorded thanks. Here was the progression:
- Started with a linear list of cards, each one showing the text from the “thanks”.
- Then grouped the cards by day, with a friendly “X days ago” text header for each day, and cards beneath.
- I added buttons for deleting, marking as “thanked” and sending thanks to each card.
- I got advice from my boss at work to reduce the button count.
- Last night I added a tab bar at the bottom of the window that blurs the background behind it, and I removed all buttons from the card, featuring the content text, showing the exact date at time at the bottom in dimmed text, and offering a “more” button, to be able to perform some actions.