Jan 19

Developer Entrepreneur Seeks Same.

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I am a intense application developer with over 18 years of application development experience. I have worked for dozens of Fortune 500 companies and have been around the block a few times.

About a year ago, I took the leap into an idea I have started for my own company. I have spent many months developing applications for the mobile application market. I currently have over 100+ applications available on the Android market as part of previous projects / start-ups.

I am currently involved in a product concept that has become much-much-much larger than I anticipated and have finally decided I need help getting this to launch.

I am looking for a hard-core developer who specializes in (but not limited to) .NET, Android (Java), Objective-C, and most importantly, not afraid of languages / environments they’ve never used (read: fast learner).

I am not able to pay anything up front, but willing to work something out in regards to profit-splitting / partnership should I find the right match.

To be clear, what I am looking for:

* Application Developer / Architect (Sr. Level)
* Able to devote at least 20+ hours / week. (To be up-front, I am currently putting in over 80+ hours a week on this. This is my full-time focus.)
* English speaking, preferably US based, but open to the right fit.
* Able to pick things up fast and run with them
* Not have to be tasked, but take initiative
* Excellent communication, this won’t work if we don’t know what each other are doing.
* Willing to sign a non-disclosure

Where we are at:

* I have Test / Production Servers
* I have 2 generations of the software already in production
* Generation 3 (this project) is 80% complete.
* Online Source Control
* Project Management Website
* I have developer accounts with Android, Apple (iPhone), and Microsoft (WP7)

If this sounds like the match for you, please contact me via the contact form. I’ll email back ASAP.

Thanks,

~Lex

Jan 12

Seriously CNN? Learn to Code, get a job….?

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“Learn to Code, Get a Job” says CNN.

http://www.cnn.com/2012/01/12/opinion/rushkoff-write-code/index.html

I don’t know what I find most insulting about this article, but the basic premise of the story is that using an online website, you can learn to program by the end of the year, and get a better paying job. I have been seeing sentiment lately that programming is nothing more than a class or two at a local community college, and you are prepared to enter the world as a coder.

Having worked as a consultant for over 15 years, this is truly shocking to me. Just like with any industry, you are going to get what you pay for. And, many managers, looking for ways to control spending, look for cheaper ways to staff programming teams. Unfortunately, many times, (and, in my experience, more often than not) compromises the project and dooms the en devour to failure.

So, thanks CNN for this… * sigh *

- LexDysic

Jan 12

The Truth Behind Presentations… This is HILARIOUS!

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If you have ever given a presentation, you must watch this video. This catches almost every aspect behind presentation failure that I have ever seen.

Well, I’m going to go ahead and link the video and post this now so that I can begin the process of cleaning the coffee off of my monitor…

Jan 12

Looking to Take Microsoft Certification Exam? Study on Android!

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ExamShout

I recently became aware of a study program for Microsoft Certification that you use on your mobile phone! Currently (at the time of this blog post), it is offered on the Android line of phones. Exams 70-640, 70-642, and 70-680 are available for use. However, iPhone and many more exams are on the way.

Tons of simulated questions, help you prepare. I’ve talked with a lot of people who have used this, and they swear by it. There are also a ton of videos to explain complicated subjects and detailed explanations of most answers.

For a limited time, each exam is UNDER $5.00 (USD).

If you are looking to take any of these exams, head onto the Android Market and look for ExamShout. Don’t miss out as I am sure their prices will be going up soon.

Visit the Android Market now: Market.Android.com

Jan 12

(Android) Show a quick dialog box to end user.

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ToolboxThere are a lot of questions you get over and over from people just beginning in Android. So, I thought I’d take some time to pose a few of them out here. These kind of posts are “very beginner” level and meant to be used as a quick-search type reference.

In this post, I am providing the function that I use to generate a user dialog box that has a single button (in this case… it says “OK”). You pass in the Title and the Text you want displayed so that you can reuse this code anywhere you need to.

Java
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public void ShowGenericAlert(String titleText, String messageText)
{
AlertDialog.Builder builder = new AlertDialog.Builder(this)
.setTitle(titleText)
.setMessage(messageText)
.setPositiveButton("OK", new DialogInterface.OnClickListener()
{
public void onClick(DialogInterface dialog, int id)
{
dialog.dismiss();
}
});
builder.show();
}

Jan 10

Check Internet Connectivity (Android to Web Service)

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Android Based CodeOnce you have established your code to connect from Android to a Web Service, we now need to ensure that we handle the general connectivity issues that you may encounter. Here are a couple code snippits that I use in these situations:

Issue 1: The user’s device is unable to connect to the internet. WiFi is turned off, Cellular Service is not working, etc.

Solution:

Check for connectivity via the following snippit:

IsOnline
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public boolean IsOnline()
{
ConnectivityManager cm = (ConnectivityManager) getSystemService(Context.CONNECTIVITY_SERVICE);
NetworkInfo netInfo = cm.getActiveNetworkInfo();
if (netInfo != null && netInfo.isConnectedOrConnecting()) {
return true;
}
return false;
}

Now that we have that done, there is another issue we need to possibly consider. What if the internet is, in fact, available, but the server we are requesting, is not?

Issue 2: Remote Server Outage

Now, I have had a few debates with everyone on this, and to some degree, everyone is right. So, the following solution is only my preference in dealing with the problem. Some people prefer to call the service with a specific time-out. If the service times out, they provide appropriate notifications to the user.

Why don’t l like this approach? Well, I do, but… if my server is down, I like to immediately notify the user instead of waiting the appropriate minimum amount of time for a response. Also, I have a lot of applications that use “slower” server, so I generally have to set my timeouts to a longer duration. This means, that if my server is, in fact, down, that the end user has to wait the extended time-out period to know this.

I prefer to take the “ping” approach. Before making a call, I ping my server to see, if it is, in fact, there. If so, I generally continue on with my http request with a longer than normal timeout.

The code for my ping test is as follows:

Ping Test
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public boolean IsReachable()
{
boolean myResult = false;
try
{
Runtime runtime = Runtime.getRuntime();
Process proc = runtime.exec("ping www.google.com -c 1"); // using google as an example....
proc.waitFor();
int exit = proc.exitValue();
if (exit == 0) { // normal exit
myResult = true;
} else { // The server is unreachable....
myResult = false;
}
}
catch (Exception e)
{
myResult = false;
Log.e(TAG, "isReachable Returned an Error. Exception: " + e.getMessage());
}
if (!myResult)
{
ShowGenericAlert("Connection Error", "The server is not reachable at this time. Please check your connection and/or try again later.");
}
return myResult;
}

Hope this helps. Let me know if you have any questions, I’ll try to help the best I can!

~ Lex