Not a terribly ambitious app, but no less ambitious than the app described.
Ruby Motion looks interesting, but I don't really see how it would make a big difference to shipping something like this in a very short time frame.
Although i was learning Obj C for some time, i developed my tube map app in 2 weeks of starting with cocoa framework.
Its time to start looking at marketing 101 lessons :).
On the other hand, if you want to target iOS and Android you'd better learn Objective-C and Java. An interesting alternative is to use HTML5 and JavaScript if you already have a good background as a web developer.
If you don't know C# I see little reason to buy a Xamarin license (I know you can get started for free which is great).
Congrats on the launch!
I've recently been working on a game and I wanted to include this font in it. I've been a bit worried though because of the vague and scary sounding license that seems to come with all fonts, including Johnston. Did you consider the legal aspects? And did you do anything to make it "legit"? Like pre-rendering your text assets to images or anything? Or did you just include a .ttf in your app bundle?
Nice looking app btw!
I may have been misread - to clarify, I wasn't knocking the app or saying it was bad - it has a distinctive style (or really, is borrowing from the LU) and I wish the author success.
To a large extent this has been the real problem in the iOS app domain for a while. Apps are far more likely to make you enough to buy a small pizza than even approach earning you a reasonable salary.
Part of it, I think, are the mechanics of the App Store itself. Search has been broken for years. When compared to searching on the 'net the difference is stark. This is unfortunate because developers who do a little financial math will, without a doubt, walk away. You are far more likely to make money with a good website than on the App Store. That's why people hesitate to spend $200 on Ruby Motion...you simply won't get your money back unless you use it to write apps for others and earn money for your work rather than from your apps.
For example, "met" a guy on Reddit who claimed to have built a bootload of Google Gadgets and made 1/2 mil in the process. I've been in the same market during that same time-frame, so I'm generally aware of what is feasible... and I believe I can vouch for the fact that this may still be possible, but probably 150x harder now.
It's extraordinarily easy to get burned.
I was curious about ruby motion beforehand but now I can't wait to get stuck in.
Oh, and congrats! :D
There are about half dozen similar applications on the Appstore, for free.
I tried a few, and most of them did the job they were suppose to do fairly well.
How did you convince people to choose yours as opposed to the other ones that already existed ?
Clearly the Metro article is what pushed people (that possibly didn't know that those apps existed) to actually get and download your app.
Congrats and kudos.
Implementations age. They stop getting updates. They are missing little things that new incumbents will add by default. They become boring if they're not constantly being reinvented. And they stop being supported by their makers.
Things that people build and give away for free, if its not a true point of pride, will eventually show their age as the makers lose interest...
That's when its time for the second, less-tired wave of makers to come in and stake a claim.
I knew that there were a lot of similar apps on the AppStore but I went with my conviction that less is more. Nearly all the apps are multifunctional and include journey planners, maps, alerts etc etc.
As a Londoner, I know my way around, the only thing I want to know is if the tube is even working – this is how Lines was born. I've tried to make the app's simplicity it's main selling point and hope I've achieved this to some degree.
Simple question, though: what's the story behind the Metro article? Your story is interesting enough that it makes for good reading anyway, but I was wondering (and absolutely no offense intended -- there's nothing wrong with it imo) if you had a contact/friend/similar who helped you get the article? Again, congratulations, I hope your app continues to sell well.
I actually was doing something similar (well, the very same actually) a few months ago, got to a working version, but then saw that there were already plenty of options, got discouraged, and suddenly lost all interest in polishing/publishing it...
