Having worked on the original LOVEFiLM iPhone and iPad applications, this was the first project where I was Development Manager. For this project, I lead a team of four people – three developers and a test analyst – to create LOVEFiLM’s first Android application. My experience with the LOVEFiLM API over the past few years (since October 2009) gave me the best position to advise the team and problem solve any API issues.
In the initial phase of this project, I helped in drafting up the wireframes and documenting a new version of the LOVEFiLM API we would use for this project for the developers to use. The behaviour of the application was very similar to the iOS applications so only Android specific changes were needed. Since I was one of the few Android users in the office, I had a good idea of some of the best practices and common UI elements used in Android apps – this information was used to create the wireframes for the application.
Later on in the development process, I assisted the team in finding solutions to problems involving the API and communication bugs back to the client. I was also responsible for compiling new versions of the application for Client User Acceptance Testing (UAT). Once the application was complete, I also deployed the application to the Android Market.
I encountered a few difficulties along the course of this project, one of which was the API. The application used a undocumented version of the API, for which I did the initial documentation for the project. Through development, we encountered a number of bugs and discrepancies between the undocumented, newer API compared to the older, documented API used for the iOS Apps.
Another issue was the fragmentation of Android and the different hardware devices and configurations the application needed to support. From the start, the app was designed to support 80-90% of the available devices but during client UAT and after releasing the final version, we found devices that weren’t fully supported. Fixes were made to the application as and when issues were discovered. The release of Android 4.0 – Ice Cream Sandwich (ICS) posed the biggest risk, as the app was released a couple of weeks ahead and wasn’t tested on this version.
For the Financial Times, I developed a simple Landing Page application for user’s who visit the FT Facebook Fan Page for the first time. The Fan Page has a simple CMS which administrators can be used to customise the fan page with new images and copy (up to six boxes, each with an image, text and outgoing link).
The application was developed using PHP, but a flat file storage system was used to store the content of the page. The CMS system linked to a XML file which contained the URL for the image, copy and destination URL. Images were uploaded to the server via the CMS into a image folder.
The Volvo Emissions Equality Petition application was created to gather support to reduct carbon emissions in the UK. The application was a Fan Page application that sits on the Inside Volvo UK Facebook Fan Page, with the aim of gathering 2,000 signatures to put pressure on the automobile industry to take action in reducing emissions.
The Fan Page application also promoted the Emission Equality iPhone Application, which shows the carbon footprint of popular cars in addition to CO2, cars emit carbon monoxide, oxides of nitrogen, hydrocarbons and other particulates.
To sign the petition, users were asked to fill out a quick form entering their name, email address, and an optional comment. The data entered in the form is stored in a database, and available for export by the client. Comments entered by the user appear on the fan page for others to see and review.
The Volvo Emissions Petition was features in Contagious 23, as part of some of 2010′s most striking brand initiatives that are long-term projects as opposed to one-off campaigns.
The Lewis Moody Teamtalk Facebook Application was created to promote the 2010 Investec Internationals. The application allows the user to select up to three friends to appear in an interactive video featuring the England captain, Lewis Moody, talking to the friends the user selected.
The application used a flash animation will the friends’ and user’s name passed in as flash variables using a PHP form. The application was created in PHP with a MySQL backend. As the client was expecting huge traffic to the website, the application made use of memcache caching to reduce I/O access involved in accessing the database.
The application was hosted on Amazon AWS, making use of a dedicated database server and up to four web server instances, under a load balancer to distribute the traffic to the website. Each of the web servers had a separate memcache instance running too.
The Amazon servers (or AIMs – Amazon Instance Machines) were load tested using JMeter and a simple script to measure the average page load times under different amounts of traffic. The servers were tested by simulating between 250 to 2,000 concurrent users accessing the application and database.
Preview:
As the client wanted to manage re-deployment of the application, I created a simple shell script to backup the current deployment and then export the latest code from a SVN repository in to the web root folder.
The Smoothies Competition application was created for Radox, who wanted a name for their new shampoo. I created an application that allowed Facebook users to submit their suggestions with the chance of winning a free trip to the Caribbean. The application was created in three phases.
Phase 1 was the competition entry form, allowing the user to enter their contact details and submit a name for the new Smoothie Shampoo. Users were allowed to enter as many times as they wanted, and the suggestion field was checked for profanity using a large list of blocked words. This phase of the application also featured a flash animation of the smoothie shampoo, which include the last three names submitted by users.
The entries were pulled into the flash using a XML file coded using PHP to access the database and pull in the last three entries.
Phase 2 took all the entries submitted in Phase 1 and was reduced to a list of top 3 entries choses by a selection of judges. The top three entries were then put to a vote by Facebook users. Over the course of a week, the application received thousands of votes. One name won crowned the winner at the end of this phase.
Phase 3 was an announcement of the winner from Phase 2. The winning name and the Facebook user who suggested the name were announced on the Radox Fan Page for all the users to see.
For the 2010 General Election, I developed two applications that was used to promote voting and get Facebook users interested in the debates held by the three main candidates. The two application were hosted on the Democracy UK fan page. The first application was a voting registration form for the Electoral Commission to get unregistered votes signed up in time for the elections on May 6th 2010. I build a simple application that allows users to register for voting directly within Facebook. The application app was a big part of the campaign and was featured in newspapers and even on BBC Breakfast.
The second application was a “Dial Test” for the election debates. I created an application that would be used in real time by Facebook users during the debate to voice their feedback. As the debates aired live on TV, users would be able to express positive or negative feedback, which was plotted on a graph in real time, showing the general sentiment of the debate, and the current issue being discussed. Users were also able to add their comment to the comment Wall for other users to read.
For this application, we teamed up with Facebook to make the 2010 election the first ever social media election. Facebook’s Director of European Public Policy, Richard Allan, said the following:
“The first prime ministerial debates are a landmark moment in British politics, but the rigid rules mean that the voters themselves have a limited role. The mass dial test changes that completely. The Facebook dial test enables millions of voters to say exactly what they think of the three leaders’ performances and to wrest back control from politicians.
2010 is the UK’s first ever social media election, and the dial test shows how voters can get involved on a scale never seen before. The dial test will provide a true barometer of the public mood and will define how the impact of the debates is interpreted.”
The application was hosted for the three live debates, during which time the application attracted 17,900 users, of which 11,600 users were active in all three debates.
On the day of the first debate (April 15th 2010), the application received a overwhelming number of users which inevitably took the server offline. For the second and third debates, we moved the servers from a dedicated server to Amazon’s Hosting Cloud (EC2) so we could scale the application as needed.
The application was targeted to Facebook’s 23 million UK users so I took extra precautions the second time around. To prepare for the second debate we setup 20 Amazon servers to handle as much load as possible. I used jMeter to load test the servers to make sure we could handle as many possible concurrent users as possible.
The Dial Test application in the press:
In order to promote the new Lynx Rise shower gel, I created a fan page application where users are asked to spot the difference in a photo of Jessica Jane Clement. The fan page application has a simple data entry form users could fill in to enter the contest. The winner would win a Flip HD Camera and a signed copy of Jessica’s calendar.
After entering the contest, users were presented with four television adverts they could view that promoted the Rise shower gel. The application was available to use on Lynx’s official Facebook Fan page for a few weeks. The application was taken down after the end of the competition.
The application can still be accessed here.
The Nissan Winter Challenge application was another application I created for Nissan’s “Prove It” Facebook Fan Page. The application allowed users to upload videos and photo of their skiing holidays from several European destinations. Users could then comment on the the content and hate it using a thumbs up / down rating system.
The application hooked into YouTube to provide automatic video upload functionality, and with Flickr to share photos. Users uploaded their video and photos to the application server, after which the content would either get sent to YouTube and Flickr for videos and photos, respectively.
The futher add-on to the application was created to integrate with the Nissan Ski Contest iPhone Application, which I built an API for. Users could record their Ski run on their iPhone and upload it to the Facebook application to share with friends. The iPhone application was build by another agency but the API for the Facebook Application was built by me using XML and PHP.
The application was localized for five European countries:
- United Kingdom
- France
- Germany
- Spain
- Italy
In December 2009 I developed a e-commerce application for Facebook and a Microsite to promote a new “Quit Smoking” product for GlaxoSmithKline. The application and microsite allows users to purchase a 2mg or 4mg packet of NiQuitin Minis, a tic-tac like pill which contains nicotine.
Both the application and microsite used PayPal for payment processing and integration with a 3rd-party pharmacy for order fulfillment and distribution. I used the PayPal API to manage payment and an API to link with the pharmacy ordering system.
The campaign lasted until March 2010 and during the time, the app and website sold over 700 units. The website and Facebook application were marketed on leaflets and on television adverts. Facebook media was also used to promote the application.
This particular project was quite challenging as the website needed to meet internal and government regulations, as products with nicotine as classed as medicine. The website and facebook application took a few months to pass regulation checks, with various revisions in between. The original launch of the product was delayed from September to December, as this process took longer than expected.
The Nissan Winter Challenge application was created for Nissan’s “Prove It” Facebook Fan Page. The application featured 10 videos created by amateur directors, giving fans of the page a chance to vote for their favourite directors. The voters could enter themselves into a prize draw to win a ski weekend in Verbier.
The application used a Flash video player to play the amateur videos and included a thumbs up / down rating system. The video with the highest overall ranking won. The application also included a comment wall for user comments and discussion, and was localized for five European countries:
- United Kingdom
- France
- Germany
- Spain
- Italy
The application was coded by myself using PHP, MySQL and JavaScript in the space of one week. The application made use of social functionality including newsfeed when watching, rating or commenting videos. The Winter Challenge application was also built using Facebook Connect and feature on the EuroSports Website. The application replicated the fan page functionality but used Facebook Connect for social functionality.