Some days ago I released my second application for the Windows Phone. Probably it mean something I had a Windows Mobile device for the last four years and I never tried to write a single row of code and since last December, when I got my brand new HD7, I already wrote and published two applications.
The true story is that the hard part in realizing an application for Windows Phone 7 is to find a good idea. Discarded the possibility of making something unique the sole thing that you can do is try to find something you know well and write it as good as you can.
So, given that I'm on diet from an unmemorable time it is probably the thing I better know, so I said to myself: why don't write and app to track my weight? I minute after I was head down to write it and I hope someone can find it useful almost the same as I enjoyed to write it.
The application is made of few pages and of a main dashboard that collect all the data you record to display a number of important parameters. I've tryed to imagine what I would like to know: the weight from which I started, the weight I've still to burn and an estimation of when I should reach my goal. You can see these and some other parameters in the figure on the left side.
There are two things I really enjoyed: first of all creating the gauge on top of this page gave me a deep respect to Blend that has been my best friend for this purpose. I think I will write a post about how to create a similar graphical element in the next days.
The second have been to create the transitions between pages when you navigate from a page to another. All the application became very dynamic thanks to these animations and for some days I have continuously tryed them on my phone only for the pleasure of seeing them playing.
The software uses Sterling to store the samples you record during the diet. Thanks to it is was very easy to create a log of all the data for the purpose of showing the history. You can also write a comment for each sample to remember something happen during the week.
The application require a regular sampling so the best is to put a recurring alert in the calendar to remember the date. It is a very bad thing being not able to do this from the application itself. I hope in the future this become possible.
Thanks of every comment.