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Messages - asromzek

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1
Other / Mobile App UI Update
« on: February 18, 2019, 10:32:52 AM »
After a number of false starts over the last few months, I finally sat down and put about 8 hours into the mobile app over the weekend. About 1/3 of that time was trying to figure out where I left off and what I was doing back in July. Right now I don't see any light at the end of the tunnel, but I'm going to try to put about 2 hours per evening into the app until the entire app UI code is cleaned up. After that I can finally get back into to working on some of the bells and whistles that I've wanted to add for a long time, as well as some other larger project ideas that I've been kicking around.

We're only a few weeks (or maybe days) away from adding a new human that will be sharing our living space. Most of my time over the last several months has gone into preparing for that, but I think we're finally coasting into the home stretch. I should have a week or two off work to deal with things, so I'm hoping to squeeze some side project development in between child maintenance sessions.

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Announcements / Mobile App Server Maintenance
« on: February 04, 2019, 02:15:27 PM »
It's been a while since I updated the Digital Ocean droplet that hosts the mobile app. I'm doing that today, and hopefully future-proofing it against some coming changes to the LetsEncrypt SSL certification system. There should be no major interruptions in service, but you never know...

I'm getting a little rusty. :P

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Announcements / Re: Server maintenance
« on: December 19, 2018, 01:47:53 PM »
To give some perspective on why I have been quiet lately, I currently have 48 hours of time in at work since Sunday morning (it's currently Wednesday afternoon). A week and a half of Christmas holiday/vacation starts in a few hours. Oddly enough, I had actually planned to spend some time getting back on track with the mobile app and over the upcoming break after recovering the end of year crunch. So, we'll see how that goes.

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Other / Re: Financier Mobile v1.2.X
« on: September 26, 2018, 01:50:37 PM »
Alright, if you haven't noticed already, the development updates have been few and far between lately. Attached is a picture of the primary reason.

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Other / Re: Financier Mobile v1.2.X
« on: September 05, 2018, 12:39:17 PM »
I recently discovered that sneaking candy and caffeine to my nearly 3 year old niece before bed time is frowned upon.

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Other / Re: Financier Mobile v1.2.X
« on: September 04, 2018, 09:49:20 PM »
Another Monday Tuesday Update: Ummmm... well... life has chucked a few lemons my way over the last couple of weeks. Had a few significant family issues pop up, work has been up and down, and I was let go from the band I've been playing with since January this morning (I'm not really heartbroken about that). We just got back from a 5 day road trip vacation, and I get to take my car in next week to find out why the dashboard was lighting up like a Christmas tree over the last 250 miles. It's been a summer to remember to say the least. Side project development time has been zero while dealing with and sorting all of that out. But enough about me. How are you guys doing?

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Other / Re: Financier Mobile v1.2.X
« on: August 14, 2018, 02:05:54 PM »
Another Monday update: Ran into some quicksand with work and family stuff last week and weekend. Progress was still made slowly, but nothing much new to report. Still trudging through fixing a bunch of page layout stuff after making a change that broke everything thoroughly. Nothing much on the schedule for tonight, so I’m going to pick up some programming beverages on the way home and hop to it.

Wait... it's Tuesday...

8
Other / Re: Financier Mobile v1.2.X
« on: August 06, 2018, 10:09:59 PM »
Monday update: Thousands upon thousands of lines of code added, removed, or changed so far. The next update will be a hefty upgrade, and not just a layout redesign like I had planned. There are a few new features in the works that will make managing your budget complete (add/edit/remove budgets, add/edit/remove accounts, etc.). It's a good time to fill those gaps in as I go through the app structure page by page. I'm also learning how to add some flair like menus that slide up down smoothly, or modals that fade in and out. Some of that stuff isn't necessary, but it makes the app feel a lot nicer to use. I've been putting in about 2 to 3 hours per night and it's been a slow, tedious process. When I get closer to having a functional app, I may put together a "beta" site (without syncing enabled) that you can play with or test without interfering with your main budget.

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Other / Re: Financier Tutorials Here !!!! Need Sticky!
« on: August 06, 2018, 09:47:18 PM »
Hmm, I don't think I can sticky stuff. @Alex!!!

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Other / Re: Financier Mobile v1.2.X
« on: August 01, 2018, 06:51:01 AM »
Wednesday morning update: Spent 4 hours fighting with the new layout stuff last night after discovering that list scrolling was not working as it should on my iPhone (header wasn't locking to the top, and kept scrolling off screen). Rage quit and went to bed with zero new lines of code written for the evening after trying what I thought was everything under the sun. Woke up and something clicked...

Changed 4 lines of code and scrolling works again. I think that's enough to call today a total success.

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Other / Re: Financier Mobile v1.2.X
« on: July 31, 2018, 01:32:52 PM »
I’m still making progress, averaging about a page per day. The account view with the transaction list is currently underway and it’s probably the ugliest since it was one of the first pages built. The budget view is up next and that will probably take the longest due to the shear complexity of the layout. There are a lot of moving parts, and I’m taking this opportunity to break small, common chunks out of the layout into their own components that can be reused. An example is the amount indicator surrounded by a red/green/gray bubble. It was implemented differently on each page, so I made a separate component that can simply be plopped down wherever an amount bubble is needed. That way, they all look the same and I can tweak the layout for all of them throughout the app by changing one file. I should have done this from the beginning, but I shot for functional vs. well formatted code, so now I get to pay for rushing things. :P

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Other / Re: Financier Mobile v1.2.X
« on: July 27, 2018, 04:44:33 PM »
I often have to stop and ask myself, "How on earth did I end up in this situation?", and it's usually self inflicted. The app style/restructure overhaul is going to take some time, mostly due to the tedious task of undoing all of the Frankenstein code I wrote. I spent most of the week refactoring the same 3 or 4 files (over, and over, and over, and over) until finally landing on a structure that works and can be cleanly reused throughout the app. It's only the tip of the iceberg, but a lot of the design decision making process is out of the way. Now I can stick to my new personal guidelines, rebuilding every page piece by piece. When I'm done, I will try to tally up the total number of lines changed throughout the project.

I did have one small but notable victory. If you have ever entered a long memo for a transaction that also has a long category name, you might find that the two values overlap in the account transaction list. I finally figured out how to property implement truncating of the memo with and ellipsis (...) when it collides with the category name (It's really not that difficult).  Actually, I haven't gotten to the transaction editor yet, but I figured out how to do it in another location. That issue has been on my hit-list for way too long.

13
Other / Re: Financier Mobile v1.2.X
« on: July 24, 2018, 10:34:41 PM »
FYI,

I am officially bogged down by a complete redesign of the entire application structure/styling. When I started, this was my first real project as a "web developer", so early on I did not apply a lot of common design patterns that I have come to understand more much more fully. Most of the app was pieced together one chunk at a time like Frankenstein, and once it looked good enough or mostly worked, I moved on to the next piece. Yeah, total n00b. ::)

I have decided to "fix" the design/layout/style inconsistencies throughout the app, so I'm putting all new feature development on hold until I'm happy with every single component. It's going to take some time, but maintainability and the ease of adding new features will be significantly increased. I really really really don't want to do this, but it was like jumping into quicksand when trying to weave in a new feature to the transaction editor. I finally gave up and decided to do it right.

So, v1.3.0 will be coming Soon™.

Edit: By the way, if I do my job right you'll be asking yourself why the app looks and works nearly the same.

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Other / Re: Financier Mobile v1.2.X
« on: July 24, 2018, 06:02:22 AM »
Yes, displaying a list of the 3 most frequently used categories after selecting the payee is definitely possible. In fact, the app already does something similar in reverse when entering a transaction from the budget view for a specific category. It calculates the three most used payees for the category, and displays it above the full list. The logic should be the same for showing a list for showing a list of frequently used categories if the payee is set first. The app can still auto set the category to what was used for the last transaction, and the frequently used list will make it easy to switch for situations like you describe.

I run into the same situation often when I go to our local grocery store that has a gas station out front. When I have to enter two transactions in a row, one for food and one for filling my car up, it’s a toss up if the auto suggested category will be correct next time. Although, I have another secret project in the works that might take care of this issue...

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Other / Re: Financier Mobile v1.2.X
« on: July 23, 2018, 09:21:54 AM »
Quote from: uberdrops on July 23, 2018, 03:22:36 AM
Love it. Might I suggest a possibility to change the suggested category?

Currently, the main app and mobile app set the category auto suggest value for a payee when you enter a transaction. It’s basically a memory of the last category used for the payee. Changing the setting manually would only apply to the next transaction that you enter for the payee, and it would be overwritten if the transaction is set to a different category. I decided to leave out the setting since it won’t have much of an impact on the behavior.

What I would really like to implement is a default category suggestion for a payee. If set, the category would always be set to the default when entering a transaction. If not set, then the normal auto suggest memory would take effect. This requires a change to both apps, so I would have to figure out how to do it in the main app, or work with @Alex to make it happen.

Edit: After thinking about it a little more, I can probably implement a separate default category suggestion setting for payees, and only the mobile app would utilize it. The category auto suggestion memory would still work the same in the background.

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