As folks may be aware, over in the Wikimedia Mobile Apps team we're starting a refresh of the Wikipedia mobile apps for Android and iOS, which have not been updated in a while and are now wayyy behind the mobile web in features and UI awesomeness.
The new apps are using native UI around the content web view, which lets us integrate with the system better than the old PhoneGap-based HTML app, and provide long-desired features like pinch-to-zoom in the article view.
Our first 2-week work sprint is finishing up, and builds of current state are available:
* Android: http://dumps.wikimedia.org/android/apps-android-wikipedia-dev-sprint1.apk
* iOS: on testflightapp.com (email notifications sent to our recently trimmed beta list)
Both versions are pretty bare-bones, so don't be surprised by missing icons, toolbar buttons that don't work, or incomplete design. :)
This first feature sprint concentrated on getting search & basic content loading working. You can type into the search box, the search results include thumbnails, and you can select a search result to load the article. You can also click on internal links in both iOS and Android versions, though they get a little flaky from there out. :) Back/forward is not yet implemented on iOS; back works on Android but there's no forward.
Note also the pretty animation when following links on Android -- neat!
Next sprint's release should look more polished, as we'll have some more navigation working, and the first sprint stuff prettied up to better match design: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c8/Search-overlay-01.png
For in-progress design & UX ideas for the new app, see https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Wikipedia_App_Design
Note that you may or may not need to manually uninstall the old app if it's present first.
If you want to try the iOS version and aren't on the beta list you'll have to build it yourself on a Mac with XCode 5, and then you can only install it on your device if you are a registered iOS developer (thank Apple's restrictions on third-party app installations!):
$ git clone https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/apps/ios/wikipediaapps-ios-wikipedia
(Unfortunately we cannot add new people to the iOS beta list until Apple clears out old entries from our 100-max device database, either at the end of the calendar year or in February when our membership rolls over. Yeah, I'm serious...)
And of course you can build the Android version too, and run it with no restrictions:
$ git clone https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/apps/android/wikipediaapps-android-wikipedia
Note that there's separate work going to revitalize the Wikipedia app for Firefox OS, which will remain HTML5-based as that's how native Firefox apps work! That's being spearheaded by the Wikimedia Mobile Partnerships & Wikipedia Zero team.
-- brion
Exciting to see the first sprints work up. Can't wait to see the next version in two weeks.
--tomasz
On Wed, Nov 20, 2013 at 6:33 PM, Brion Vibber bvibber@wikimedia.org wrote:
As folks may be aware, over in the Wikimedia Mobile Apps team we're starting a refresh of the Wikipedia mobile apps for Android and iOS, which have not been updated in a while and are now wayyy behind the mobile web in features and UI awesomeness.
The new apps are using native UI around the content web view, which lets us integrate with the system better than the old PhoneGap-based HTML app, and provide long-desired features like pinch-to-zoom in the article view.
Our first 2-week work sprint is finishing up, and builds of current state are available:
- Android:
http://dumps.wikimedia.org/android/apps-android-wikipedia-dev-sprint1.apk
- iOS: on testflightapp.com (email notifications sent to our recently
trimmed beta list)
Both versions are pretty bare-bones, so don't be surprised by missing icons, toolbar buttons that don't work, or incomplete design. :)
This first feature sprint concentrated on getting search & basic content loading working. You can type into the search box, the search results include thumbnails, and you can select a search result to load the article. You can also click on internal links in both iOS and Android versions, though they get a little flaky from there out. :) Back/forward is not yet implemented on iOS; back works on Android but there's no forward.
Note also the pretty animation when following links on Android -- neat!
Next sprint's release should look more polished, as we'll have some more navigation working, and the first sprint stuff prettied up to better match design: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c8/Search-overlay-01.png
For in-progress design & UX ideas for the new app, see https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Wikipedia_App_Design
Note that you may or may not need to manually uninstall the old app if it's present first.
If you want to try the iOS version and aren't on the beta list you'll have to build it yourself on a Mac with XCode 5, and then you can only install it on your device if you are a registered iOS developer (thank Apple's restrictions on third-party app installations!):
$ git clone https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/apps/ios/wikipedia apps-ios-wikipedia
(Unfortunately we cannot add new people to the iOS beta list until Apple clears out old entries from our 100-max device database, either at the end of the calendar year or in February when our membership rolls over. Yeah, I'm serious...)
And of course you can build the Android version too, and run it with no restrictions:
$ git clone https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/apps/android/wikipedia apps-android-wikipedia
Note that there's separate work going to revitalize the Wikipedia app for Firefox OS, which will remain HTML5-based as that's how native Firefox apps work! That's being spearheaded by the Wikimedia Mobile Partnerships & Wikipedia Zero team.
-- brion
Mobile-l mailing list Mobile-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/mobile-l
\0/ so awesome!
On Wed, Nov 20, 2013 at 7:33 PM, Brion Vibber bvibber@wikimedia.org wrote:
As folks may be aware, over in the Wikimedia Mobile Apps team we're starting a refresh of the Wikipedia mobile apps for Android and iOS, which have not been updated in a while and are now wayyy behind the mobile web in features and UI awesomeness.
The new apps are using native UI around the content web view, which lets us integrate with the system better than the old PhoneGap-based HTML app, and provide long-desired features like pinch-to-zoom in the article view.
Our first 2-week work sprint is finishing up, and builds of current state are available:
- Android:
http://dumps.wikimedia.org/android/apps-android-wikipedia-dev-sprint1.apk
- iOS: on testflightapp.com (email notifications sent to our recently
trimmed beta list)
Both versions are pretty bare-bones, so don't be surprised by missing icons, toolbar buttons that don't work, or incomplete design. :)
This first feature sprint concentrated on getting search & basic content loading working. You can type into the search box, the search results include thumbnails, and you can select a search result to load the article. You can also click on internal links in both iOS and Android versions, though they get a little flaky from there out. :) Back/forward is not yet implemented on iOS; back works on Android but there's no forward.
Note also the pretty animation when following links on Android -- neat!
Next sprint's release should look more polished, as we'll have some more navigation working, and the first sprint stuff prettied up to better match design: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c8/Search-overlay-01.png
For in-progress design & UX ideas for the new app, see https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Wikipedia_App_Design
Note that you may or may not need to manually uninstall the old app if it's present first.
If you want to try the iOS version and aren't on the beta list you'll have to build it yourself on a Mac with XCode 5, and then you can only install it on your device if you are a registered iOS developer (thank Apple's restrictions on third-party app installations!):
$ git clone https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/apps/ios/wikipediaapps-ios-wikipedia
(Unfortunately we cannot add new people to the iOS beta list until Apple clears out old entries from our 100-max device database, either at the end of the calendar year or in February when our membership rolls over. Yeah, I'm serious...)
And of course you can build the Android version too, and run it with no restrictions:
$ git clone https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/apps/android/wikipediaapps-android-wikipedia
Note that there's separate work going to revitalize the Wikipedia app for Firefox OS, which will remain HTML5-based as that's how native Firefox apps work! That's being spearheaded by the Wikimedia Mobile Partnerships & Wikipedia Zero team.
-- brion
Mobile-l mailing list Mobile-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/mobile-l
On Wed, Nov 20, 2013 at 6:33 PM, Brion Vibber bvibber@wikimedia.org wrote:
Note that there's separate work going to revitalize the Wikipedia app for Firefox OS, which will remain HTML5-based as that's how native Firefox apps work!
I was going to ask if this could be a Wikipedia app for Firefox in general, since most of Mozilla's WebAPIs are available on Firefox for Android and desktop Firefox[1]. But the current version already is!, https://marketplace.firefox.com/app/wikipedia installs on desktop Firefox.
Since all the second-tier phone OS are saying "write HTML apps for us", with some app manifest munging might the Firefox app work on them too? At what point does a Web app become a modern HTML5 web site, or is it vice versa? :)
[1] https://wiki.mozilla.org/WebAPI#APIs
-- =S Page Features engineer
Since all the second-tier phone OS are saying "write HTML apps for us", with some app manifest munging might the Firefox app work on them too? At what point does a Web app become a modern HTML5 web site, or is it vice versa? :)
The forthcoming, rebooted Wikipedia app for Firefox, geared at developing and emerging markets, could in principle be munged to work on other platforms, like the Chrome Web Store.
The HTML5 < --- > web app conversion cuts both ways.
I believe Jon, and maybe others on the core mobile web team, is examining LocalStorage / AppCache enhancements for the mdot web experience.
Jon and I are going to talk tradeoffs regarding shoehorning mdot into the app for Firefox versus starting fresh, looping Tomasz Finc and Dan Foy in for prioritization.
Second work sprint on the new apps is wrapping up; while we still have some visual polish to do there are builds available snapshotting today's state.
This sprint has added some basic data storage to the app, tracking page view history and making it visible through the sidebar menu (on Android) or by directly tapping the W icon (on iOS, will have a menu soon!).
We're just starting to put together some of the new UI elements, so the next couple of sprint releases are going to be much more visually interesting... and with a little more expansion of the database we'll soon start caching pages to allow offline reading... Exciting times!
* Android: http://dumps.wikimedia.org/android/apps-android-wikipedia -dev-sprint2.apk
* iOS: on testflightapp.com (email notifications sent to our recently trimmed beta list)
On Wed, Nov 20, 2013 at 6:33 PM, Brion Vibber bvibber@wikimedia.org wrote:
As folks may be aware, over in the Wikimedia Mobile Apps team we're starting a refresh of the Wikipedia mobile apps for Android and iOS, which have not been updated in a while and are now wayyy behind the mobile web in features and UI awesomeness.
The new apps are using native UI around the content web view, which lets us integrate with the system better than the old PhoneGap-based HTML app, and provide long-desired features like pinch-to-zoom in the article view.
Our first 2-week work sprint is finishing up, and builds of current state are available:
- Android:
http://dumps.wikimedia.org/android/apps-android-wikipedia-dev-sprint1.apk
- iOS: on testflightapp.com (email notifications sent to our recently
trimmed beta list)
Both versions are pretty bare-bones, so don't be surprised by missing icons, toolbar buttons that don't work, or incomplete design. :)
This first feature sprint concentrated on getting search & basic content loading working. You can type into the search box, the search results include thumbnails, and you can select a search result to load the article. You can also click on internal links in both iOS and Android versions, though they get a little flaky from there out. :) Back/forward is not yet implemented on iOS; back works on Android but there's no forward.
Note also the pretty animation when following links on Android -- neat!
Next sprint's release should look more polished, as we'll have some more navigation working, and the first sprint stuff prettied up to better match design: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c8/Search-overlay-01.png
For in-progress design & UX ideas for the new app, see https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Wikipedia_App_Design
Note that you may or may not need to manually uninstall the old app if it's present first.
If you want to try the iOS version and aren't on the beta list you'll have to build it yourself on a Mac with XCode 5, and then you can only install it on your device if you are a registered iOS developer (thank Apple's restrictions on third-party app installations!):
$ git clone https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/apps/ios/wikipediaapps-ios-wikipedia
(Unfortunately we cannot add new people to the iOS beta list until Apple clears out old entries from our 100-max device database, either at the end of the calendar year or in February when our membership rolls over. Yeah, I'm serious...)
And of course you can build the Android version too, and run it with no restrictions:
$ git clone https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/apps/android/wikipediaapps-android-wikipedia
Note that there's separate work going to revitalize the Wikipedia app for Firefox OS, which will remain HTML5-based as that's how native Firefox apps work! That's being spearheaded by the Wikimedia Mobile Partnerships & Wikipedia Zero team.
-- brion
Third work sprint is coming to a close with basic page save functionality. Menus are very much in flux and far from final, especially on iOS! :)
* Android: http://dumps.wikimedia.org/android/apps-android-wikipedia-dev-sprint3.apk
* iOS: on testflightapp.com (email notifications sent to our recently trimmed beta list)
As always, remember the source is out there:
$ git clone https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/apps/android/wikipedia apps -android-wikipedia $ git clone https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/apps/ios/wikipedia apps-ios- wikipedia
Patches are welcome through Gerrit or via our GitHub mirrors (they'll end up in Gerrit in the long run), and please don't be afraid to come talk to us in #wikimedia-mobile on Freenode IRC. We don't bite! Much.
-- brion
On Wed, Dec 4, 2013 at 4:38 PM, Brion Vibber bvibber@wikimedia.org wrote:
Second work sprint on the new apps is wrapping up; while we still have some visual polish to do there are builds available snapshotting today's state.
This sprint has added some basic data storage to the app, tracking page view history and making it visible through the sidebar menu (on Android) or by directly tapping the W icon (on iOS, will have a menu soon!).
We're just starting to put together some of the new UI elements, so the next couple of sprint releases are going to be much more visually interesting... and with a little more expansion of the database we'll soon start caching pages to allow offline reading... Exciting times!
-dev-sprint2.apk
- iOS: on testflightapp.com (email notifications sent to our recently
trimmed beta list)
On Wed, Nov 20, 2013 at 6:33 PM, Brion Vibber bvibber@wikimedia.orgwrote:
As folks may be aware, over in the Wikimedia Mobile Apps team we're starting a refresh of the Wikipedia mobile apps for Android and iOS, which have not been updated in a while and are now wayyy behind the mobile web in features and UI awesomeness.
The new apps are using native UI around the content web view, which lets us integrate with the system better than the old PhoneGap-based HTML app, and provide long-desired features like pinch-to-zoom in the article view.
Our first 2-week work sprint is finishing up, and builds of current state are available:
- Android:
http://dumps.wikimedia.org/android/apps-android-wikipedia-dev-sprint1.apk
- iOS: on testflightapp.com (email notifications sent to our recently
trimmed beta list)
Both versions are pretty bare-bones, so don't be surprised by missing icons, toolbar buttons that don't work, or incomplete design. :)
This first feature sprint concentrated on getting search & basic content loading working. You can type into the search box, the search results include thumbnails, and you can select a search result to load the article. You can also click on internal links in both iOS and Android versions, though they get a little flaky from there out. :) Back/forward is not yet implemented on iOS; back works on Android but there's no forward.
Note also the pretty animation when following links on Android -- neat!
Next sprint's release should look more polished, as we'll have some more navigation working, and the first sprint stuff prettied up to better match design: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c8/Search-overlay-01.png
For in-progress design & UX ideas for the new app, see https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Wikipedia_App_Design
Note that you may or may not need to manually uninstall the old app if it's present first.
If you want to try the iOS version and aren't on the beta list you'll have to build it yourself on a Mac with XCode 5, and then you can only install it on your device if you are a registered iOS developer (thank Apple's restrictions on third-party app installations!):
$ git clone https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/apps/ios/wikipediaapps-ios-wikipedia
(Unfortunately we cannot add new people to the iOS beta list until Apple clears out old entries from our 100-max device database, either at the end of the calendar year or in February when our membership rolls over. Yeah, I'm serious...)
And of course you can build the Android version too, and run it with no restrictions:
$ git clone https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/apps/android/wikipediaapps-android-wikipedia
Note that there's separate work going to revitalize the Wikipedia app for Firefox OS, which will remain HTML5-based as that's how native Firefox apps work! That's being spearheaded by the Wikimedia Mobile Partnerships & Wikipedia Zero team.
-- brion