[APP] auto-mate first showing of features

Hi all

I've been a member of XDA for a while (have a hero and been on the villanrom builds since they began). But I am a developer full time and so I have decided to start in Windows Phone 7. I know silverlight, I know .NET so why not.

I have started the company 'Infinite Monkey Theorem' and this is a showing of the first application.

auto-mate. This app allows you to record your cars stats at each fuel up and service to allow you to view statistics about your cars. This app will also allow you to setup service types (months or miles) and the app will schedule them for you taking into account your mileage per year. MOT and Tax renewals are stored and show when they are close.

The reason for this app is this: I drive 24,000 miles / year which means that I need to maintain the car more than just a yearly service, this app will tell me when I need to change my oil or have a minor/major service based upon the miles I drive per year and the miles I'm doing recently allowing me to budget for it accordingly.

This app syncs to the cloud so you can look over all the cars you are monitoring from your office and export the information or book a service.

This app is in beta at the moment, it is not feature complete as I need you to be able to say you have done your MOT or Tax but its almost there. Of course with it syncing to the cloud there is a cost, that I MUST pass on somehow. I looked into Ads but Microsoft in thier wisdom only allow thier ad framework in america so Im out (UK). But I'm thinking of a free version that has ads (in future) and does not sync to cloud. Thoughts on what you would/might pay for this app would be greatly appreciated.

The future of the app?

Well I am planning a pro version which is for business mileage and will export from the web site allowing business travellers to fill out expense forms. But there are lots to add to this app as well.

Take a look at the vid and let me know what you think.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tyw_ivcygk

Njoy.

Thanks for comments

Hi all

Thanks for the comments, aint been on here in a while. Dont know why its showing in the games section, I've downloaded the trial and it shows in the normal menu, have purchase it and try it that way.

Answers:

1) Cost of fueling up will be coming in an update (not long)
2) Putting final touches to website then its live. it will be at www.infinitemonkeytheorem.co.uk You will be able to do everything you can do on the phone but see more information and view multiple car details over each other
3) Had to do some changes to the app to see the charts better, this is coming real soon.
4) will be adding fuel type soon.

barryallott said:

Hi all

Thanks for the comments, aint been on here in a while. Dont know why its showing in the games section, I've downloaded the trial and it shows in the normal menu, have purchase it and try it that way.

Answers:

1) Cost of fueling up will be coming in an update (not long)
2) Putting final touches to website then its live. it will be at www.infinitemonkeytheorem.co.uk You will be able to do everything you can do on the phone but see more information and view multiple car details over each other
3) Had to do some changes to the app to see the charts better, this is coming real soon.
4) will be adding fuel type soon.

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When I put it to my phone using a developer account its in the normal place. Strange

jgibo said:

I bought the app yesterday and couldn't find it. Today I noticed in other games. Should I uninstall and resync? I pinned to start for now.

thanks for what looks like a good app. Have another question. I have a csv file exported from a program I was using on my iphone. Any way of exporting or manually entering almost two years of data online vs the phone? You also mention website. Was is the url so I can check it out.

Thanks,

Johnny

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You could try uninstaling and resyncing, as its all stored online you just re log back in.

acky85 said:

Love it and it looks superb. I dont know what you can and cannot do in regards to apps interacting with other features of the phone. But the option to put a reminder in the calendar or a pop up one month before the tax is due or service is due etc I think would be really beneficial (liked I said not sure if MS will let you do that though)

The only other thing I can think of is a field it enter a monetary value for the top up. So you put 44.66 litres in and it cost £70 for instance. You could maybe track this in the same way the MPG are, but as a Pence, or cent etc per mile.

In regards to price, there are alot of apps/games I have seen for say £2.99 that I refuse to pay for (bejwelled for one) but this I would pay for. Im not sure what price you were expecting but Id happily pay £2.99 for it which seems the average.

I know you have spoke about the cloud but is it possible to export the information to PDF or excel etc and then have the users email this to themselves, this would cut your costs but again I dont know whats allowed

Good Luck and I look forward to this being released.

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One idea I have going is that as the data is stored online, I should be able to send a message to the phone when a service / mot /tax is due and the pic will go amber and show a 1.

The thing i'm working on right now is auto-mate (offline edition). The basic functionality of keeping track of your vehicle, store when your tax/mot is, and it will schedule the services for you, but all offline. becuase of the zero cost to me, it will be priced low. thinking £0.75...

Hope to have that out in a week.

Just checked and microsoft has put it under games, when I specifically said Tools and it was under tools originally.???

Nice one microsoft.

I could e-mail microsoft to change this but I'll just do an update which will fix it. Sorry for it being in the wrong place, not my fault.

Prepare to be one happy camper, now im not saying now, im not saying in 1 week but excel import/export is always a step in the process

Just to let you know, an update was sent to microsoft over the weekend. This update will put the app back in the apps list. Include better charting, bug fixes. And ability to send error reports on some errors if they happen

Its in alpha now.... Beta next then live.

Yes, this is coming in an update.