Here it is; the first (mostly) functional alpha build of Project Avocado.
There’s about 3 hours in it at the moment**. Most of that is setting things up;
- Reserve it in the Microsoft Store.
- Setup a OneDrive OAuth (for backup and restore).
- App Center (anonymous metrics and crash reporting).
- Creating an IAP (In App Purchase).
- Preparing a closed release app ‘Submission’.
Now, of all those things only the last one involves any code at all, because to make a submission you need an app to submit.
Note that I do this pretty early in the process. I’m expecting a short (<25hrs within two months) release cycle here. Why is thinking about timing important?
Well, there are things like seasons and peak buying periods for app types, getting to market as early as possible, etc. But….
None of those are why.
In a more pragmatic way, I now try to focus on short, fast MVP. Bigger projects need a LOT more due diligence and research than I am outlining here.
So you want to stand up a product, get it to people and try it out as fast as possible. You can, and I have, spend MONTHS working on something only to have it fail. The best thing you can do with an idea, even if you have extensively researched and received feedback on it, is get it in front of customers.
Now, one thing to mention here, is that you don’t want to setup a release and ad units too early, or it can effect your earnings on those ad units. More on ads, later.
You can see the app taking shape. Basic functions are there but they aren’t how I want them yet and much more needs adding.
But I tend to design first, prototype functionality rapidly (do NOT get caught up on small details yet) and then refine enough to pre-release test or MVP.
It’s easy to get hung up on a box not looking quite right, or a particular UI experience not being as clean as you want, or colour choice, etc.
Park that. Is it going to stop you getting feedback? Yes? Then park it. (get a todo list, or better yet, something like KanbanInk to manage things like this)
I will talk more about this some other time, but I love this image so much and want to make sure that you see it (sadly, I don’t know where it came from. Let me know if you do!)
More on this, and how I get this far this fast, soon.
Rob.
**Yes, I have spent more time writing these posts than actually making the app so far.