By now you must have realized that I’m a big fan of Android development. You may have been wondering though, what exactly am I developing? Well, today is the day you find out! But first I have to tell you about quub…
quub is a service that helps you tell others where you are, what you’re doing and how (or if) you’d like to be contacted. It does this by using sensor data and machine learning techniques to learn your status setting practices and provide helpful suggestions to make it easier to maintain accurate status throughout the day.
What I personally hope to get out of using quub is better interruption management and group awareness. When I first subscribed to a data plan for my phone, I tried staying continuously logged in to my google talk account. That turned out not to be a good idea. Friends and family and coworkers would assume that since I’m online, I’m open to receiving IMs from all of them all the time. I even received one in the middle of the night while I was asleep, asking me why I was up at that hour! (I don’t turn off my phone at night.)
quub also lets you publish status updates to groups of contacts, and learns the style you use for each group. That means it helps you tell your friends and family that you are “at work,” while telling your colleagues that you are “in the budget meeting.” This sort of control over status excites me, but also presents a big challenge for the user experience. It’s tricky to design a clear and easy to use interface that gives users quick access to so many options, especially on a mobile device.
Speaking of mobile devices: quub has native applications for iPhone, BlackBerry, and Android devices (Windows Mobile, Symbian, and webOS will follow suit.) And that’s where I come into play! I’ve been developing the Android client! Now you know!
The first version of the quub app was published in the Android Market yesterday. It’s very much a first version and still has a long way to go before it supports all of quub’s features. Even so, I’m quite happy with the work I’ve done, and look forward to moving the project forward. Thanks to the awesome API, the Android version of quub can become far more sophisticated than anything on other platforms, and I plan to take full advantage of that!
Here are some screenshots of the app:
Here are some of the things I will be working on for future releases:
- Redesigned update status screen: The current one is kinda ugly. It also stops making sense when you consider the on-screen keyboard in Cupcake.
- Advanced quub features: The app currently doesn’t support groups and many other features found in the quub web app. It will soon!
- quub widget: Remember how I was stoked about widgets in Android? Updating status will soon be just a matter of a few swipes ands taps!
- Notifications: quub can get to know you so well that it can remind you to update status whenever you forget to.
Another cool (for me!) thing I’d like to mention is that quub is based on Nomatic*IM, a research project from the Informatics department at UCI (that’s where I study.) The coolest part is that my Master’s thesis is part of this research, so maybe one day my work will help make quub even better!
quub’s launch has been covered by a bunch of high-profile tech blogs, and was even mentioned in the Washington Post! Here are some links in case you’re interested:
Quub: A Micromessaging Service That Asks “What Are You Doing?” And Means It @ techcrunch.com
Quub: The Status Update Reinvented @ mashable.com
How Microsoft (And Others) Are Trying To Make Money From Status Updates @ washingtonpost.com
