Archive for the ‘Update’ Category

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Happy Holidays

Sunday, December 25th, 2011

I’m currently investigating odd message list errors on Xbox Live, so if you’re affected, please contact me by emailing the address on Android Market. There seem to be two seemingly unrelated causes for the errors – in one case, Xbox Live web site itself crashes and is unable to load your messages; in another, Spark alone crashes. While the first case is something that I can’t fix until Xbox Live itself is fixed, one of Spark’s users has noticed that deleting messages with images fixes the problem in the second case. I’m still investigating probable cause, but since I don’t have an Xbox camera, I’m unable to test – if you have one and can send a picture message, please drop me a line.

Depending how well things go, I should have another app announcement in the next few weeks.

Posted in Spark 360, Update | 1 Comment »

Spark 360 release coming soon

Tuesday, December 6th, 2011

In the next day or so, a new version of Spark 360 will be available on Android Market. This update is likely to be one of the most significant to date, as it will finally target Android 3.0 (as well as earlier versions, up to 1.6), natively. While the difference may not be readily obvious, Spark 360 has been considerably overhauled to properly support tablets, and the next release will include a decent landscape mode for the Games List (others will soon follow), as well as the ubiquitous Action Bar:

Additional changes are a new, tighter list layout, game box art in the Friends List and initial support for beacons. Create your own beacons by pressing the beacon icon on the appropriate game in the Games list, or open a friend’s profile to view their beacons, and/or respond to beacon (for Xbox Live Gold accounts). Finally, this release will also include a number of bug fixes, and stability improvements.

 

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Posted in Spark 360, Update | 3 Comments »

Changes coming to Xbox.com

Wednesday, November 9th, 2011

Please note that as reported on the Xbox blog, changes are coming to xbox.com in the next few days which may break Spark 360 for a time (as that’s where Spark gets its information). I’ll do my best to keep the app’s brokenness period to a minimum, but depending on the changes, it may be a while before an update will be available for download from Market. When that happens, I’ll post an update here.

UPDATE It has happened (11/10/11). Please be patient

 

Posted in Spark 360, Update | 6 Comments »

Tablet preview

Sunday, September 25th, 2011

I’ve been working on proper tablet (Honeycomb) support in Spark for a while now, and while the work is still not complete, here’s a sneak preview of the first release.

So why no release yet? I’ve largely been struggling with the new lifecycle model of Fragments – the modular views introduced in Honeycomb. While the model is not very different from the usual, when dual-pane views, tabs and device rotation are thrown into the mix, things become somewhat problematic – panes occasionally get out of sync, resulting in all sorts of annoying visual glitches. This, coupled with the fact that Google still refuses to release Honeycomb source makes figuring things out.. difficult, at best.

In any case, I’m still working on it, and while I still don’t have a release date, do expect a bugfix release within the next week. Among other things, there should be a fix for the Xbox Server Status tool.

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Posted in Spark 360, Update | 1 Comment »

Coverflow coming to Spark 360

Monday, July 18th, 2011

The Xbox Live/Windows Marketplace merger came and went without any serious issues – a minor change broke “Last played date” in Game History, resulting in all games having been last played almost 40 years before an Xbox 360 would become available (this was addressed in a fix shortly thereafter). Another change that several of you may have noticed is reordering of the “Compare Games” list – opponent’s games are now listed in alphabetical order – for privacy reasons no doubt.

Anyway, “coverflow”, not dissimilar to that of the NXE is coming to the next Spark 360 release. The feature will be optional, enabled in landscape mode for friends by default.

Coverflow

And finally, not related to me, but still worth mentioning is fMSX for Android - Marat has released fMSX for Froyo and Gingerbread.

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Posted in Spark 360, Update | 7 Comments »

Xbox.com to merge with Windows Marketplace

Monday, July 4th, 2011

As various game sites have already reported, Windows Marketplace will be merging with Xbox.com next week, July 11th. Depending on the magnitude of the change, this may cause temporary problems for Spark, as Spark 360 parses Xbox.com for its information. If you notice errors with the application around next Monday, please hang in there – I will try to address them as quickly as possible.

In the near future, look forward to considerable additions for both Spark 360 and Spark Trophies. Trophies will see the release first, and should include various new features that have been sorely missing. While 360′s new features are slightly more low-key, I imagine they will be welcomed as well.

Finally, Spark 360 has been reviewed for the next release of Android Tips, Tricks & Apps, published by the same company that is responsible for my favorite magazine, Retro Gamer. As far as I know, this is the first time Spark 360 will appear in print, so it’s a pretty big milestone. Until the “bookazine” is released in August, you can read the review here – it’s an overwhelmingly positive one :)

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Posted in Spark 360, Spark Trophies, Update | 5 Comments »

Spark Trophies future uncertain; June 15th and compatibility

Sunday, May 29th, 2011

I apologize for the lack of weblog updates lately. Time for side projects has been steadily dwindling as of late, and even something as basic as throwing together a couple of descriptive lines on a website seems to require time I can’t much afford.

Since the last post, there have been at least two or three updates to Spark Trophies and Spark 360 – I haven’t posted about them here, because Android Market already does a decent job at notifying users of new updates. I will most likely stop posting about each and every update here – I will, however, randomly post on stuff of interest, as I’m about to do.

(more…)

Posted in Spark 360, Spark Trophies, Update | 1 Comment »

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