Get Repper

→ Download Repper from its Android Market page → Full project source code available at → Follow the conversation on → Scan the QR code below to download from your mobile device

Overview

Repper is an Adobe Flex “Hero” based Android app that calculates your 1-10 rep max on any lift in the gym. For example, you might have a workout that requires you to know your 5 rep max on the bench press, but you you only know that you can lift 275 for 1 rep. Using Repper you can get a very close approximation based on estimation methods developed by fitness specialists. Just punch in 275 for the weight and 1 for your reps and Repper will return your 2-10 rep weight estimations.

The application itself isn’t that exciting, I know. The idea here was to see what the entire development and deployment cycle was like for Air for Android development. What’s easy with Flex/AS3/Air? What’s hard? What are the limitations? What are the annoyances? Where does it excel? Where is native development or even another mobile framework better suited? As it turns out, I generated a lot of answers to those questions. So many so as to merit their own blog post in the near future.

The other concept I was testing here was multi-screen development (inspired by Christian Cantrell’s work). If you peruse the source code you’ll notice that all layout and skinning was done with a liquid layout in mind. This means once I get the chance, Repper should be able to be deployed to other mobile devices like iPhone, iPads, Android tablets, or the Blackberry Playbook without much additional effort.

It was an interesting project and one from which I learned a great deal. in addition to the blog post on the ups and downs of Flex “Hero” that I alluded to earlier, I plan at least a handful of smaller instructional posts on some of the technique I picked up in this experiment. Topics will include handling portrait and landscape orientations with states, AS3 and MXML skinning, and liquid design for multiscreen projects. There’s more to share, but that seems more than enough to start.

All in all, this backend developer had a great time creating something visual and usable in the mobile environment. It won’t be long be another one of these app blog posts shows up!

Screenshots