Price Book iPhone app Forum

The version of the Shopping List app with access to the website with prices for scanned barcodes is in the App Store.

I'm curious if people are finding the website with prices for scanned barcodes useful?

1) Can you find prices for the barcodes that you've scanned?
2) Are there local prices for your scanned barcodes?
3) Is this an interesting feature of the Shopping List app? Or is the app more useful to store prices you've entered manually?

I'd appreciate hearing your thoughts.

Thanks,

Jim

The new version, 1.14, of the Shopping List app, is now on iTunes.

I've added to the www.pricebook.aerende.com website the ability to edit the scanned barcode information. For items that come from scanned barcodes, to the right of the magnifying glass, there will be a barcode image that you can click on to get to the editing page.

This works fine for items that have newly scanned barcodes but unfortunately, during this update, I found a bug where items that have already been scanned, and have new prices entered, aren't showing up on the website as items with barcodes. So I've submitted a new version of the Shopping List app to Apple that fixes this bug. This new version is version 1.14.

Jim

Last edited: Mon, 02 Jan 2012, 04:25pm by admin

Over the holidays I will add to the www.pricebook.aerende.com website the ability to edit the following user input data per scanned barcode:

A) Item Name
B) Package Size
C) Package Size Units

This data will be editable by everyone in sort of a wiki style.

Jim

The website that provides online and local prices for scanned barcodes is back up with the latest version of the Shopping List app, version 1.13. The last video tutorial on the page at this link explains how to access the online and local prices for a scanned barcode:

http://www.pricebook.aerende.com/user/frontend_...

The IOS5 version of the Shopping List app, version 1.13, is now in the iTunes app store. The things that are new in this version are:

- Website with online and local prices for scanned barcodes is now back up !
- Added popup for when barcode prices website is down.
- Fixed checking for internet connection to also check if connection is allowed. This bug was causing attempts to upload prices to the website, when internet access was available but there was no account on the internet medium.
- added index on right hand side for Items and Stores
- can no longer add duplicate items to Shopping List
- now checks first if Internet connection is available before starting up barcode scanner
- fixed crash for first time users

Please let me know if you find any problems with this new version and I will fix them immediately.

Thanks,

Jim

I've released today to Apple an update to the Shopping List app that has:

1) the website for online and local prices for scanned barcodes back in service
2) fixes for iOS5

This new version of the app should be in the iTunes store next week.

It looks like the update to iOS5 broke a lot of apps, including the Shopping List. I plan on submitting a new version to Apple this week that will work with iOS5. If you see any specific problems using the Shopping List with iOS5 please let me know and that will speed up the process. The problems I know about currently are:

1) Can't delete existing item
2) Problem using barcode scanner
3) Item/Prices navigation is missing Back button

Last edited: Thu, 01 Dec 2011, 07:47am by admin

@n&b -

Thank you for your post.

A. First post -

Categories have been suggested previously and they are on my list to add.

B. Second post -

1. Customizable drop-down for Store names -

Good suggestion. I've added it to my list of improvements.

2. Improved Syncing -

A) To upload an item from the device to the website when a price has been entered when there was no internet access, the following has to occur:

a) When the device has internet access, then a new price is entered. This triggers the upload software to check for internet access, and if available, then all prices that have not been uploaded to the website are uploaded.

B) The app should be able to sync over 3G. For internet access, the device just needs to be able to access the internet, in whatever manner. Could be that the device has internet access but 2)A)a) above is not fulfilled.

C) Can you explain how you were duplicating items? Were you both entering the same item on two different iPhones?

3) Yup, categories are on my list.

4) A) IF the barcode has been scanned before, the Quantity, Units and Brand should be populated when a 'New Price' is entered. I will check this and if not the case, fix it.
B) For a new Item from a barcode, unfortunately the Quantity, and Units are not available, so those have to be entered manually, the first time. I have mentioned this to the barcode scanner provider and they are looking into adding this information.
C) The next thing I will do is allow editing on the website for scanned barcodes, the Item Name, Quantity and Units information.

5) Previously there was a bug in Apple's library for scrolling in the prices page that caused random crashes, so I disabled scrolling. I have on my list to re-enable scrolling, so I will check if the bug was fixed before re-enabling scrolling.

6) These are good suggestions. I will add them to the list.

7) I can add a button to copy existing prices when creating a new price.

Thank you for your comments !

Jim

Last edited: Mon, 31 Oct 2011, 10:40am by admin

Ok, I've looked through the other forum posts to be sure I'm not missing anything.
Here is our current list of improvement/enhancement/fix requests:

1. Customizable drop-down for Store names
If I'm entering several items in one shopping trip, it gets very cumbersome to have to type the store name over, and over, and over. Sometimes will use copy/paste - but then can't use that if I'm entering versions of the same item, etc.

2. Improved Syncing
A) I registered my device long ago, and still have not found that 'once I have internet, my items sync online'.
B) Why the 'internet only' syncing? I have plenty of data - and for the amount of data (minimal) that would be syncing, I don't understand why the app can't sync over 3G thus allowing it to sync immediately? If there are concerns with data, perhaps include a settings option to 'sync over 3G' on/off?
C) The scenario here is that my husband and I both have iPhones - and want to be able to add something on one phone - and see it on the other phone. We're both registered - but in our initial testing with this, we started duplicating items, etc. This would be WONDERFUL since we both like to see/have this information - but don't want to constantly be uploading/downloading/clearing duplicates, etc.

3) 2-level naming/categories...
As mentioned above, the ability to have a primary [customizable] category (Nuts, Milk, Cheese, Cereal, etc.)followed by the item name (Walnuts, Skim, Cheddar, GoLean, etc.) I like comparing apples to apples - so wouldn't put multiple kinds of 'Nuts' under one 'item', however I like having them grouped so I can easily compare/review like items.

4) Barcoding to populate data
As mentioned in other posts, the ability to barcode an item and do one of the following:
A) If the user is barcoding to add a 'New Price' (thus the item name has already been created), populate the Quantity, Units, and Brand (user must be able to manually enter the price as it would never be right if pulled from online unless synced w/ each unique stores current POS software.)
B) If the user is barcoding from 'New Item Name', the barcode could also enter the Item Name along with the Quantity, Units, Brand.
These populated fields must always be able to be manually edited, however, in the event you'd like to rename the item, the barcode data was incorrect, etc.

5) Ability to scroll within an item.
Whether entering the item or viewing it, I can't scroll through the fields. If viewing an existing item, I must tap in a field to enter Edit mode in order to get to the bottom-most field. If I'm entering a new item, I must hit enter to progress through the top fields to get to the bottom fields due to the keyboard being up. This is VERY cumbersome and NOT intuitive.

6) Keep the menus consistent.
Here is the behavior I see:
From the Home screen to the Search screen, the bottom menu bar remains (with the +, cloud up, cloud down, etc.)
From an Item to the Search screen, the bottom menu is gone and there is a top menu with Edit item name, Delete, Home.
My recommendation: Always show the bottom menu on the Search screen, and at the top, always show the Search text box - but have an icon to the right of that text box to 'edit' (like a pencil, or cog, or 'edit'). This button would then give you the native iPhone 'Delete' function, and use an arrow to the right to allow name editing, etc.

7) Ability to add a new price using an existing price.
For example, I entered the reg. price of milk at Cub 2 months ago, and it's changed and I want to enter the new price as a new price (not just edit the existing price). My thoughts - I would open the price from 2 months ago, and there would be a button at the top for 'New price'. This would copy forward the Location, Quantity, Units, Brand, & Notes values and use the current date and allow the user to edit any and all fields from there. This would also help with entering full price and a sale price as I like having them as separate prices for comparison, but currently have to enter everything twice which is a hassle and is time consuming.

Love the app though! Hope to see some of these improvements in the near future else we'll begin to look elsewhere to enter/track our pricing data.
Thank you!

I did not post the previous list, but would like to add a comment about the categories. I like that all the items currently list alphabetically, but I find myself naming them with a 'category' first, followed by the item so that I can find them faster.
Some examples:
'Nuts: Walnuts', 'Nuts: Pecans', 'Nuts: Peanuts'
'Milk: Skim', 'Milk: Rice', etc.

After having several items, sometimes I forget if I had previously documented an item, and have found that if I have that first 'category' then it's easier to find/see what I've entered w/o having to remember how I entered everything.
The categories would need to be customizable, however, as each user may want to organize in their own way along with the fact that there would be countless categories.

The app is great - and with some improvements will be wonderful! I'm looking into a few other things - but will post any additional ideas we have at a later time. Looking forward to the next release!

I answered this in an email, but here are the answers for anyone else who is interested.

1) To get the total of the shopping list to go back to zero after you have deleted the items in it, on the Items page of the Shopping List click on "Lowest Unit Price" and then the total will be zero.

I.E. you need to click on something to have the List recalculate the total.

2) The Shopping List functionality is to be used to determine which store your list of items will be cheapest at, hence unit prices are used. If the actual prices were used, you wouldn't be able to tell which store the shopping list would be cheapest at.

Should I add a button to calculate the total price? Could I assume that you always wanted to buy the quantity that is stored for that price?

1) When I set up a shopping list and then delete the items in it, the total does NOT go back to zero...though there are no items in the list.

2) How do I get the total of the shopping list to reflect total prices, instead of unit prices?

Last edited: Wed, 28 Sep 2011, 08:19pm by aurorahorse

If you delete the app from your device and then re-install the app and do an import, the prices on your device can get jumbled. This is because the website still thinks its database is still in sync with the database on the device. (The sync between the two databases allows you to update prices on the device and have the website updated correctly, and visa versa.)

To let the website's database know that the sync between the website and device database is gone and needs to start from scratch, there is a new button on the website called "App Deleted From Device". Once the app has been deleted from the device, click the "App Deleted From Device" button which will restart the sync between the website database and the device database. Then you can import your prices from the website to your device with no problems.

Thanks to a user who alerted me for the need for this button.