Some tiggzi beginner's questions, before choosing it as an app development tool.

Mon Feb 06, 2012 7:10 pm

Dear Tiggzi team,

Tiggzi seems really promising and powerful. I have been playing around for a couple of days and did some nice stuff. However, I think I am missing some features (I am a web developer, but I have minimal experience on mobile development)

1) Embed external website
Is it possible to open external websites, using an in-app browser? We want to embed an external website inside the app, but not by opening the phones browser?

2) Parse integration
Do you plan to fully integrate Parse with tiggzi. I can see now that REST is implemented, but push notifications are not. At the moment, I suppose that we have to download the source code, and add the parse integration by ourselves using eclipse, right?

3) Photo gallery
Is there any tutorial on adding a photo gallery to tiggzi apps. How could we add something like that to our app?
http://www.photoswipe.com/latest/exam...

4) Multi-location map
Again, is there any option to add multi-locations maps. Would you recommend to use parse.com in order to add map data and then use tiggzi to pull this data and show on the map?

5) Best practices to extend an app
Are there any docs regarding the best and recommended practices to extend the apps functionality, i.e. add GPS coupons, fan wall module, QR Scanning coupons, newsletter registraion etc etc

Looking forward to hearing from you.

Kind regards

Haris

Mon Feb 06, 2012 7:51 pm

[quote:]
Is it possible to open external websites, using an in-app browser? We want to embed an external website inside the app, but not by opening the phones browser?
[/quote]
Are you planning to build a mobile Web app or native (hybrid) app? When you click on a link, you would like the site to open inside the current app window?

[quote:]
Do you plan to fully integrate Parse with tiggzi. I can see now that REST is implemented, but push notifications are not. At the moment, I suppose that we have to download the source code, and add the parse integration by ourselves using eclipse, right?
[/quote]
Yes, we are planning push support as well. Yes, you can add the push support in Eclipse. Let me confirm what kind of support is available right now, out-of-the-box.

[quote:]
Is there any tutorial on adding a photo gallery to tiggzi apps. How could we add something like that to our app?
http://www.photoswipe.com/latest/exam...
[/quote]
Easily done if the service expose REST API. Do you know the API used? I was just working on a tutorial to use Instagram to build something like that.

[quote:]
Again, is there any option to add multi-locations maps. Would you recommend to use parse.com in order to add map data and then use tiggzi to pull this data and show on the map?
[/quote]
Can you clarify what you mean by multi-locations maps? Multiple markers on the same map?

[quote:]
Are there any docs regarding the best and recommended practices to extend the apps functionality, i.e. add GPS coupons, fan wall module, QR Scanning coupons, newsletter registraion etc etc
[/quote]
You are building a mobile app (Web or native) - so general mobile practices apply here. Tiggzi makes it super easy and fast to build the app - but the practices remain the same. Any service you want to use, as long as it exposes REST API, you can easily use it in your app. I'll be more than happy to answer specific question.

Mon Feb 06, 2012 8:12 pm

Hallo again. I really appreciate your quick response.

1) Embed external website
I plan to make a hybrid app. This app will several goodies (contacts, maps, coupons) but also mobile shopping, by embedding the web mobile shop inside the app. So, yes when click an app button, I would like to go to a new app tab, where the mobile shop is embeded.

2) Parse integration
Ok, I understand that we can fully integrate Parse using Eclipse to customize the code further. An very draft ETA about full integration would be appreciated. Will it be Q1 2012, or maybe end of 2012?

3) Photo gallery
I did not mean to use REST. This is a standalone HTML5 code snipset to have a mobile photogallery. We would like to integrate it in the app, but not using Eclipse, but using the online utility.I saw that in tiggzi we can add our custom Js, assets (i.e. images). How can we add some HTML pages that utilize those assets inside a TAB? Or is this not possible?

4) Multi-location map
Yes, this could be a map with multiple markers and directions, or a set os tabs showing some categorized locations.

5) Best practices to extend an app
I will be more specific. How can we add a feature for users to add short posts in an in-app Fan Wall? Shall we do it via Eclipse later on, or can we use tiggzi interface to add that kind of code required.

Thanks in advance

Haris

Mon Feb 06, 2012 11:37 pm

[quote:]
1) Embed external website
I plan to make a hybrid app. This app will several goodies (contacts, maps, coupons) but also mobile shopping, by embedding the web mobile shop inside the app. So, yes when click an app button, I would like to go to a new app tab, where the mobile shop is embeded.
[/quote]
Yea, this is possible. There are probably two ways to go about it. Today you can ue JavaScript to embed any content/markup. We are also planning to add a special div-like element which will allow you to write any markup and include it in a screen.

[quote:]
2) Parse integration
Ok, I understand that we can fully integrate Parse using Eclipse to customize the code further. An very draft ETA about full integration would be appreciated. Will it be Q1 2012, or maybe end of 2012?
[/quote]
Much sooner than end of 2012. I will find out and get back to you on this.

[quote:]
3) Photo gallery
I did not mean to use REST. This is a standalone HTML5 code snipset to have a mobile photogallery. We would like to integrate it in the app, but not using Eclipse, but using the online utility.I saw that in tiggzi we can add our custom Js, assets (i.e. images). How can we add some HTML pages that utilize those assets inside a TAB? Or is this not possible?
[/quote]
Yes, basically same thing as in #1.

[quote:]
4) Multi-location map
Yes, this could be a map with multiple markers and directions, or a set os tabs showing some categorized locations.
[/quote]
Easily done with Google Map API

[quote:]
5) Best practices to extend an app
I will be more specific. How can we add a feature for users to add short posts in an in-app Fan Wall? Shall we do it via Eclipse later on, or can we use tiggzi interface to add that kind of code required.
[/quote]
Yes, you can build that. The Fan Wall posts would still need to be saved on the server, correct? So, you would need to expose the service via REST. For example, Cocoafish (http://www.cocoafish.com) has REST API to do that.

Just in general, the app you are building in Tiggzi is a standard jQuery Mobile/HTML5 mobile app - so you can really build anything you want. Tiggzi makes it super fast and easy to build mobile apps connected to any REST API.

Hope this helps...

Tue Feb 07, 2012 8:05 am

Hallo and thank you for your replies.

Your answers are clear, however I would need some help with 1) Embed a website in a tab.

Can you please send me some sample code?

I have given a try with it using something like $().append('someclass') but with no luck.

Is there any recommended way to do it?

A tutorial would also be useful, since I think this is a very basic need for many apps.

Thanks in advance.

PS. I read somehwere in your forum that you also provide clients with custom development services. Who should I contact about that?

Tue Feb 07, 2012 10:07 pm

Loading another web site inside a tab is possible for example using or getting a div and inserting it. There are some things you need to keep in mind. Cross-domain security, here is more information: http://www.cakemail.com/the-iframe-cr... and here: http://davidwalsh.name/window-postmes.... In general, it might be simpler if your content could be load as a widget: http://help.gotiggr.com/how-to (YouTube video).

This is not Tiggzi limitation but how browsers work. The app you are building in Tiggzi is a standard HTML/JavaScript/CSS app.

[quote:]
$().append('someclass') but with no luck.
[/quote]
This looks fine but you need to make sure the selector is correct and the appending stuff is correct. jQuery is under the hood in Tiggzi, any jQuery will work.

To what element and what specifically did you try to append?

[quote:]
PS. I read somehwere in your forum that you also provide clients with custom development services. Who should I contact about that?
[/quote]
Yes. Send me an email to max at exadel dot com, I will get you in touch with the right person.

Wed Feb 08, 2012 7:41 pm

Hi again and thank you for your reply

1) Regarding embeding a web page into a tab, I did use exactly this one:
http://help.gotiggr.com/how-to
But with no luck!!!

2) While exploring the docs, I did not find a way to set up a slpash screen for my app. Did I miss something, or this feature is not supported at all?

3) Thanks for your email. I will send you email

Thu Feb 09, 2012 12:45 am

[quote:]
Regarding embeding a web page into a tab, I did use exactly this one:
http://help.gotiggr.com/how-to
But with no luck!!!
[/quote]
Can you describe what exactly didn't work?

[quote:]
I did not find a way to set up a slpash screen for my app.
[/quote]
Here is a workaround: http://blog.gotiggr.com/2011/10/setti.... We are planning to add the feature to the app builder.

[quote:]
Thanks for your email. I will send you email
[/quote]
Got your email.