Connexions App for Android Released

The Connexions team is launching an Android application for the Connexions website. I developed the application as a side project to my regular job as the Connexions development manager.

Since this is the first version of my first app, it could use a few more features. I'll be adding them in the near future. However, I believe in not waiting until software has every feature completed before releasing it. I'd rather get some feedback so I can include requested features as I add the planned ones.

The App has the following functionality:

• Search Connexions using Google Site Search and view Modules and Collections found in the search results.
  
• View the list of Lenses from Connexions, view the content of a Lens and view the Module or Collection that is part of a Lens
• Save a search, Lens, Module or Collection to a list of Favorites that is stored locally on the phone. It is not the same list of Favorites you might have on the Connexions site. There is no login required. You can select a favorite from the Favorites tab and view it.
  

The application was built using existing feeds and URLs from Connexions. I used Google Site Search because it is a feature our users have asked for in the past. It will allow you to search for items which our current search on Connexions does not allow such as searching for lenses and in the Connexions help files. The Lenses and Lens ATOM feeds provide the data for the listings. The content is displayed as it currently is on Connexions. We hope to have a more mobile friendly version in the near future.

I would like to thank Max (the Connexions designer) and all of the beta testers for their help. The app is free and can be downloaded from Connexions. It is also in the Android Market. The application help file gives a good overview. Source code for the app is released under an LGPL license like all of our other code so it is free and open source. You can browse the code from our SVN repository.

The app was tested on an Archos 32, Droid X, Droid, enTourage eDGe and a Haipad M701 using Android versions 1.6 to 2.2. I hope it will be used by students as a quick way to access our content on the go. I'll keep improving it since developing it was a lot of fun. If you try out the app, let me know what you think at techsupport@cnx.org.