This plugin takes the data stored in The Conference Plugin and auto-builds a Sencha Touch mobile app for use on smart phones such as the iPhone, Android and Blackberry Torch. The app also works in WebKit browsers such as Safari and Chrome.
The plugin is built with lots of hooks, making it possible to build additional add-on plugins to customize the app, all without having to hack into the original code. Using a settings page, with the ability to override settings on a conference-by-conference basis, you can specify the Twitter hashtag for your event, and coordinates for a Google Map.
You can also turn on/off the “Cache Manifest” which enables the app to work offline. When you have Cache-Manifest enabled, all of the data for the conference is downloaded to the users phone when they visit the page. This includes all of the speaker photos and bios. It means that the user will be able to view the app, even if their phone is in Airplane mode.
Note: This plugin requires The Conference Plugin to be installed and activated on your WordPress installation. All of the data that the app uses is managed using The Conference Plugin.
What is Cache Manifest? What is Manifest Version
On the general settings page, and also on the settings tabs for individual conferences, there is a checkbox for the “Use Cache Manifest:” and a textbox for “Manifest Version:”. Checking the first one will serve your app using a Cache-Manifest causing your app to get stored locally on the user’s device. That means that once they’ve downloaded the app and saved it to their home screen, they can access it again, even if their phone is in Airplane Mode. This is an attractive feature to be sure and makes your Web App feel more “Native”. The Manifest Version is a way for you to manually push new versions of the app to your end users. Any time you change the value there downloaded apps will grab all of the javascript and images from your server again.
To push new speaker & session information to your app, you must “Update Published Schedules” for your Conference. Click Conferences under Top Quark in the left-nav.
All of this is great, but it can cause headaches while you’re building and testing your app. Version 1.0.3 of The Conference App introduces several features that make it less headachy, but I still recommend not turning this feature on until you’re ready to go live with your app.
What devices will the App work on?
The app uses Sencha Touch, which works in any Webkit browser. That means iPhone, Android, Blackberry Torch, Safari and Chrome. It does not work in Mobile Firefox, Desktop Firefox or Internet Explorer. Maybe one day.
What is the “Path” on the The Conference App settings page?
This is the path off of your WordPress home directory that your app will live at. The Conference App uses WordPress rewrite and redirect techniques to hijack URLs. You should make “Path” a unique slug that doesn’t exist as a top level page on your site.
For example, if your site sits at http://mydomain.com and you make your path the-app, then the app will sit at http://mydomain.com/the-app. Going to just that URL will try to load the conference data for the current year (i.e. any conference with a Year parameter equal to exactly the current year). To load the app for a specific conference, just put the year after the path (i.e. http://mydomain.com/the-app/2011-conference – where your conference year parameter is 2011-conference)
Anything Else?
Please visit the forums on http://topquark.com and search for or ask your question.
