What To Weather? Good question.

I submitted this last week for iPhone Engineering.

The Ensemble tab performs a Google Image API search with JSON using a basic rule system to create the search query. First checks the user’s Gender from NSUserDefaults, checks the season, and applies a random season-specific clothing term, e.g. Jackets, Suits, T-Shirts, Board Shorts, Flip Flops, and so on. The image is added to a threaded download queue using NSOperations and, when loaded, is zoomable via just one method from the UIScrollViewDelegate. The only trick was setting the content size of the UIScrollView, but the width/height is in the JSON string.

The Forecast tab queries the Bureau of Meteorology FTP site to retrieve an XML file. Parses this using NSXMLParserDelegate. Weather forecast is available for all major Australian cities.

The last tab is just a UIWebView which loads up fashion-tips.co.uk. Doesn’t appear until webViewDidFinishLoading is called, then fades in.

My two fave bits of the whole app:

  • round corners on the UIViews using view.layer.cornerRadius 
  • animated view fade in, using the standard 5/6 lines of code to setAlpha, begin animations, commit, etc.

This app might be more aimed at girls, but hey.. it’s got a Male setting too.

RMIT University
iPhone Engineering