Contact Information:
David Hibshman
203 Beech St
Downingtown, PA 19335
610.269.253
davehibshman@gmail.com (or use the Support Request link below)
Topic Links
Android side-loading back to topics
If having trouble with the Google Play Store you can download and install the latest for Android manually via a process called side-loading. Navigate to this support page via a browser on your Android device and click the link above to download it. When finished downloading you will be offered to open the file. It should ask if you wish to install it. When installing this way you may have to allow installation from the browser in settings and answer yes to or otherwise opt to ignore any security prompts or warnings. IPhone does not support manual loading of an app in this manner.Compatibility back to topics
Android >= 14.x
The app technically targets Android 14.0 or higher. This is Google's minimum Android release that an app get target. Google has decided to get more like Apple and start restricting apps to run on versions within 2 years of age. This doesn't necessarily mean older devices won't work. They might not work at all or they might work less well. For example this version of the application has been tested on a Samsung Galaxy S9 running Android 7.0 and it seems to work OK.Android 13 changed the prior versions of Android default opting-in to receive notifications. For Android 13 the default will be that users are opted in to receive notifications and won't be shown the native permissions prompt. This version of the app supports Android 13 too.
Apple iOS >= 13.0
The app requires iOS 13.0 or higher. iOS 13.0 was released on June 4th 2020. As a baseline the IPhone 5s runs iOS 12.0. Apple is a little tighter with ensuring devices upgrade so hopefully most Apple devices should work.Device Form Target
The app was designed for the 4" to 6" screens that are typical of phone devices. It should run on smaller screens with a fair amount of scrolling required and larger screens with an awkward amount of dead space visible or overly large widgets. Really small screens may display much wrapping of text, but should still be functional.Test Targets
The app has been tested on the following real devices. The Android App store also automatically tries to test on 100s of virtual devices.- Samsung Galaxy S23 running Android 14
- Samsung Galaxy S9 running Android 10
- Samsung Galaxy A21 running Android 11
- Samsung Galaxy Tab 6s Lite running Android 12
- Samsung Galaxy S7 running Android 7.0
- Google Pixel 6a running Android 12
- IPhone 12 running iOS 15.6.1
- IPhone SE Gen 2 running iOS 15.6.1
- IPhone SE Gen 2 running iOS 16.6.1
- IPhone 8 running running iOS 15.6.1
- IPhone SE Gen 1 running iOS 15.7.1
Instructions back to topics
User Verification Process
The app requires users to verify their registration with the club website before it's full functionality is available.- Download the app from an app store and install it.
- On first start, and until completed, instructions for sending a verification email are shown.
- Enter the email address on file at the PhilaBlues.Club Website. in the field provided
- After sending the email from this screen the screen will update to display a field to enter a verification code sent in the email.
- This screen will display by default until a valid code is entered and the verification process completed.
- Enter the code received in the email sent to you.
- Use the Request Support link above if unable to find the email in your inbox or spam/junk folder.
Notifications
Once the user verification process is completed by entering and submitting a valid code you will be asked whether you wish to receive real time notifications on your device. The notifications you will receive if you answer yes are described below. You can also later toggle all notifications on or off in the Settings screen. Clicking most the notifications will launch the Blues app allowing you to see updated weekly game information. Clicking the News notification will display the Blues news web page.Starting with version 2.0.0 of this app all of the notifications are also now Venue specific. With the Blues playing twice a week at 2 different rinks the website and this companion mobile app have been updated. This means if you play at both Venues you will get twice the amount of weekly notifications.
- Game Status changes - 2 per week.
- A few days before game day when the week's game becomes Planned.
- On game day when game moves from Planned to Finalized.
- Commissioner Message - if included in the Planned game setup will be sent as a separate notification and will probably be delivered at the same time as the Planned Game Status notification.
- Website news has been updated.
Notifications Initially Turned Off - and Then Later Turn On
If upon the initial ask to allow notifications you choose no it can later be toggled on from settings. Android and IPhone only allow prompting the user to allow notifications once (iOS) or twice (Android) per installed application. This is to defeat apps constantly asking to turn the notifications back on. Given this if you answer Not Allow the first time and later go to settings and toggle them on the you might be sent to the device settings for the application on the device instead of being presented the usual Allow prompt. In this case:- Click the Notifications setting category and toggle notifications for the app on.
- Close settings.
- Close the app. See closing an App below.
- Restart the app and check the settings.
- If the App Notification Setting is not toggled on do so now.
Closing/Killing an App
Switching apps on mobile devices doesn't actually kill the app it just puts it in the background. To truly kill an app:- On iOS
- Click the Home button twice quickly
- Find the app screen and click on it to bring it to the foreground.
- Click and hold on the app screen and swipe upwards towards the top of the screen.
- Make sure the screen no longer displays.
- Tap the Home button once to return to normal mode.
- On Android
- Click the three vertical bars icon once.
- It's usually on the bottom left side of the device/screen.
- Find the app screen and click on it to bring it to the foreground.
- Click and hold on the app screen and swipe upwards towards the top of the screen.
- Some versions of Android will show an 'X' that be clicked to close it as well.
- Make sure the screen no longer displays.
- Tap the Home button once to return to normal mode.
- Click the three vertical bars icon once.
User Verified
Once the user verification process is completed full app functionality becomes available as described below.App Navigation
App Drawer
- Clicking the Blues logo icon on the left side of the app towards the top will open a navigation drawer.
- In the open drawer the following available screens can be clicked to be launched and close the drawer.
These screens are described in the following sections below.
- User Profile Screen
- Weekly Game Screen
- News
- By Laws
- Settings Screen
- About Screen
Venue Selector
- On the top-right side of the app an icon will draw to indicate which venue the data is displaying for.
- If you play at more than two venues then the icon can be clicked to toggle the data displayed of each venue.
User Profile Screen
This screen is presented initially with the verification process widgets described above. Once user verification is completed this screen continues to display read-only information about your user on the website. It will display:- Your Player Name.
- Your Player Type - Skater or Goalie.
- Your Player Status - Full Time or Sub.
- Your Player Email Address - the one you used for verification.
- Your Current Season Beer Volunteer Count.
Weekly Game Screen
This screen will display information- The Weekly Game screen will display by default whenever the app is opened after user verification has been completed. It will:
- Show your name and the current season at the top.
- Show Game Status - Unplanned, Planned, or Finalized
- Show Game Weekday, Time, and Date.
- Allow viewing of any Commissioner Messages for the week.
- Show your Playing Status for the week's game - FT committed or not, Sub available or not.
- Allows changing if the Game Status is Planned.
- Show your Beverage Volunteer Status for the game.
- Allows changing if the Game Status is Planned.
- Will alert if enough have already volunteered.
- Show your assigned team for the game when game Status is Finalized.
- Show the amount of committed skaters.
- Show the beer volunteer count.
- Show a Pay With Venmo button.
- Will try to launch to the Venmo website with pre-filled in amounts and comment based on whether you are an FT player or not, the current season, and the current game date.
- Devices with the Venmo app installed may open the Venmo App instead.
- The pre-filled data may only work if you have already logged in and chose for the Venmo web page or app to remember your login.
- Show a Weekly Status button for a Planned game or a Final Teams button for a Finalized game
- Launches the website with the appropriate page based on the current game status.
Settings Screen
This screen allows you to configure notifications or reset the user for the app.- Notifications Toggle - Applies to all notifications. Individual notifications settings are not provided.
- Reset App Data - If your email address with the Blues has changed use this to clear the current user setup and start over with the user verification process.
About Screen
This screen displays information about the current app version and the features it supports.Known Issues back to topics
- With the 2.0.0 release the iOS app notifications do nto work correctly. Clicking a notification is supposed to start the app on the page an venue associated with the notification, but this is now broken on iOS. It works fine for Android. Unfortunately this outside of my control.
-
Pay With Venmo button is designed to load the Venmo website URL with party names, payment amounts, and season
info
as a comment pre-filled. If the Venmo app is installed then users will typically be asked to open it instead of
the website.
Testing on some android tablets seem to try to open the app even though it isn't installed. The result is that a
web browser opens and the web address entered starts with venmo://paycharge.
- Replace the venmo://paycharge with https://venmo.com.
- This feature requires a saved Venmo login to work properly. If you don't have a saved Venmo login then the Venmo site or app will ask you to login first. In this scenario sometimes the pre-filled information gets lost and is not pre-fill. You can enter the data manually in this case.
-
After Resetting the App Data or after reinstalling the application after previously
uninstalling it the Push Notification Setting gets out of sync.
- To fix on Android - go to settings and toggle the Push notifications setting off and then on again.
- To fix on iOS you must uninstall and then re-install the app.
-
On iOS when answering No to the initial prompt to receive notifications and then later going to settings and toggling to receive
notifications it does not work.
- To get the notifications working on iOS you must uninstall and then re-install the app.