Show HN: Curiosity, a context-aware Wikipedia reader for iPhone

[jeffd]

https://tamper.io/curiosity/

[kenhaggerty]

Very cool. At some point I'll have to get a Watch to see what it's like having it on my wrist, but the iPhone app itself is a fun time killer.

What was the most interesting / surprising / difficult part about making the Watch portion of this app?

[jeffd → kenhaggerty]

The hardest part of the watch portion is just the testing and debugging. It takes a long time to install on the device and get a real feel for the speed of the app.

The other hard part is figuring out what feels right on the wrist, that part I'm still figuring out.

[thehoff]

Great idea, I even went to the store and purchased it (I'm that guy, the one that never buys apps).

Alas, the app won't open, it keeps crashing upon startup (6s+) so I can't even play with it.

[jeffd → thehoff]

Bummer, I'll try and hunt down the crash logs and see what's happening.

[thehoff → jeffd]

After a phone restart all is well now. Nice clean app that will definitely a new go-to when trying to kill a few minutes (ie. waiting in a line).

I thought it would be cool if you could go to other cities and see what article pop up there, but then noticed you have that already!

[jeffd → thehoff]

Weird that it worked after a restart. iOS ... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Glad you found the location search feature, let me know if you think anything else would be cool.

[grinich]

Is this built with Swift or Objc-C?

[jeffd → grinich]

It's 100% Swift, with some Obj-C libraries.

[wingerlang]

Cool, although I really wish it was free and with an iAP to unlock it. Or a lite version. I want to give it a go for some days to see if I really use it.

How do you get the items by location?

[jeffd → wingerlang]

I thought about doing some sort of free version of the app with IAP, but it was very hard to find a way to do it that didn't make the app feel too restricted. I might toy with the idea in the future, are there any good examples that you like?

I get the items using the GeoData extension of the MediaWiki API: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:GeoData

[wingerlang → jeffd]

Maybe full version for a week, month or X usages, then restrict to some kinda distance/amount of items or add ads.

Or just keep it as it is, it might yield more with less downsides for you.

[jeffd → wingerlang]

Yeah it's a tough call what to do. I remember that the Reddit client Alien Blue did a pretty good job of free/paid separation.