Apostol Apostolov's dashboard

Hi GeekMetal,

The problem you reported indeed exists and is caused by a critical issue with Twitter API, also known as a "Twitterocalypse" that every client has to address in order to work with the service in future. Many already have done so - unfortunately, we did not address it prior release of 1.01.

The issue is already solved in 1.02 and will go for approval on 19-20th of July. As usual, it takes up to a week for an app approval. In order to protect our future customers from your negative experience, we have taken Black Box off the iTunes App Store until we have 1.02 up and running. Our goal is not to swindle users with broken application, alas, we still learn from our mistakes.

Because 1.02 will only address this problem, it will not contain your suggested feature of using RSS 1.0/2.0/Atom 1.0 feeds. It will be addressed in 1.03 which is currently in development.

I will now check it with your account.

Also, have in mind that if both Twitter clients are on the same network, for example WiFi, and share the same IP address, they will share the limit of 150 API calls per IP address that Twitter is enforcing. If you use Black Box with several accounts being monitored, and a Twitter client on the same wireless network, you could likely eat those 150 API calls per hour. Still I don't think that's the problem, I'll get to checking your case now. – Apostol Apostolov, on July 17, 2009 18:07

The RSS refresh rate is between 3 and 10 seconds and user modified in the app itself. If set to 3 seconds, it should read the RSS each 3 seconds. – Apostol Apostolov, on July 17, 2009 18:04

That is a great idea. Consider it very high in the priorities for the next feature version. – Apostol Apostolov, on July 17, 2009 18:02

No Twitter keyword triggering and no Twitter feedback using 1.01 that is on App Store now?

Please help us out here with more information. I am sorry this has annoyed you so much but this is first problematic issue with the app's functionality and we'd like to resolve it completely. – Apostol Apostolov, on July 17, 2009 17:48

Hi GeekMetal,
I apologize for the extremely delayed response to your issue! Your problem came in while we were on a vacation after sending version 1.01 for approval. Probably the worst time we could choose for a summer vacation with little access to WiFi or 3G. Please accept our apologies for such unacceptable delay.

I've studied the problems you had with the app. Our tests and feedback from several other users show Black Box works as intended with Twitter, but sometimes when into maintainance or having hosting problems Twitter is experiencing problems such as not updating its RSS feeds used to monitor accounts. We did run in such problems while testing Black Box 1.01 prior approval. Quite frustrating and we have no control over such problems with Twitter.

To remedy such problems to a point, we have implemented dynamic Network Test in 1.01. The Network Test is a field in the Settings, that provides info whether Twitter responds to RSS queries or Twitter or Internet is not accessible and Alarms must be used. I hope you find it helpful.

Pranks & Ideas was a link to a web-page that along with the frustrating, boring texual manual we had with 1.0, did little to help users with ideas how to use the app. With 1.01 we totally scrapped the old useless Manuals and the Pranks Ideas page and went ahead with better, longer comic book tutorial. We expect that our users can figure out new ideas to use Black Box, and we will expand the comic tutorial with new pages in a new section, with all new art, as the application expands with future versions.

Your review in AppStore came in just days before Black Box 1.01 was released on App Store so we would be very glad if you check it out and see whether your problems persist. Please, feel free to come back to us if you experience any problems with the application - we will make sure you get lightning fast response from now on.

Three days and not a single response from Ping.FM employees... is the service being actively developed? Sometimes I wish there are paid accounts so the company makes money from users so it really listens to their needs :(

This is pretty simple to do in Firefox with an extension.

It is not possible right now. Ping.FM doesn't support the Windows Live APIs. Developers should look into this page for API references:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/libra...

Yahoo 360 is dead and deprecated. There has been some development on Yahoo Profiles API lately, which is making it ready for implementation. It's matured so far. – Apostol Apostolov, on June 25, 2009 21:54