New Android app for playing on OGS

I don’t think it’s a matter of not being invited to the party. The party just had a bouncer to keep out ne’er-do-wells.

Application-specific passwords are worth the inconvenience for the added security, I think.

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It’s more like airport X-ray scanners, armed guards and K9 units. I’m not opposed to a little security here, as long as it does not impede the normal usability of the app. The user should at the very least be allowed to edit the bloody password to something that is meaningful to him/her and not have to type 40 random characters…

I’m sure the developers could find a good solution should they chose to - after all this site is very nicely designed and obviously a lot of care and thought was put into making it usable.

People have a bad habit of using the same password for everything. Having your OGS account hacked is an inconvenience. If it leads to, say, someone’s bank account being compromised, I’d say X-ray scanners and armed guards and K-9 units are not unreasonable.

Well, I don’t want to hijack the thread for this discussion as I’m not here to convince anybody that what I’m saying is better… all I’m saying is if you want to know why a professional-looking Android app was not developed already (and will probably never will) - look no further than this reason.

Sure, hobbyists will come and they will produce something regardless if anybody uses it or not, but such hobbyist will move on to other things when they will find out a grand total of 10 people use their app. And OGS will thus remain without a complete and polished native app unless the devs decide to implement one.

Well, I guess that’s as secure as it gets though… no app = no password = no security issue.

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I think this is a valid discussion point. The API was definitely geared around power users making personal applications, not people making a general-use app. Given the devs apparent interest in the development of a mobile app, I suspect this is something that could be worked on. Perhaps allow for application-specific authorization by a notification on the site? All that would take is giving the app your account name, and then log in to authorize it on a browser.

I’m sure there are ways to work this out with security and usability both in mind.

I had not heard of F-Droid before but it looks cool. I’ll try to get it added in the near future.

I’ll keep low bandwith in mind on the todo list, but to be honest it will be pretty low on my list. My main use case is to be able to play 19x19 games on the tablet while sitting on the couch rather than the pc, so bandwidth is not a concern.

I agree that inputting the generated password in is a pain, but it is at least just a one time thing. I wish there was an option to edit the password.


Thanks everyone for testing. Sorry about the accepting challenge not working. I must have been testing with a different version because it was a silly error that would cause a crash every time. It should be fixed now. I also made a quick challenge screen to create your own challenge.

I spend more time working on the app right now than I actually do playing the game :laughing: , so the previous versions didn’t get tons of playtime. This time I have played a few games and it seems to work well enough.

Version 0.3 released: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/13955195/ogsdroid-0.3.apk

0.3 Changelog

  • Add ability to create challenges
  • Improve the stone removal stage
  • Fix a crash when accepting a challenge
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This could be because you are clicking when it not your turn, or clicking outside the board. I need to prevent the app from sending the move command when either of those happens.

Hey folks.

I took a break over the holidays from working on this, but now I have a new release. Game chat now works. Click on chat in the menu to switch between the chat and the game.

Version 0.4 released: https://github.com/nathanj/ogsdroid/releases/download/v0.4/ogsdroid-0.4.apk

0.4 Changelog

  • Add game chat
  • Add stone and pass sounds
  • Update launcher icon
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The next version has been released. Grab it while it’s hot: https://github.com/nathanj/ogsdroid/releases/download/v0.5/ogsdroid-0.5.apk

The main new feature is that the my games screen now shows a preview of the game, like the OGS web page does. There are also a few fixes for some crashes.

0.5 Changelog

  • Display mini boards for the “My Games” list, like the OGS web page
  • Pressing back while in the chat screen will go back to the game view
  • Fix a crash when clicking outside the board during the stone removal phase
  • Fix a crash when navigating away from the app while network activity is
    happening
  • Fix a crash when there is no network connection while starting the app
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Just a heads up that the app does not work on the new v5 of the site just yet. I am hopeful that I can finalize things and release a new version later tonight.

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And it’s out!

https://github.com/nathanj/ogsdroid/releases/download/v0.7/ogsdroid-0.7.apk

There hasn’t been too much testing on this yet, but I played two quick 9x9 games and it worked.

I recently found out that the create a challenge screen was buggy. Challenges would be removed after about 10 seconds because the server thought that I had abandoned the game. This should now be fixed. So if you tried in the past and never got a game, give it another shot.

There is now the ability to display notifications when it is your move. It is disabled by default. Go into settings to enable it. It is still an experimental feature so don’t timeout of your game because you expect the notification and it doesn’t show up!

When testing this on the beta site there were times when I couldn’t make a move. I’m not sure why yet. If this happens go back and then re-enter the game to fix it.

0.7 Changelog

  • Update to work with the v5 website
  • Display notifications when it is your move
  • Display actual time control on the find a game screen
  • Improve pause activity behavior to disconnect from the game
  • Keep screen on during the game screen
  • Fix create a challenge to keep challenges around
  • Fix a crash when pausing the application on the create challenge screen
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Hello nathanj439

I wonder if you have put yourself in contact with OGS developers. I mean, maybe they could give you suggestions, or mention your software somewhere (for example here https://online-go.com/docs/other-go-resources).

I haven’t really publicized the app yet because I want to work out the bugs before sending it to a bigger audience. I think that time is close.

I think the devs know the app exists. I’ve asked a lot of questions in the dev chat :slight_smile:

It seems the notifications are not working. They were on the old site but not the new. Just consider it a sneak peak into the features of the next release :slight_smile:

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I put a report in the API forum on the notifications.

It affects my extension as well.

Sorry if that was answered somewhere already: how do I log in if my account is connected to my Google account? There used to be an option for application specific password, but I can’t find it anymore in the settings

I knew I forgot to mention something. If you go into your settings you can now change your password even if you logged in via Google. So you can now set your password rather than having to use the long generated token.

New version is out.

https://github.com/nathanj/ogsdroid/releases/download/v0.8/ogsdroid-0.8.apk

The biggest change is that the my games screen now does not reload the game list every time. If it is your move in several games it should be faster to swtich between games. You can manually refresh by swiping down like in other apps.

Notifications should now work as well. Make sure to enable them in the settings if you want them.

0.8 Changelog

  • My Games screen now caches games list, pull down to refresh
  • Fix notifications to now work
  • Fix refresh token being requested too often
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I downloaded the app, however, I have no idea how to log in. There used to be an option on OGS where one could create application passwords, but I don’t see that option anymore.

You now login with your actual password. If you don’t have a password because you login via Google/Facebook go to your OGS settings page and create a password.

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Uhmmmm, I tried that, but it didn’t pass the loading stage. Has this happened to you before?

EDIT: changed wording for clarity.