Stevenson Software

Landscaper’s Companion Gardening App – New York Times Review

admin — Thu, 22 Mar 2012 14:26:47 +0000

Landscaper’s Companion, our top-selling mobile app for gardeners, was reviewed today in the New York Times. We appreciated that the review was honest in pointing out features the app is missing. However, we do disagree with the author’s conclusion about developers looking for quick bucks. While there are quick-buck cases, as there are in any market, most of the large gardening publishers and organizations do have apps already in the app store. But, in our opinion, they are built on the legacy book publishing model and release apps that are never updated, nor include any tools that gardeners need. Maybe someday they’ll “get it” and publish better apps, but in the mean time, their customer base will already be using other tools.

We are committed to keeping Landscaper’s Companion the top-selling gardening app for iPhone and iPad. We’re the only gardening app that releases frequent updates that include new plants and new features. We’re not in this for the quick-buck, but rather to support gardeners world-wide and provide them the best gardening and landscaping tools.

Full New York Times review: Digital Tools for the Sheds of Persnickety Gardeners

Update: I emailed the author letting him know of my disagreement with his conclusion. His quick response: “I didn’t mean to imply that you were among those who were looking for the quick bucks. That’s why I listed the qualifications of your researchers — to show that you took this seriously enough to include deeply knowledgable people in the process.” Thank you Bob.

MobileSlopes Conference Presentations

admin — Mon, 19 Mar 2012 16:17:53 +0000

I presented at the first MobileSlopes.com conference in Ogden, Utah on March 16. I had the opportunity to present a couple of sessions. One, Monetizing Mobile Apps, covered 10 ways to make money with your iPhone, iPad, and Android apps. The second presentation was an intro to building great mobile apps.

I’d like to thank the city of Ogden, MobileSlopes, and all the attendees for the opportunity to speak. It’s always great to be around other mobile app developers and feed off their energy and passion. If you attended the conference, please feel free to contact me with any questions.

Monetizing Mobile Apps

View more presentations from Dave Stevenson.

Mobile Mud Pie – Intro to Building Great Mobile Apps

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Landscaper’s Companion Gardening App – On KSL Radio

admin — Sat, 10 Mar 2012 06:17:51 +0000

I had the opportunity to make a brief appearance this afternoon on Salt Lake’s #1 news station, KSL Radio, to talk about our top-selling gardening app, Landscaper’s Companion. Enjoy

Landscaper’s-KSL-3-9-2012

10 Ways to Monetize Mobile Apps

admin — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 15:20:16 +0000

I presented last night at the Utah Mobile Developers group on 10 Ways to Monetize Mobile Apps. In short, here are the 10 ways I talked about:

Paid
Advertising
In-App Purchases
Webapp Subscriptions
Subscriptions
Sponsorships/Promotions
Lead Gen
Affiliate Sales
Analytics
Don’t

Each way has different business and marketing implications. They can also all be mixed-and-matched for interesting combinations. I think the future is with in-app purchases and the “freemium” model.

Here are the slides for your enjoyment.

Monetizing Mobile Apps

View more presentations from Dave Stevenson.

Have a Mac? Like Airplanes?

admin — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 18:07:45 +0000

Try Airplane Quiz for Mac, now available in the Mac App Store for $1.99.

Web Apps I Use

admin — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 20:32:19 +0000

I’ve written about tools that I use as an iOS developer, but I didn’t list any webapps – just software on my computer. While trying to keep the debate of whether webapps are software or not, here are a few webapps I use. In order to make the list, the webapp had to be used for a “business” purpose. So that left out my favorite airplane site, Airliners.net, but it does include Google Reader, which I think bridges the gap between busines and pleasure. Oh, and let’s not forget Facebook, which can be a time-suck, but also houses the fan pages of some of my apps.

In no particular order:

Workflowy – my master To-Do list.
Trello – I use trello to collaborate on a project I have with another partner.
Gmail – I live inside my inbox.
Google Reader – I’m a TechCrunch junkie.
Facebook – useful for Fan pages of apps.
Google Analytics
App Annie – I like the morning emails they send with the previous day’s app sales.
iTunesconnect – this is where I manage all my apps and check when I’ll get paid next by Apple
Elance – I use contractors to do some things that I don’t have expertise in.
Google Calendar – A great way to keep my calendar in sync between my laptop and phone.
Google Apps – I use their free email hosting for my domains. I forward all of my emails into my gmail account. So I never technically go to the Google Apps page.
MailChimp – Useful to send out newsletters to my email lists.
Stackoverflow – has the answer to all of life’s questions, almost.

I hope you’ve enjoyed these posts from me. I’d like to hear from you about any useful webapps you use. Find my on Twitter, @dnstevenson

A Little About Me

admin — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 15:06:20 +0000

Last week I tweeted out that I hit the 18 month mark from the day I left corporate America and struck out on my own as an iOS developer. A Twitter follower, @trevmckendrick thought it’d be a good time to interview me about my road to going indie. It was a good opportunity to reflect back, not only on the last 18 months, but on the last 6 years that I’ve had serious entrepreneurial ambitions. Thanks Trevor!

Intro to FMDB

admin — Wed, 09 Nov 2011 16:54:58 +0000

On November 1, I presented at the Salt Lake Cocoaheads on FMDB. FMDB is an Objective-C wrapper around the SQLite APIs for iOS and Mac. Below is my presentation. Sample code, which is an entire fully-functioning app, can be found on Github at https://github.com/dnstevenson/US-Landmarks

FMDB – SLC-Cocoaheads

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More Tools I Use (Less Frequently)

admin — Thu, 29 Sep 2011 17:14:36 +0000

A couple of weeks ago I published a list of tools that I use weekly as an iPhone/iPad developer. I received a lot of responses with good alternatives to the tools on my list – a lot of which look really good.

Here are a few more tools I use, just not as regularly - perhaps at least monthly. In no particular order:

Adobe Illustrator – I’m not by any means a graphics guy, but I do use Illustrator to resize any vectors I grab from iStockphoto
Gimp – Useful for quick image changes like resizing or changing a color
Cyberduck – nice to have a graphical tool to do SFTP or SCP to my remote servers
Sqlite Inspector – a quick way to browse through a sqlite database. I also use a Firefox plugin called SQLite Manager, which I prefer, it’s just that I’m not in Firefox much these days.
iOS-Simulator Cropper – makes great website and appstore screenshots for iPhone. Unfortunately, my monitor is too small to make it work for iPad very well
Openoffice – I do a lot of work with csv files
Keynote – I’m starting to give more presentations at local tech meetups and user groups
Dropbox – I use mostly to share large files with partners

With these two lists I’ve tried to keep the tools to just “installed” software (tried being the keyword). However, that line is hard to draw. So perhaps I’ll do another list that contains “online” tools next.

What other tools to you use? Tweet me @dnstevenson

Tools I Use as an iPhone/iPad Developer

admin — Wed, 07 Sep 2011 16:10:57 +0000

I made a quick list of tools that I use as an indie iOS developer. To make the cut, the tool has to be used at least weekly, and for at least the last few weeks. In no particular order, here’s the list:

Xcode – need I say more?
Versions – for Subversion management
Tower – for my private repo and public github repo (I’m moving from svn to git, slowly)
Workflowy – I keep my todo list here – it has replaced the notepad I kept on my desk
Chrome – I love the speed
TextMate – The first app I bought after becoming a Mac user. Who can forget the “Blog in 5 minutes” video by DHH?
JellyfiSSH – excellent way to manage all of your SSH connections
Evernote – my brain dump. I use the Chrome plugin liberally to save stuff I want to read later
Sequel Pro – a great MySQL tool to manage local databases, and best of all, remote databases over SSH
PathFinder – a Finder replacement with a few nifty features
Backblaze – I backup everything and never need to worry about it
Pandora – get a Pro account and you won’t regret it. New tunes all day
Twitter – I have an addiction to Twitter and love their official Mac app store app. Find me @dnstevenson
AppViz – it helps me track my app sales and reviews. I also use App Annie for to get a daily sales report in my inbox.
Gmail – I know, I’m a Mac user and I should be in love with Mail, but I can’t do it. Gmail fits my style.
Fantastical – super easy way to create calendar events and see my calendar from the menu bar.

There are plenty of other tools that I use – just not quite as regularly (OpenOffice, Dropbox, and more). There are also technology stacks that I use that I did not include – such as Ruby on Rails and MySQL.

I’d love to hear what tools you use – tweet me @dnstevenson