November 19th

I got fed up with the bloated gym apps that were in the App Store, so I built one that only has the features I need: An easy way to organize specific exercises into a collection of “workout packs.” A quick way to record sets and sessions at the gym, storing data for posterity and long-term analysis. Data storage in a standardized format that will allow me to import into Excel easily, and backup and restore in a pinch. …and not the features I don’t need: Videos of how to properly do an exercise. A pre-populated collection of thousands of exercises I will never do. A complicated scheduling system. A diet journal. It’s called Pump. You can get it here. It’s built using jQTouch and PhoneGap, which has disappointingly twitchy quasi-native behavior. I’m planning for the next version to be entirely native. Apple should open its iAd framework to be available for general app creation. Their JavaScript library, PastryKit, feels indistinguishable from a truly native app, but it’s completely undocumented and unsupported.

I got fed up with the bloated gym apps that were in the App Store, so I built one that only has the features I need:

  • An easy way to organize specific exercises into a collection of “workout packs.”
  • A quick way to record sets and sessions at the gym, storing data for posterity and long-term analysis.
  • Data storage in a standardized format that will allow me to import into Excel easily, and backup and restore in a pinch.

…and not the features I don’t need:

  • Videos of how to properly do an exercise.
  • A pre-populated collection of thousands of exercises I will never do.
  • A complicated scheduling system.
  • A diet journal.

It’s called Pump. You can get it here.

It’s built using jQTouch and PhoneGap, which has disappointingly twitchy quasi-native behavior. I’m planning for the next version to be entirely native.

Apple should open its iAd framework to be available for general app creation. Their JavaScript library, PastryKit, feels indistinguishable from a truly native app, but it’s completely undocumented and unsupported.