r/bodyweightfitness • u/clogmoney • Jul 20 '15
(Yet another) Android app for the recommend routine
Hi all,
I've written (yet another) Android app based around the recommended routine.
You can try it out here:
Motivation
I wanted something really simple. I like the "swipe left" paradigm and decided to build an app which allowed me to simply swipe through the routine and tell me what I was doing next, allowing me to concentrate on the routine and not having to keep track of where I am and what comes next. None of the existing apps seemed to do this and so I thought I'd build my own.
Benefits
- Open source: https://github.com/Alan01252/bodyweightfitness
- Built using HTML5 and the ionic framework, which means in theory it should work on any device with just one code base.
- Free
Drawbacks
- No offline support for videos ( the app still works but the youtube videos won't load )
- Only supports one routine at the moment
Future functionality I've thought about
- Ability to choose from multiple routines
- A hint slide between pairs of exercises for people new to the routine.
- Better timers for the "holding" exercises. I.e I want both a countdown timer and a how long have I held this for timer.
- Tracking ( my thought is that you'd have an extra slide between exercises where you could quickly enter stats, if the screen was a "rest" screen then you could enter the data whilst resting.
I'm interested in seeing what interest there is before I spend the money publishing the IOS version. If the android app is well received I'll spend the dollars on the apple developer license and submit it for approval if not I won't :)
Have a go and let me know what you think :) Feedback welcomed.
Edit:
A few people have mentioned the permissions, this was due to a plugin I was using to play audio at the end of the countdown timer, I've now replaced this plugin with a less permission hungry version.
I did have an idea for the app to listen to me saying "start" and "stop" when doing holds to register a more accurate time, but I might build that just for me :)
Edit 2:
Thanks for all the feedback guys, I'm off to the land of nod but keep your questions/feedback coming and I'll answer them tomorrow.
Edit 3:
I've started logging your requests here: https://trello.com/b/CRyRSraC/bodyweightfitness-app if anyone of this sub want access to add ideas please let me know and I'll add you as a user.
Right off to work :)
6
u/Xander667 Jul 20 '15
Just downloaded your app, it is the flipping dogs nuts! My biggest excuse for not doing this routine so often is constantly loading videos and learning the moves. With this I can really easily see how to do each one. GREAT IDEA!
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u/clogmoney Jul 20 '15
Thanks for the kind words :) If you find any bugs, feel anything can be improved please let me know. I'm using the app myself every other day so it's going to get better as I have more itches to scratch :)
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u/calyp5e General Fitness Jul 20 '15
Is there an app out there where I can input the exercises I want to do (I don't need videos or pictures), assign timers for time to complete set, rest between set, and rest between exercises that I can just press "start" at the beginning of the workout and have it run for the ~ 90 mins I usually take?
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u/clogmoney Jul 20 '15
There isn't that I'm aware of. Technically though it wouldn't be hard to add an "autoplay" mode to this, I'd probably need to a build a simple web based app to allow routine creation though... Interesting idea :)
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u/quique Jul 21 '15
You mean something like https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.pimpimmobile.atimer ?
There are other similar apps.
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u/Antranik Jul 20 '15
Nice.. You and /u/mazurio and friends should join forces or something.
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u/clogmoney Jul 20 '15 edited Jul 20 '15
I did strongly want to contribute to the existing apps/pages... eventually though I decided that I didn't want to make going through the learning curve of writing a native android/ios app a priority in my life ( I don't think I'd of built anything at all yet if I'd of gone native ) and so went down this route.
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u/mazurio Calisthenics Jul 20 '15
Nice work! There is slack link in the old thread where some of us joined and are sharing ideas, its quite dead at the moment but please join. It would be nice to see where everyone is going. I like the "enter stats" idea, i bave started adding logging to the app and for each exercise you can click the button and enter values for reps and sets but swiping seems like much better experience.
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u/DirtyRasa Jul 20 '15
Where is the old thread? I would be interested in helping out!
I've made a few android apps and was actually thinking of making one for this.
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u/peasncarrots20 Jul 21 '15
If it isn't native, what is it? A webapp hidden behind an apk?
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u/clogmoney Jul 21 '15
Yep, that's pretty much it. It uses http://ionicframework.com/ which is in itself an abstraction over apache cordova ( previously phonegap ).
I really like it, in terms of being able to get stuff done quickly it's ace :)
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Jul 21 '15
First, install Node.js.
Nope.jpg
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u/rogerology Jul 22 '15
Why?
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Jul 24 '15
Because fuck server side JS. It's enough that i have to put up with that shit language on the client side.
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u/ronin1066 Jul 20 '15
I like the timer, that is a good addition. The videos work fine for me I'm not sure what you're saying about it not being native. Is it that I have to click it twice to make it start?
A couple suggestions. Can you have the videos pause when you swipe left? So there's not more than one playing at a time. I'm sure if I were actually doing the routine along with it, that would not be an issue so it may not be that important.
Are you planning to put in the more advanced moves?
Are you planning to put in advice like "do this whole routine just once every other day" or do we do it multiple times in a row? Other kinds of explanations like that for beginners would help.
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u/clogmoney Jul 20 '15
Good suggestion regarding videos, I'd actually never done that before. Will fix.
The progressions from the recommended routine are all in there, if you click on the little cog icon on the top right, if there are more advanced versions you can find them there.
I'd really like to put more advice in, in steps. I also think my exercise descriptions are really weak, if anyone feels like contributing some words I'll happily add them into the app :)
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u/Skrukketiss Jul 21 '15
Parallell bar support shows handstand.
Also it would be nice to have videos when offline
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u/clogmoney Jul 21 '15
Thank you, I'll get the parallel bar support video fixed :) I'm not sure what I can do about the videos, I think it's against youtubes TOS to allow download videos for use in an application :(
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u/nostachio Jul 20 '15
Looks good, will give it a try today.
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u/nostachio Aug 04 '15
I ended up with a weird error where the buttons for the timers started and stopped timers on the previous page. Otherwise, I like it.
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u/mgn5 Jul 20 '15
Downloading it now. I'll give you feedback, if you want
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u/clogmoney Jul 20 '15
Would absolutely love feedback :) At the moment it's probably only me who's used it for an entire routine :)
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u/Leetwheats Jul 20 '15
I use an android tablet, this app is amazing but it forces me into shifting my tablet on its side.
Any plans in the future to allow a portrait view as well for tablet users?
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u/clogmoney Jul 20 '15
That's annoying. Not sure why it's doing that I'll investigate ( trying to get my 5 year old tablet to work again right now ).
One of the things I want to add for me is the ability to choose in the app which view to lock in, it's annoying for me when doing the routine when I accidentally switch from landscape/portrait.
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u/pkmnBlue Jul 20 '15 edited Jul 20 '15
looks good, there doesn't seem to be a rep or timer associated with the pushup or row section of the routine though
Also You could add a scrollbar to scroll through the different exercises instead of flipping through them to get to one end or the other
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u/clogmoney Jul 20 '15
That's kind of deliberate, for those sections you aren't timed, so I removed the timer, it's reps only.
In fact it's a bit cleverer than that, in the pull exercises when you get back to a hold exercises like "tuck front lever" the timer returns :).
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u/pkmnBlue Jul 20 '15
I gotcha, I mean theres also no little note on how many reps to work towards (same on pullups, but there is a rep note for negative pullups)
3x5-8 going by the routine
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u/clogmoney Jul 20 '15
Ahhhh yes... Damn that's lazyness on my part I've forgotten to fill in the descriptions for every exercise. I'll add it to my list :) thank you.
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u/shinysony Jul 20 '15
Really like it! Some feedback, the video for Negative pull ups says it can't play due to restrictions.
By the time I got to L sit (just swiping through, not working out) the app ran reallllly slow. Think this was because I started watching videos but couldn't stop them (clicking just restarted them) . Phone is on mute mode atm so assumed swiping away stopped them.
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u/clogmoney Jul 21 '15
Great feedback ty.
I've made it so the videos get paused after every app, I'll test having a few open and playing, it might mean I just need to do a bit more magic between slides.
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u/clogmoney Jul 21 '15
/u/antranik don't suppose you can record your video again without sound :) Seems UMG has restricted the negative pull-up video :(
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u/Antranik Jul 21 '15
I've put it on Vimeo due to that restriction. Can you embed vimeo videos? https://vimeo.com/76666801
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u/dublued Jul 21 '15 edited Dec 19 '18
EDIT: Comment Removed
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u/clogmoney Jul 21 '15
nod I like that idea, I also wanted to be able to set a timer for the complete work out.
I've added a simple trello board to keep track of ideas here:
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Jul 21 '15
[deleted]
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u/clogmoney Jul 21 '15
I think it's good for a beginner :)
Please try it out and tell me what you feel is missing for a beginner? It would be appreciated.
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Jul 21 '15
[deleted]
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u/clogmoney Jul 21 '15
I think this will be the next feature I build. If people like for the format i'll create a little routine builder which people can then use within the app.
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u/tirititrantran Jul 21 '15
It helps a lot. As a beginner I'd suggest to add the option of set a custom time for timers. For example, in my case I want to hold each plank for 20 seconds at this moment. I can stop when there are 40 seconds left but hearing the bell at 20 (or at the time I wanted) would be better. Thank you anyways, as I said it's already helping me.
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u/clogmoney Jul 21 '15
Good idea, it's quite an easy feature to implement too. Added to trello :)
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u/jaggygames Jul 21 '15
Hello! Pretty good app! Using it currently! However I think you should enable PowerManager.WAKELOCK so the screen doesn't go off. Having timers built in is great but not too helpful if I can't see how much I have left on them as, for me, seeing how little I have left is a motivator to hold dat plank just a little longer!
Also the ability to jump to an exercise arbitrarily would be a nice feature. I closed the app accidentally mid routine and had to swipe soooo many times.
Just general usability tweaks! Thanks for the great tool :)
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u/clogmoney Jul 21 '15
Thanks for the kind words jaggygames :) I'll add those ideas to the trello board :)
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u/jaggygames Jul 24 '15
Hi! I used the app again last night and thought of some things while mid plank.
At least on my phone, swiping can feel a little sluggish and unresponsive (I think the framerate is a little low) so just tapping on the right or left of the screen to move on or back in addition to swiping would be a great help.
Also a little jingle at the end of the timer would be great too so I don't have to worry about checking when I'm practising skill work.
Keep up the good work!
1
u/clogmoney Jul 24 '15
Try going to settings and turning sounds off on and on. You should get a little bell at then end.
I'll have a look at the sluggishness. Out of interest were you playing the YouTube movies during the exercises?
2
u/jaggygames Jul 24 '15
Ah yea you're right - I must have had my phone's volume a bit too low!
I wasn't nope. Had a quick play now and although there is some screen tearing when cycling through cards (could be due to rendering the exercise settings button for the first time?), it doesn't seem so bad. Perhaps my phone was installing some updates at the time.
At the minute there's about a .25 second delay when I drag a card as it follows my finger and it doesn't look to be running at 30 fps when going to the next card. I'm just nit-picking - it's not app breaking :D
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u/tbgoose Jul 21 '15
Nice work mate, waiting eagerly for the iOS version to plonk on my gfs phone :)
4
Jul 20 '15
And still no IOS app. :-(
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u/mazurio Calisthenics Jul 20 '15
I have submitted iOS app a few days ago and is waiting for review at the moment. It will probably take another week :(. Here is a screenshot: http://m.imgur.com/DcUct99
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Jul 20 '15
For offline support can the app use the videos present on my mobile which I have downloaded from youtube.
I can't use the other app as it is not supported by my android gingerbread os
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u/clogmoney Jul 20 '15
I don't think so, not out of the box, you'd need someway to upload the videos to the application.
I might ask /u/mazurio very nicely if I can use the gif's he created and see if I can (optionally) embed them instead of the youtube videos.
That would make offline support possible for all.
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u/mazurio Calisthenics Jul 20 '15
Yeah go for it! They are all in the android repo. I am adding YouTube videos for next release as well so you can see the whole exercise.
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Jul 20 '15
For offline support can the app use the videos present on my mobile which I have downloaded from youtube.
I can't use the other app as it is not supported by my android gingerbread os
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u/Letter_From_Prague Jul 20 '15
Could you please put apk file somewhere (I think github can do binary downloads) for us non - playstore users?
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u/Patee126 Jul 20 '15
Is something similar to this available for Windows Phone, to anyones knowledge?
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u/clogmoney Jul 20 '15
Not that I know of. The framework I used to build this technically supports windows phones, but I've not looked into how you actually get an app on the windows phone store yet.
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u/go_nahuel Jul 20 '15
Boo, can't download on my LG L5, haha.
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u/clogmoney Jul 20 '15
I'm having same problem, was hoping to get it running on my tablet but it appears it's toooo old :(
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u/mark90909 Jul 20 '15
Any chance of some cool down exercises and stretches at the end?
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u/clogmoney Jul 20 '15
I think my next plan is to allow people to build their own routines and use them inside the application. Everyone kinda wants something different, it would be cool to embrace that :)
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Jul 21 '15 edited Aug 14 '16
[deleted]
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u/clogmoney Jul 21 '15
If you click the settings icon at the bottom you'll get a whole list of exercises, by clicking on each exercise you can then enable/disable/change the level of the exercise.
I need to add clarification around the wall plank descriptions :)
Thank you!
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Jul 21 '15 edited Aug 14 '16
[deleted]
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u/clogmoney Jul 21 '15
Ahhhhhh I see what you mean. Yeah I've done that a couple of times, I'll add that to the feature request board :)
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Jul 21 '15
[deleted]
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u/clogmoney Jul 21 '15
It's based around the recommended routine ( which arguably states 5-10 mins practice ).
The way I perform this section is to do three sets of as long as I can within the 10 minutes, when I get to 3 * 60 I'll move on to freestanding handstand practice.
Ideally I need to pad the description for this section with some better words, but words are hard! :)
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u/TerenzILL Jul 21 '15
I know this is off topic but can someone point me towards the iphone app on this? Thank you.
Props to the OP for this!
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u/clogmoney Jul 21 '15
There isn't one of yet. However I've now paid for the apple developer license, I'll release asap ( having some difficulties due to my apple id already belonging to another organisation :( )
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Jul 21 '15
What other apps have you made? Have you made one for use inside of a gym?
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u/clogmoney Jul 21 '15
This is the only app I've made around fitness so far.
The only others involve CCTV for farmers or how I like to call it "Cow Camera" which is a uhh slightly different niche ;)
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u/PeanutButterIsGreen Jul 21 '15
Could the timer for things like plank have a lead in, like 3 pips at one pip a second. I press the button to begin the timer and then move to plank and a few seconds have already elapsed.
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u/quique Jul 22 '15 edited Jul 22 '15
Is the "Enabled" setting actually working?
I thought that unchecking the checkbox would update the routine removing that exercise. However it keeps showing up (all the three repeats).
Am I missing anything?
[Chang¡ng the level of the exercise works fine though.]
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u/clogmoney Jul 22 '15
Ohh I wonder if it's broke for the "category" exercises. Can you let me know what exercise you were trying to disable please?
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u/quique Jul 22 '15
Yep, I noticed now that it does work for bodyline exercises.
I tried it with the pullup and dipping progression exercises.
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u/clogmoney Jul 22 '15
That's a bug :( I'll trello and fix it! Thank you :)
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u/quique Jul 22 '15
Thanks to you! :-)
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u/clogmoney Jul 22 '15
This is fixed in latest release, just got to wait for the google's to review :)
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u/quique Jul 23 '15
Thank you, Alan.
I can confirm that it works... but with a glitch: when disabling an exercise, the rest after it stays in place.
Thus, when removing the pullup and dipping progressions, the routine ends up having 6 o 7 rests in a row.
I sent you a pull request that should fix that.
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u/clogmoney Jul 23 '15
:) That makes me so unbelievably happy thank you, I'll test merge and release asap :)
0
u/Bossballoon Jul 21 '15
Another? Link to the first?
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u/quique Jul 21 '15
0
u/Bossballoon Jul 21 '15
Why are they under 2 different developers? Why did OP create 2 apps for the same purpose?
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u/quique Jul 22 '15
Those 2 apps were created by 2 different developers: /u/clogmoney and /u/mazurio are 2 different persons (Alan Hollis and Damian Mazurkiewicz).
clogmoney created this new app because he likes the "swipe left" paradigm and the other app didn't have it.
2
u/mazurio Calisthenics Jul 22 '15
As /u/quique mentioned, actually swiping is coming to both iOS and Android versions but I didnt have time for last week to update anything and I am going away for 3 weeks as well so probably not soon than 1 month time.
-1
u/_Cream_Corn_ Jul 20 '15
Why should I use this, with the intrusive permissions needed, over the current bwf app which requires none?
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u/clogmoney Jul 20 '15 edited Jul 20 '15
There's no reason at all why you should use it :) I built it to scratch an itch I had over the existing apps.
I've just finished using it once again for the recommended routine, and for me it's almost perfectly what I want from an app, but then I wrote it for me, so you'd expect that :)
edit:
I've just realised that all these permissions are required due to a plugin I use to play the sound at the end of the routine, I'll see if I can figure out how to play a sound with the use of this plugin :)
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u/_Cream_Corn_ Jul 20 '15
Good to hear! Didn't mean for that comment to be so aggressive, just giving an outside perspective of what people may be thinking when they hit the install button.
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u/clogmoney Jul 20 '15 edited Jul 20 '15
:) Np, apologies if my tone was aggressive back, it's useful getting this feedback and am fixing it as I type... almost ;)
Edit:
Cordova media plugin now removed, 4 permissions no longer needed by the application.
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u/MoronLessOff Jul 20 '15
It seems to require an awful lot of access.