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Welcome to the Bottle Rocket Blog! Find the latest news, announcements, shop talk and general iPhone discussions that affects our industry.

Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category

The Boss Can’t Take a Vacation

Saturday, July 3rd, 2010

Even while the boss is supposed to be away on family vacation in New York, he can’t help but snap pictures of Apple billboards of the NPR News app for the iPad.

Santa Wings 2 Selected for New and Noteworthy on Apple’s App Store

Tuesday, December 22nd, 2009

screen-shot-2009-12-22-at-91030-am

Save Christmas by delivering presents and blasting grinches with your flying attack elves. A fun, addictive and action-packed holiday game that is sure to put a smile on your face. Safe for kids, action-packed for adults.

Features:
• Photo-realistic full 3D world combined with whimsical illustrations and hilarious sound effects
• Deliver presents using your rapid-fire gift cannon
• Blast grinches using your flying attack elves
• Save Christmas by maintaining Peppermint Power
• Speed increases making each level more challenging
• Dangling air freshener tells you which way is up

Apple picked Santa Wings 2 for their New and Noteworthy showcase on the iTunes App Store. Thank you Apple. It’s the perfect holiday gift!

See more about Santa Wings 2 here.

Download Santa Wings 2 from the App Store here.

AppReview Gives Wings Galaxy Two Thumbs Up

Friday, December 11th, 2009

This is a fun game. – AppReview


(See other Bottle Rocket YouTube Videos)

Something Wicked Arrives – Bottle Rocket’s First iPhone Hardware App

Wednesday, October 28th, 2009

hdradio

Bottle Rocket is one of the first companies to release an app that controls a hardware accessory connected to the iPhone/iPod Touch.

Please contact us about making an app for your hardware (and the hardware itself).

About the HD Radio iPhone/iPod Touch App:

Turn any iPhone or iPod Touch into a HDRadio receiver using the HD Radio Tuner (available from RadioShack) and this app!

HD Radio is the most significant advancement in radio broadcasting since the introduction of FM stereo more than 50 years ago. HD Radio technology enables AM and FM radio stations to broadcast their programs digitally – a tremendous technological leap from the analog broadcasts of the past.

The HD Radio app controls your HD Radio Tuner, which is an external piece of hardware that connects to any iPhone or iPod Touch’s dock connector to tune your local radio stations. There are two models available from Gigaware that can be purchased at www.radioshack.com or your local RadioShack store.

Features:
- Amazing interface
- Tune manually using the wheel or using auto-seek
- Song and station information
- Tell your friends what your listening to through Email, Twitter and Facebook
- Tag your favorite songs for later review or purchase
- Store your favorite stations
- See what’s playing on a station’s HD Radio channels

Requirements:
- Compatible with all iPhones and iPod Touch models.
- The HD Radio app requires a compatible HD Radio Tuner.

Download the app from the App Store (you must have the HD Radio iPhone/iPod Touch hardware accessory to use the app).

How to Make an iPhone App

Saturday, September 19th, 2009

labs-gpsWell, it’s not paint by numbers. But it’s still pretty interesting.

Take a look at our labs page and let us know what you think about it.

Click here for the Bottle Rocket Apps labs page.

NPR Responds Swiftly to App Users; Bottle Rocket Adds “Most Wanted” Features to NPR News App

Thursday, September 17th, 2009

image001NEW YORK—Usually people listen to NPR. But this time it’s NPR who is listening.

Bottle Rocket Apps, developer of several top iPhone applications, announced the 1.1 update for the NPR News app. Less than a month after its initial launch to critical acclaim, the NPR News iPhone app received an important update including ever-popular social networking. This update makes reading, listening to and sharing the news even more accessible for millions of people. Bottle Rocket Apps is bringing iPhone development to the next level with its high utility, visually stunning apps.

Immediately after its release, NPR News quickly became the #1 free News app and the #7 most popular free app overall in the App Store (recently surpassing the Facebook app). Since its launch last month, NPR News has already achieved one million downloads. As the first app offering users the option to read, listen, and peruse NPR’s large catalogue of programs and content, the response by the public has been overwhelmingly positive.

A few of the major features in 1.1 include the ability to:
- Share news stories via Facebook, Twitter or Email
- Pause radio programs
- Fast forward and rewind (scrub) radio programs
- Pinch-zoom news story images

“Working with Bottle Rocket, we built a road map for NPR news and programs and NPR station programming that is audience driven,” said Robert Spier, Director of Content Development and Mobile Program Operations for.NPR. “Our goal is to deliver the highest quality journalism and programs on all of our platforms, ensuring that our content is universally accessible.”

It is important that companies listen to their users; this is particularly true for iPhone developers as consumers have a myriad of choices available in the App Store. NPR and Bottle Rocket Apps selected new features based on user feedback, with social network capabilities and scrubbing being the most requested features. “We dig in deep and push hard on every aspect of the project to make sure it’s the best it can possibly be”, said Calvin Carter, President of Bottle Rocket Apps. “The success of this app is a combination of our unique design process, NPR’s amazing content and our shared focus on what the user wants.”

These constant improvements to the usability of their apps are what distinguish Bottle Rocket Apps and NPR, as both companies understand that they must tailor their service to the user, creating an effortless usability and quality of experience. With this constant attention to detail, they are redefining how to create a polished mobile application that is a pleasure to use.

“Want to read, listen, see, share, Twitter, Facebook, email, scrub, scroll, save and playlist the news? Now there’s an app for that” said Carter.

The 1.1 update to NPR News is available now in the App Store as a free download on iPhone and iPod Touch or at this link.

NPR News 1.1 Brings Great New Features

Saturday, September 12th, 2009

Want to read, listen, see, share, Twitter, Facebook, email, scrub, scroll, save and playlist the News? There’s an app for that.

The NPR News iPhone app is now the number one News app on the iPhone and the seventh most downloaded free app on the App Store, more popular than Facebook.

Bottle Rocket Apps proudly announces version 1.1, delivering all the major features that users have asked for from version 1.0. The below screen shots show both the Share features and Pausing and Scrubbing (fast forward and rewind).

We absolutely love working with NPR. Their content is amazing and we share a common goal, making the user experience the absolute best possible.

Look for more updates to come…

photo photo1

Something Wicked This Way Comes

Thursday, August 20th, 2009

wicked1(wicked good, that is…)

Here’s a sneak peek at the latest app we’re working on. This picture shows us jacked in to the iPhone’s dock connector to run debug tests on this yet-to-be-revealed hardware accessory for iPhone and iPod Touch.

The iPhone 3.0 SDK provides the ability for third party apps to communicate with accessories attached to the iPhone or iPod Touch through either the 30-pin dock connector or wirelessly using Bluetooth.

This will be Bottle Rocket’s first hardware integration project to launch since the release of iPhone 3.0 which made third party app to hardware integration possible. We learned a lot from this project and can’t wait to put that knowledge to good use.

Stay “tuned”… ;-)

The Making of the NPR News iPhone App

Wednesday, August 19th, 2009

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By Demian Perry, NPR

What I love most about our new NPR News iPhone app is the way the design combines the plentiful content choices of the Internet with the effortless functionality of an old transistor radio. But while the app’s interface is simple, its creation was complex, involving dozens of contributors, from designers and developers to business strategists and communication specialists, all working together for more than half a year. That process began early in 2009, with our search for a development partner who was… (read more at npr.org)

Bottle Rocket releases NPR iPhone app

Wednesday, August 19th, 2009

app-icon-512x512We’re very pleased with the great reviews and unbelievable download rate of the app we developed for NPR. It’s now the #1 News app on the iPhone as well as the #19 most downloaded free app on the iPhone (that’s huge!).

Thank you to everyone who is downloading it and telling their friends about it. It’s free and a great app. It will change the way you listen to NPR radio and programming.

We’re already working on version 1.1 and will be adding pausing, scrubbing, Twitter, Facebook and a ton of other stuff. So get the app free here and stay tuned!