iJustLeft

Web: http://ijustleft.mazapps.com/

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Version 1.2, built for iOS 9 is on it’s way to the app store.

v1.0

Key features

  • Parents want to be sure that their children:
    • Have arrived at school.
    • Have left school.
    • Have left school at the wrong time (e.g. during school hours.
  • Notify yourself or other people when you arrive or leave a location.
  • You leave work at different times and you want to send a message to your spouse when you leave.
  • You sleep on the bus on the way to/from work and want to be reminded when you arrive.
  • Automatically send SMS notifications as you arrive or leave a location (NB this requires a Web SMS subscription).
  • Lock access to the app with a code so other people can’t change the settings.

Top tips

  • Web SMS Setup
    • If you have set the Web SMS correctly, you should see your SMS Balance as a number in: Web SMS Signup for that provider.
    • Check you have entered all the fields for the Web SMS Setup. E.g. Username, Password.
    • Do you have and Web SMS Balance?
    • If you do see a number for your SMS balance, check on the previous page “Web SMS Providers” that the SMS provider has been selected and the row appears highlighted in Blue.
  • SMS (Auto) not being sent:
    • In the Actions list, SMS (Auto) should be White. If it is Red, it is not set correctly or not selected.
    • Check the Web SMS setup above.
    • Have you configured any Triggers to use SMS (Auto) Actions?
    • Are all the pieces “Active”?
      • Region
      • Contacts
      • Actions
      • Triggers
    • Do your Contacts have a SMS mobile number set and is it correct?
  • Region entering/exiting:
    • Happens too often or not enough:
      • Go to Regions. Select the Region you want to fix.
      • Toggle the Edit switch to ON – this allows you to change the size and centre of the Region.
      • Experiment by making the Region larger/Smaller and moving where it is centred.
      • A good way to check that a Region is working properly is to use a “Notification” action in your Region Trigger so you yourself are notified when you enter/exit a region. Use this to choose the right Region size and centre.
    • Happens on the wrong days or at the wrong times:
      • Go to Trigger. Choose the trigger you want to fix.
      • Press the “Set times” button.
      • Check that the Trigger is set to operate only on the days you are interested in and only at the times you want.
      • Note that you can specify the times to be “Inside” or “Outside” a time range. E.g if you wan the Trigger to fire only in the morning you might set:
        • After: 8am
        • Before: 11am
      • Test using a “Notification” action to check.
    • No Region Notifications are happening at all
      • Go to More->Settings: Check that the Region monitoring switch is ON.
      • Check that the Regions you are expecting to be monitored are listed at the bottom.

Basics

This app is all about sending messages when you (the person carrying the iPhone) either move into or out of a specific region. So whats a region? It’s a place, an area. E.g. shopping centre, home, work etc. This app notices when you go into or out of these regions. When you do (enter/exit) a region, it “Triggers” some action. This means things like “Send an email to Bob” or “Send an SMS to Anne”. These can be automatic (they just happen without you doing anything) or they might need you to do something (like press OK). Each one of the things a Trigger does is an “Action”: Email/SMS this person.

Sending SMSs

There are two options for sending SMSs. Manual and Automatic.

Manual SMS

For manual SMS sending you will hear/see a Notification on your iPhone telling you that you have Exited/Entered a region. Click on the notification to open the app or open the app directly. You will then be given the choice of sending the notifications (in this case SMSs) or cancelling them. If you choose to send them, a standard SMS Sending dialog should appear and all you will need to do is hit Send. Alternatively you can edit the message before sending it.

Automatic SMS

The Automatic SMS sending is much more useful as it does not require you to do anything – the messages will just be sent without any interaction required by you.

To send automatic SMSs you have to subscribe to a Web SMS provider. To do this, go to the More->Settings tab and press the [Configure] button for “Web SMS setup”. Select one of the providers (at the moment there is only one).

NB The selected provider will be highlighted in Blue when it has been chosen. Pressing it again will deselect the provider if you wish to disable automatic SMS sending.

Then press the [>] button for the provider on the right in order to configure it. This opens the Signup page for the SMS provider. Use the apps browser to browse the web page and sign up.

You will normally be given a small number of SMSs for free so you can test the service, but always read the specific Terms & Conditions before signing up.

When you have signed up you will receive a username and password for your SMS account. Enter the details in the scrolling list above the browser.

Notes

  • The parameter list at the top of the Signup page may contain more entries at the bottom that you may not be able to see. To check that all the entries have been filled in try scrolling the parameter list to the bottom.
  • If you have entered all the details correctly, the SMS balance should change to show you your initial SMS balance.

When you have entered all the parameters press the

Web SMS PROVIDERS

Not all SMS providers will provide coverage in your area. So before signing up you should:

  1. If they have a coverage checking utility, use it to check the coverage they offer for your area.
  2. Take advantage of any introductory Free SMSs they give you to see if it can send SMSs in your area.
  3. Always read the Terms & Conditions.

Text Magic

Example – Tell my parents that I left school

In this example we will set up an SMS notification to tell your Mum and/or Dad that you have left school.

This could be set up by the parents who also have the option to set an access code for the app to stop changes being made to the configuration.

Step 1 – Set up a region and give it a name

Regions-All

In the Regions tab press the + in the top right corner.

Region-School

Press the “Region name” text box and type in a name like “School”. The map should be centred on where you are right now.

Zoom out and find the place you want then zoom back in so that the place you want is filling the map.

A scale of 0.5km is quite a good first guess but you can adjust this later, larger or smaller as needed based on your experience. Then press the <Region] button at the top right to go back.

Step 2 – Set up your contacts

This is where you set up the contact details of the people who will be getting SMSs or emails from the app.

Contacts

Go to the Contacts tab and again press the + in the top right corner.

Contact

If you know all the contacts details you can just enter them. If you have the contact details in your iPhone contacts, press the Contacts button and find them, then press their name. It will choose the first mobile number for the SMS or if there is no mobile then the first telephone number. It will also choose the first email. Correct these if they are wrong.

Press <Contacts] to go back.

Step 3 – Set an action

This is where you set the Contacts and the type of message they will receive.Actions

Go to the Actions tab and press the + in the top right corner.

Action-SMSAuto

Using the top spinner, choose the type of action: SMS (Auto)The using the bottom spinner, set the Contact. Then go back using <Actions].

Step 4 – Set the Trigger

Finally set what happens when a region is triggered (entered/exited).Go to the Triggers tab.

Triggers

Press the + in the top right corner.

Trigger-School

Using the spinner at the top, select the region – “School”. Use the two switches to set whether or not you want this trigger to be for entering/exiting/both. In this example we are only interested in “Exit”ing the School region. Then press the “Set actions” button. This will take you to another page where you can set the Actions that occur when you exit the School region.

Step 5 – Set the Trigger Actions

Trigger-Actions

The top section shows you what actions this Trigger currently has set. For a new Trigger this will be empty. The bottom section shows you the Actions that are available. This should contain all the Actions you set up previously.

To add an Action swipe the appropriate row to the right. An Add button will appear: press it. This Action will then disappear from the bottom section and appear in the top section.

To remove a row from the top section do the same – swipe and press.

Notes

  • If a contact name is Blue, the contact is “Active” – this means they can be sent messages. If they are Red they have been set to inactive meaning they can’t be sent messages. This is done on the Contacts tab.
  • If the Action type is red then it is unavailable. E.g. if you have not setup and activated SMS (Auto) messaging it will be shown as Red.
  • The Tick/Cross on the right side is the In/Active setting for the Action. This is set in the Actions tab.

Set the trigger times

You can also set the days and times you want the Trigger to fire. E.g. you might only want it to happen on weekdays in the afternoons.

Trigger-School-Times

In this example you might want it only to fire Monday-Friday and between: 9am-4pm.

NB If you want a Trigger to fire in more than one time range you can do this with more than one Trigger, each one specifying one time range.

Go back by pressing <Trigger] and then <Triggers].

Thats it. Now when you “Exit” your “School” region, an SMS will automatically be sent to your parents telling her you have just left School.

Example – Remind me when I get to work

In this example we will set up a notification to tell you that you are arriving at your place of work. This is useful for example when you have a long commute to work and may need to be reminded when you arrive.

The procedure is the same as before except:

[Action] Set up a “Notification” action – no contact is needed as this is just a reminder for you.

[Trigger] Choose the newly added “Notification” action created above. Also choose only the “Enter” switch so you are notified when you enter the region.

Settings

To enter Settings go to: More->Settings.

Owner identifier

The main thing to enter here is: “Owner identifier”. This is the title that will be sent with any notification message saying who has entered/exited a region. Normally you would put the iPhne owners name.

Minimum time between region notifications

This is the time that must have passed before the same region will trigger another notification.

It is set at 10s by default as this appears to be good enough to avoid repeat notifications being sent too quickly.

Maximum user notifications

This is the maximum number of notifications waiting for the user to acknowledge.

E.g. if you enter/exit several regions that are not automatic, you will have a queue of notifications waiting for you to decide if you want to send the notification messages. This setting limits the buildu up of that queue.

NB This does not apply to automatic notifications – they will always be sent.

Security

In some cases you may wish to limit access to the app so that only certian people can make changes tothe configuration.

E.g. a parent may wish to set up the app for their child but may not want the child to change to setup.

In this case, you can set an acess PIN.

To do this:

  • Go to: More->Settings
  • Press the “Set” button next to App access
  • If no current code has been set, choose a n access code number and enter it in “New code” and again in “Confirm code”.
  • The code must be 4 numbers in length.
  • If the code is acceptable the screen will go back to the previous page.
  • Check tht you have entered the code correctly by entering it in the top “Current code”.
  • If you have entered the correct code, you will now have the option of pressing the “Lock app” switch to ON.
  • If you press the “Lock app” switch to ON  you will be required to enter the code you chose every time you open the app.

To disable app locking, enter the current code and then switch “Lock app” to OFF.

To change your access code, again enter the current code and then enter and confirm your new code.

Notes

  • You need to set an access code to be able to lock the app.
  • When you first set an access code, you have not yet locked the app. You need to set “Lock app” to ON.
  • If you have set an access code you need to enter it in “Current code” to make any changes to app security.
  • The access code must be 4 numbers.
  • If you have entered the code but the “App access” switch is still not accessible, then you have entered the wrong code.
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