Category: MIT-GROUP (page 1 of 3)

Goodbye, Picturex

It is with a deep regret that we announce that we will shutdown our beloved service, Picturex. We started Picturex almost five years ago, with a small team of passionate and experienced engineers and IT-professionals at MIT Cloud Innovation AG. Over the years, we have tried to follow our vision of making photo sharing private, secure and easy.

It has been a fantastic journey for us, we have learnt a lot, and we want to THANK YOU, our valued users, supporters, testers and partners, for giving us the opportunity to serve you! 😍

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Goodbye, TouchMountain.

Hello everyone,

it’s with a heavy heart that we share with you the news that TouchMountain will be shutting down on December 31th, 2018.

The past seven years have been an incredible journey for all of us. What started as a university industry project at MIT Cloud Innovation AG shortly after Windows Phone 7.5 launched, quickly grew into an award-winning app, with love and support from almost 70′000 users. Our database stored almost 900′000 different mountains, overall almost 100′000 peaks have been recognized, and the top peaks (Mount Everest, Matterhorn, Rigi, Pilatus) were each recognized thousands of times. We want to say a big THANK YOU to all our users, supporters, testers and sponsors/partners 😍

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Why we Dislike Meetings, and Why Agendas make them Better

One topic that many software developers in our productivity studies are very vocal about are meetings. For example, in an online survey with 379 developers, 58% described meetings as a waste of time – one of the main reasons for feeling unproductive. In this blogpost, I explore reasons why meetings are so unpopular, especially for developers, and discuss why I think meeting agendas could make your meetings more efficient and successful!

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Picturex: Collect the best Snapshots from your visit at Tierpark Goldau

I am thrilled to announce the first publicly available version of Picturex for Business. Tierpark Goldau, a Swiss landscape and animal park, offers its visitors a unique way to share and exchange the best snapshots they took during their visit at the Tierpark. Also, users of the Tierpark Momente-App can create private photo albums to share their photos in private within their family.

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How wedding planners can increase sales, save time and make weddings more memorable with Picturex!

Are you a wedding planner (or organizing your friends’ wedding) and are you looking for a way to collect the best photos from the big day without breaking a sweat? – Search no more!

Picturex makes it incredibly easy to collect all photos, the guests and even the professional photographer take at the wedding in a single, shared space! With Picturex, the best wedding memories are easily shared with newly-weds and guests and even printed – no complex organization or set-up required!

Learn here how you can use Picturex for your wedding company and how you can gain a unique marketing opportunity and help the newly-weds get the best memories of their big day!

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Erhöhen Sie Ihre Verkäufe, das User Engagement und die Kundenzufriedenheit mit Picturex für Business

Unsere Picturex-App, die bisher für Private den einfachen und sicheren Foto-Tausch von Fotos während einem Event mit allen Gästen ermöglicht, wurde kürzlich um ein weiteres Angebot erweitert: Mit Picturex für Business können Firmen ganz leicht das User Engagement, die Kundenzufriedenheit und Verkäufe steigern. Einzelne Funktionen können gemäss Ihren Wünschen aktiviert werden, die Apps (Web und mobile Apps) können mit Ihrem Corporate design umgesetzt werden und in die bestehende (oder eine neue) Infrastruktur integriert werden. Alle Informationen zum Angebot sehen Sie hier.

Haben Sie Fragen? Wir beraten Sie gerne!

Neu: Picturex für das Web

Es freut uns, Picturex für das Web (Feature-Request #1) anzukündigen. Mit dem Web Client können Sie folgendes tun:

  • Auf alle Foto-Alben zugreifen und einem bestehenden Foto-Album beitreten
  • Fotos in höchster Qualität auf den Computer herunterladen
  • Fotos vom Computer in ein Album hochladen, ideal für die DSLR Fotos!
  • Eine Live-Slideshow aller Fotos eines Albums auf einem Bildschirm oder TV anzeigen, ideal für Parties!

Picturex läuft in allen modernen Browsern! Hier können Sie Picturex für das Web besuchen!

2016-02-24 Picturex_Web_Client

Picturex gewinnt einen internationalen Award

Es freut mich sehr, verkünden zu dürfen, dass Picturex vor kurzem einen ersten internationalen Award gewonnen hat. Und zwar ist es der Silicon Beach App Award in der Kategorie Photo.

PX_BestPhotoApp_SBAA

Developer Stories: Interview mit André Meyer von der MIT Innovation AG

Vor kurzem wurden wir von WindowsArea.de, einer der grössten deutschsprachigen Windows-News-Site, angefragt, ob wir Interesse an einem Interview hätten. André Meyer hat sich sehr gerne dem Interview gestellt und Fragen zu unseren Apps (Picturex, TouchMountain & Co) und der neuen mobilen Strategie mit Microsoft (Stichwort: One Microsoft) beantwortet.

> Hier können Sie das spannende Interview nachlesen.

AppDeal: Get TouchMountain for free today!

As part of a promotion with MyAppFree, we are offering the full version of TouchMountain for free (instead of 2.99$) today (8th September).

> Download TouchMountain here.

 

By the way: Right now, we are working on a completely new Live View (Augmented Reality). It will still take 1-2 months until it’s ready; this is why we are offering the current version for free. Everyone who downloads TouchMountain today will of course also get the update for free when it’s ready.

> Do you want to get the update earlier? Register as a Beta-Tester here.

 

SlowTV: Den Alltag etwas Entschleunigen mit der MIT Innovation AG

Ein schräger Vogel

Sein Kopf ist fast kahl, bloss ein paar Federn stehen als wirrer Busch vom Haupt ab. Er sieht aus wie ein Wesen aus einer anderen Zeit. Das ist er auch. Vor 350 Jahren starb der Waldrapp bei uns aus. Wollen Sie sehen, wie der Vogel im Tierpark Goldau brütet und seine Küken aufzieht? Dann starten Sie hier die Echtzeitübertragung.

Sie können die Waldrappen auch live von Ihrem Mobiltelefon mit dem obenstehenden Link betrachten. Für Windows Phone und Windows 8.1 haben wir zudem Apps veröffentlicht.

Eine Kooperation von Tierpark Goldau, der Schweizer Familie und der MIT Innovation AG.

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Getting started with the new OneDrive API

Recently, I got the chance to play around a little with the new OneDrive API (REST). Boy is it cool, but only after an inital phase of crawling through the web resources filled with old tutorials and code snippets of old API parts… The documentation really isn’t as good as I hoped and I had some troubles finding the right starting point. That’s why I wanted to quickly summarize my first steps here:

 

What was my task?

For a small medical health app (running on Windows Phone 8.1) I am currently working on, we needed a way to easily export all the stored information to OneDrive (as a backup and to run certain kinds of analyses on the way more powerful MS Excel, compared to the rudimentary Excel on the phone). Further, we wanted to have the opportunity to import the exported files (in XML format) to the app, in case some data is lost (due to a corrupt update of the app). So, a single file-export and a file-import is all we needed.

 

Where to start?

I needed almost an hour until I knew where to start. Most resources Google showed me were concerning old OneDrive projects, and had little to do with the new shiny API. And the official documentation lacked many details. Finally, I found out what to do. Here is how:

 

  1. You need to register your app in the Windows Store.
  2. Get the SDK from Nuget (just search for “Live SDK” and install)
  3. Associate your App with the store (registered under 1.). In Visual Studio, right click on Project > Store > Associate App with the Store and select a unique Name.
  4. Add the Capability to the project (in the project manifest) to access the internet.
  5. Here you find out how you can authenticate with the OneDrive API. What I really appreciate is the Single Sign-On feature that you get with Windows Runtime apps. This basically means that you don’t need to worry anymore about any log-in forms, persisting the log-in or something similar. The Windows device handles this itself. At the first start, it asks for permission (depending on the requests you ask permission for (login, read, write, etc.)
  6. Now you are good to go:
  • This site in the official documentation is useful to learn more about uploading or downloading files.
  • For the download/import, I first also wrote a downloading function and realized that I need to give the user the opportunity to select the exact file before the download. After a quick websearch I found out that I don’t need to create my own FilePicker, but that Windows Runtime apps have a FileOpenPicker (hmm, why have I missed this?). This will also show the OneDrive app (if installed) and then download the app. Very simple and clean. This StackOverflow post shows an example of how the FileOpenPicker works.
  • For Android, there also exists a File Sharer and Picker
  • Here you find many other (tiny) examples and excerpts of how you could use the API (with Windows Runtime apps)

 

I hope I can save you some time with the hints. If you have any questions, please let me know.
PS: Did you know, that Microsoft relies on exactly this OneDrive API for their own apps and services? Cool!

 

Additional Resources:

Picturex at the AppCup 2015 in Brussels

Last week was a busy week: Just a few days, after we released a big update for Picturex (see the next blogpost), we traveled to Brussels to pitch our app in front of a Jury at the AppCup 2015. The AppCup was hosted by Microsoft as a part of the IAMCP Summit 2015. Prior to the pitch, we received some extensive Pitch training by Lars Sudmann, a presentation and pitching specialist. The pitch went great and we got incredible feedback: Most were interested in our unique technology of having a secure and private data exchange, but still having a service that is easier than any other service. We hope, we can use the feedback to add some new and useful features and start some partnerships. In the end, we didn’t win the AppCup, but are very happy to have received the nomination as one of the top three (out of 100) business-to-consumer (B2C) apps in the mobile apps world.

2015-03-20 AppCup Brussels 88 by Picturex (1073078)

Picturex is nominated for the European AppCup 2015 Award in Brussels

2015-finalist-b2c-general

 

 

 

A few weeks ago, we got the good news to be nominated for the European AppCup 2015 Award in the category B2C with Picturex. Next week, we will pitch Picturex in front of a jury in Brussels.

If you want, you can follow us and our experiences in Brussels with this shared photo album (PicEx) (just install the free Picturex app, click on the link again and you’re good to go; works with Windows Phone, Android and iPhone).

Picturex

What is Picturex?

Have you ever waited days or weeks for others’ pictures after a party, company event or city trip? Picturex is the solution! Picturex is the easiest way to exchange pictures with friends, family and aquaintances. Create a new album with just a few clicks, invite others into the album and upload a ton of pictures. Every invited person can also up- or download pictures. So, you can keep your best pictures and memories and easily enjoy them at any time.


Features

  • create and share new albums for free
  • very easy manual picture up- and download
  • automatically detect and suggest pictures to upload
  • very easy management of your albums
  • early-adopter bonus: benefit from very competitive features
  • and a lot more!

You can still use your favourite camera or filter app and upload these pictures! We also plan to release an iOS, Android and web version of Picturex soon!
We love feedback and suggestions to improve Picturex! Please contact us via info@picturex.ch. You may find more information  on www.picturex.ch.

Download

Free Download for iPhone, Android and Windows Phone!

 

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Screenshots