Coming of the Ashes

“There are three things wrong with this English team- they can’t bat, they can’t bowl, they can’t field.” Martin Johnson.

“The aim of English Cricket is, in fact, mainly to beat Australia.” - Jim Laker.

The statements must have indicated you something by now. “The much hyped rivalry between Englishmen and Australians”. And Ashes Tournament comes out to be a live witness.

The Ashes Tournament has its roots deeply embedded in the soil of Cricketing History.

It is a form of test cricket played between England and Australia. There have been several games seen on the field of cricket- some well-contested and some one-sided hopelessly played. You name it dominance or gentleman spirit, nothing stands close to the reputation of Ashes. Such tournaments remain the highlight of the year with respect to their growing popularity and class cricket.

Trapped by our life’s hectic schedules, don’t we often miss out on some of the exciting ventures that we have been planning since long! It could vary from taking out time arranging tickets for Ashes to experiencing the gentleman’s game ‘live’. But today many resources have come up which allows you to stay in touch with your planned ventures wherever you go. Off late, a few good apps got launched on Ashes Test and have said to arrive the stores of ‘much talked about’ platforms- Android and iOS.

‘Go Ashes’ , ‘ECBCricket’ and ‘The Ashes’ are such few apps that carry all the useful information about such an event.

ECB Cricket:

ECB Cricket is a beautifully crafted app, yet full of desired information. This app is meant for the easy accessing of news scores, matches and updates. From the tickets of ongoing Ashes to updates on forthcoming tournaments, from match highlights to choosing a cricket wallpaper, from scoreboard to the fall of wickets, you will get them ALL.

It’s USP is that it comes on four platforms- Apple, Blackberry, Nokia and Android whilst the cost comes out to be absolutely free.

Go Ashes:

Designed for both iPhone and iPad, Go Ashes acts as a perfect companion during your tour to the Tournament. It has a feature by an interesting name “Twickets”. It organizes all your Ashes twitter feeds at one place. Others include live scoring, series overview and history and news feeds w.r.t. both the teams.

Its makers say that “It is a must have for any visitor to Australia! “. Besides (in the app) you get food and drink suggestions to all the Ashes host cities.

The Ashes:

The Ashes is another commendable app on Google Play. It endows users with the latest information on the ongoing tournament. Here, all the content is powered by ‘The Telegraph’. This app has a simplified approach towards reporting on the Ashes and other cricket info.

All all, these apps are more fruitful & perfect to those having minimal time with no-fuss approach. Blessed with video content, live blogs, squad profile, photo galleries; they are match and news focused. Other apps in the line are Yahoo Cricket, Crickbuzz Cricket Scores & News, ICC Cricket and Cricket Companion App. 

 

ED Sports Fanatics..The Making!

MediaAgility, already known for rolling out edutainment apps, has come up with another app for Sports travelers called ‘ExpeDiction Sports Fanatics’. Talking about the number of apps is as easy as it seems, though most of us are not conscious about the efforts and toil that it takes. Producing a single app may take 160 to 180 days of 25 to 30 constant workers. Lets sneak into behind-the-scene actions.

A little background before starting. It was planned to launch the app by the name of ExpeDiction with 13 major volumes covering arenas on History, Culture, Festivals, Art, Sports (of course) including many others. However, while testing for the bugs and errors, the active team of developers and app testers at MediaAgility found it (Expediction) ‘hefty’. They wanted it to be more specific and user-friendly. Thereby, during the testing process, it was discussed to segregate all the 13 volumes into 13 distinct apps.

The sports affiliated volume has been given the name ‘ED Sports Fanatics’ (on both platforms- Android and iOS). This application is framed keeping in mind the thought process of a ‘Sport Enthusiast’ as it takes into account the places loved and preferred by all Sport fans. Plus, there are attributes like importance, timings and special features of the given entities.

When Senior Management was asked about the app’s structure, one of the officials said “ED Sports Fanatics focuses information from Travelers’ perspective.” From Data Collection to Testing, every strenuous task got pulled off smoothly in the end.

According to the team of app testers, features in ED Sports (Journal, Staples, Matchsticks, Potpourri, World Map to name a few) have been drafted to facilitate a hassle-free user experience.

Gradually, more people joined the team of this app. From Developers to Designers to Content Analyst to Creative Writers to App Testers, all worked in unison. “Making the best Sports cum Travel app” was the motto. Following roles were performed by the company’s workforce while working for Sports attractions:

• Firstly, the tasks got pulled off by way of Content Analysts. Tasks like researching, collecting and refining of complex data into user-friendly mode were served in their plate. Summarizing all forms of content before being presented in written form was analysed by Content Analysts. The emphasis remained highly on objective evaluation of data than on being subjective.  The ‘said’ data included detailed information on related sports venues and complexes.

• Up next, was the contribution of Designers endowing users ‘that’ feel towards the visibility of this app. The Designers have worked passionately on the User-interface (UI) and designing of App. Using their hands, heads and hearts; Designers invented new things and gave the app a feel good appeal.

• Developers on the other hand worked on design, testing and maintenance of software programs. These developers created software programs suitable for a wide variety of users, while carrying out detailed investigations into software requirements. Whereas Coding was said to be their supreme forte.

• When an app is ready from developers’ end,  App Testers enter into scene. In relation to the smooth functionality of features and icons, App Testers have to do the Quality Analysis, or QA as they say, of the functionality/ UI.

• Then, there were FAQ’s and descriptions drafted by Creative Writers. These writers, through their creativity brought the exact expression of the usage, benefits, features and description of this app. Self-expression, creative imagination, open-ended thinking and exploration were few good traits of Creative Writers.

Data stays intact and does not loses out even when the app is used offline. Also, the little details of a particular place can be viewed whenever and wherever you want.