Setting Up

Documenting the process of redesigning the Cruncher app.

Cruncher 1.0. Designed to scratch an itch

I created Cruncher to solve a problem for myself, which was to make some sense of my GTB statement. You see, at the end of the year I always wanted to know how much I’d earned and spent and how I had managed the money, but never could really make any use of my GTBank app. So I designed an app to solve that itch, and months later learned a little Ruby to make the back-end.

Couple of weeks back I stopped freelancing to catch my breath, free up time and enjoy being broke. It’s been really good so far, and I’m not sure I’m taking up any extra jobs soon. But then it’s boring, so I decided to take up a massive redesign of Cruncher.

Here’s how it’ll run

1. I have a good load of advice from people and from users of the old application to improve the new one.
2. I’ve created a 10–12 week plan to redesign the app. (Which includes learning to write tests in Ruby and releasing an open-source bank parser with Devcenter).
3. Now I have help in form of Timi, my flat mate. (We co-own Helloworld)
4. After every milestone, I wish to document my design process, thoughts, expenses and stuff learnt.

For now, I’ve

• Made up an interim logo
• Set up a to-do plan on Flow
• Invoiced a domain name
• Setup a repo for the Open source parser
• Refreshed on my little rails knowledge
• Started learning unit testing
• Setup the publication and written the first blog post

Wish me luck!