Definitively it has been a fantastic week for us. Our app Madrid Bus got 5000 downloads on Google Play and we just uploaded a new release v0.99.6 Beta.
From past August we received very good feedback from our users (almost 4,5 rating) but most of them repeated the same comment: "If it had real time connection it would be perfect". We love to hear our users and thanks to EMT Madrid (Open Data) we have had the chance to include Real time connection on this new version.
Madrid Bus users are telling us all the time they love the app basically because it's extremely easy to use, so we had the challenge to include the new feature (real time) without impact in the usability. At the same time we want to keep the offline navigation (provide lines, stops, estimated time arrival...) so we decided to do it transparent for our users. So, it works very easy, when the user go to the required Stop screen if the device is connected to Internet it provides real time data, in case it's not connected to Internet in that moment the app provides estimated time data (calculation based on official timetable). It's very easy to know whether you are receiving real time data or not. When the app is connected to Internet in every places where it provides real time info you can see the text "Powered by EMT" and the EMT logo.
In the screenshots below you can see a couple of examples:

We have fixed some minor issues too, one of them was requested in a comment by one of our users in Google Play, It consisted of when you closed the app it continued using the GPS and therefore wasting battery.
We hope you enjoy and recommend our Android app Madrid Bus and as always please don't hesitate to contact our team for new suggestions.
If you want more details about Madrid Bus you can find more details here.

El pasado 13 de Agosto publicamos en Google Play Madrid Bus (aplicación no oficial de transporte para la Comunidad de Madrid).
El día 14 se envió por parte de Quoders un comunicado de prensa a los principales medios de Madrid indicando la salida al Market de manera gratuita de la aplicación y contando como suele ser habitual en estos casos las prestaciones de la misma. 
Como se ve en la imagen, el día 15 ABC se hace eco de la noticia y, por desgracia por un error de interpretación vinculan el desarrollo de la aplicación a la EMT.

La nota de prensa hacía mención al carácter no oficial de la aplicación en la siguiente frase: "Existen muchas aplicaciones en el mercado de transporte público pero MadridBus no es una aplicación más con los horarios de los autobuses de la EMT de Madrid (aplicación no oficial). MadridBus va más allá. "

El día 16 por la mañana es cuando en Quoders somos conscientes de que se ha publicado la noticia con la errata. Por eso, en ese mismo instante (a las 9:39 a.m.), se envía un desmentido al ABC indicandoles que no es una aplicación oficial tal y como se indicaba en la Nota de prensa.

Cual sería nuestra sorpresa cuando a las 13:01 del día 16 en lugar de modificar sencillamente la noticia o indicar que hubo un error de interpretación, ABC indica que la EMT se desmarca de la aplicación gratuita para Android y además indica "La Empresa Municipal de Transportes (EMT) se ha desmarcado de esta iniciativa y asegura que dicha información se ha publicado sin su consentimiento. "
No sabemos a qué información se refieren, si quieren dar a entender que Quoders ha utilizado el nombre de la EMT es totalmente falso y si así se lo han transmitido a la EMT entendemos que lo desmintieran.

Obviamente desde Quoders no podemos aceptar lo que se dá a entender con el titular ya que el daño que puede hacer en nuestra credibilidad puede tener un impacto muy grande.

This is a new transport app for Android devices that provides info about the lines, stops and timetable of buses in Madrid (EMT). It's a FREE APP.

Why is this app different or better from the dozens of apps in the market?

• It's extremely easy to use. You don't need to know what line you need, where is the stop, NOTHING. You simply say where you want to go and the app will calculate the closest bus stop and the line you need to take. That's all.
  
• It's in 5 languages (English, French, German, Portuguese and Spanish). We want tourists, foreigns, Erasmus ;-) to use the app too.

On Nov 29, 2011 Quoders started a fantastic adventure with BilbaoBus. It was a different product (after Archer Master), a different market, so we hadn't any idea what would happen. In less than one year we have something in the market very close to the app that we dreamed, probably better, thanks to the advice and support of our users.
A few months ago we noticed that we were spending too much time for one app in order to get the quality that we wanted and it was bad for the business ;-).

And here is the elephant in the room, if you have a look to BilbaoBus and MadridBus you will see they are very similar, in fact, they have the same core app. But both of them have a very important difference in the backend. We use General Transit Feed Specification (GTFS) as source data for MadridBus. GTFS is an standard format proposed and supported by Google and it's being used right now for almost 500 cities in the world. It means that once we complete the beta for MadridBus and the users gave us their approve we are in a position to raise hundreds of transport apps in the world. But this is material for other Post in the future :-).

If you already know BilbaoBus then you are ready to use MadridBus. In other case you can find more details about MadridBus on this page.