The UKTW App

Here at UK Theatre Web we have developed an Android Application for UK theatre and concert details. The system is powered by the main UKTW database which drives this website. The main features of the system are

Local database

The system keeps an internal database of listings which you can update regularly, this allows it to do very fast what's on searches and provide simple information even when off-line.

Search

Search for any show in the listings or for any performer, author, cast or crew member (on-line only)

News

Application update news, UKTW News feed (stories and reviews) and SeatChoice blog all available to read on-line.

Show Pages

Each show listings page provides (where known/available);

• Show
  • Information including synopsis, address, star rating, poster
  • Company cast and crew details
  • Reviews UKTW and user reviews plus add your own star rating and review
• Venue
  • Basic details
  • Map
  • Shows all current listings for this venue
  • Info any additional venue information
  • Archive what shows have been here in the past!
• Dates
  • Current dates and times for this show
  • Tour any other venues/dates where this production is appearing
  • Specials any known audio described or signed performances
• Tickets one or more of; button to call the UKTW Ticket Shop, list of STAR suppliers plus links to their websites, details of venue box office and website

Archive

Search the huge archive on UKTW ... this area is still undergoing development and imdb we're not but you will eventually be able to access all of our extensive archive, over 1.2 million records, on-line.

Poster Recognition

As of Version 1.5 we have added an experimental poster recognition capability ... use your phone's camera to take a photo of a theatre poster in the tube, on the street or in a magazine and we will try to identify it and provide direct links to our show page (see above) and the ability to call our Ticket Shop (powered by Encore Tickets) directly!

Experimental Poster Recognition

Step 1 On the application homepage click on Experimental Poster Recognition to get to this page ... you can then click on Photograph the Poster to start up the phone's internal camera. Take a photo of the poster - try to make the poster big and central in the image but we can cope with quite poor pictures. No need for a high resolution image, they just take longer to upload! 640x480 is fine, slightly bigger is better!
Step 2 Once you have saved the image in your phone's camera it will appear on our page, as shown right. You can then click the Identify the Show button to ask the system if it recognises it. The photo will be uploaded to our servers (hence the delay!) and we will automagically perform the poster recognition.
Step 3 If we recognise the poster you will get The show and venue name A button to click through to our standard UKTW App show page (details above) A button to click that will call the UKTW Ticket Shop If we don't recognise the poster we will say so .. there could be several reasons why we can't recognise it but the most likely one is that its not one of the posters we are currently looking for (listed at the top of this page) ... the system is still in beta, if it works out we'll add loads more .... ;-) The poster recognition system makes use of the Moodstocks search facility.

Recognised Posters

The experimental poster recognition system is currently set up to recognise any of these poster images;

Getting the App

Check out the Android Marketplace UKTW Application page.

The UKTW app is available via the Android Marketplace on your Android powered phone or tablet, search for 'UKTW' and install it today, its free!.

The app is regularly updated with fixes and new features.

Updating the App

Once installed, you can update the internal database at any time by clicking Update/News/Blog on the homepage then, under App News selecting the Update button. It is advisable to do this only when you have a good connection as it will download all listings and venues updates since you last checked in.

If you update the application via the Android Marketplace, your local database will be updated to that version.

Screenshots

Latest News

2012-02-16:

Master app updated. Download new version to save updating database live.

2012-01-31:

Version 1.7: Just a database tidy up edition, no urgency to upgrade unless you haven't updated your database recently. App got some Press mentions today.

2012-01-16:

Archive now greatly improved allowing search and drill down to outline production and performance details.

2012-01-16:

Version 1.6: New database uploaded - if you have not updated for a while then getting an update of the application will be faster than trying to update the database. New posters recognised.

2011-12-01:

Version 1.5 released; includes experimental West End poster recognition ... photograph a show poster and let the system try to identify it ... top 25 shows only at present but we can extend it if its popular

2011-11-17:

Version 1.4 released; layout fixed, play search fixed. Android Market will update shortly.

2011-11-17:

Show search appears to be broken in the latest version and will be fixed later today

2011-11-09:

New version 1.3 released which fixes known database issues and improves performance and usability - please update to this version

2011-11-09:

The framework we've used to build this app seems to be having issues deleting old shows ... working on it ... it also seems to randomise the date order for venue listings ... working on that too. Hope to improve the archive search soon

2011-10-14:

New version 1.2 released, more stable database updating