Bytes, Bread & Barbecue · From Browser to Phone
The Poolish Calculator App Is Almost Here
What started as a little bread calculator on this website has somehow wandered into Android Studio. Apparently the dough wasn't the only thing that was going to rise.
A while back, I built a Poolish Calculator for Bytes, Bread & Barbecue. The idea was simple: take a familiar same-day bread recipe and do the annoying poolish math for you.
Then something happened that I honestly didn't expect: people found it. The calculator became one of the most visited pages on the site, and even better, people came back to use it again. A calculator that gets repeat visitors is basically the bread-nerd equivalent of applause.
Then My Son Had to Say Something
One day I was talking with my son, who happens to be a software engineer, and he made an innocent little comment:
“I bet people would like having the app on their phone where they could keep coming back and reuse it.”— The sentence that created a new project
Well, that was all it took. Suddenly I wasn't just maintaining a bread website. I was learning how to build a phone app.
The original calculator was my JavaScript code and my concept, but turning it into a real Android application meant learning a completely new set of tools. I used Capacitor to bring the web app to Android, Android Studio to build and test it, and yes, my “friend” ChatGPT became the patient teacher sitting beside me while I figured out what all those new buttons did.
I'm not embarrassed by that in the least. I wanted to learn how it worked rather than simply hand the project to somebody else. There were a few moments when Android Studio and I had differing opinions about who was in charge. Android Studio was wrong, of course.
From Calculator to Actual App
The phone version isn't just the web page squeezed onto a smaller screen. Feedback from my early testers led to a cleaner layout, easier-to-read results, better error checking, and a workflow designed for a phone sitting on the counter while you're making bread.
Those screenshots are the current app running on a Samsung Galaxy A16. The goal has stayed the same from the beginning: take the math out of poolish so you can concentrate on the bread.
Where It Stands Now
🧪 Closed Testing Is Underway
The BBB Poolish Calculator has now reached closed testing on Google Play. Version 1.3 incorporates feedback from the earlier test builds, and real testers are beginning to install it on their own Android phones. That's a very different feeling from watching it run in an emulator on my computer.
There are still a few miles to go before I can push the big red “Everybody can have it now” button — which, disappointingly, is not what Google actually calls it. But we're getting close.
When the testing requirement is complete and I'm satisfied that the app behaves itself in the wild, the plan is to release the BBB Poolish Calculator on Google Play.
Want to Try It Right Now?
You don't have to wait for the Android app to make poolish. The original web version is still free and available right here on Bytes, Bread & Barbecue. It works on a phone, tablet, or computer and uses the same basic idea that started this entire adventure.
Stay tuned. The bread is fermenting, the app is testing, and sooner or later Google is going to let me take this thing out of the oven. 🔥🍞📱