Android Code Snippet Simple and Reliable User Feedback/Bug Reporting Method

I used to have a "Send us your Comment" form in my app that sent me the user's comment/bug report by using a simple HTTP post to my website (so I would not have to embed any private email server credentials in the app), which was then converted to an email and sent to me.

But often the user would misspell their email address in the form, so my replies would bounce, and then there would be no way to contact them back.

So, I changed to using a new "Comment" activity and just have an editbox and a "Send" button on it. Then using the below code it will email me the user's comment using the user's own email app.

By using the below "email" intent to launch the user's own email client, you can be assured the "replyto" address will be accurate, and this method doesn't require your app to have Internet Permission. Plus it gives the user confidence that your app is not sending any hidden data/files because the user can clearly see everything that is going to be sent before they actually send the email.

The below code also adds some device info like it's SDK level and make/model that may be helpful in diagnosing any issue the user may be reporting. You could even customize it some more and include the name of the activity the user was on (prior to this "Comment" activity) so you will have some context to better understand what the user is talking about and what they were doing (because as you know users assume we can read their minds :))

Another advantage of this method is that it will first present the user with a blank TextEdit box (txtCommand) so it will be clear to the user of where they should enter their comment. Then, after the user clicks the cmdSend button, thats when we add the extra device info to the end of their comment and then display the email message all ready to be sent. Because if we instead just skipped over the dedicated txtComment box and go directly to invoking the email intent with some pre-filled in device info in the body of the email, the opened email will look half-baked to the user because they then need to figure out where to put their comments in the body of the email (either above or below the pre-filled in device info) and they might even accidently delete some/all of the device info when they attempt to type in their comments. So, by first asking the user to enter their comments into a dedicated edittext box and THEN create the entire email message and have it all ready to be sent without requiring the user to do anything more (other then to "send" the email), it is (at least to me) the best foolproof way of doing this.

B4X:
Sub cmdSend_Click
    Dim in As Intent
    Dim B As String

    MsgboxAsync("Thank you for taking the time to send us your comment!" & CRLF & CRLF & "Your email program will open on the next screen and your comment will be all ready to send to us - Just click 'Send' in your email app","Send Comment")
    Wait For MsgBox_Result (Result As Int)

    B = txtComment.Text & CRLF & "____________________________" & CRLF
    B = B & "App Version: " & GetAppVersion & CRLF
    B = B & "Device Model: " & GetDeviceInfo & CRLF
    B = B & "Device API Level: " & GetDeviceAPILevel

    in.Initialize("android.intent.action.SENDTO", "mailto:")
    in.PutExtra("android.intent.extra.EMAIL", Array As String("[email protected]"))
    in.PutExtra("android.intent.extra.SUBJECT", "User Comment for MyApp")
    in.PutExtra("android.intent.extra.TEXT", B)
    StartActivity(in)

    Activity.Finish
End Sub


B4X:
Sub GetAppVersion As String
    Dim PM As PackageManager
    Try
        Return PM.GetVersionName(GetPackageName)
    Catch
        Return ""
    End Try
End Sub

Sub GetDeviceInfo As String
       Dim P As Phone
       Dim manu As String = p.Manufacturer
       Dim modl As String = p.Model
       Dim prod As String = p.Product
       Return manu & " - " & modl & " - " & prod
End Sub

Sub GetDeviceAPILevel () As Int
    Dim P As Phone
    Return p.SdkVersion
End Sub
 
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