Family Groceries is an app I originally designed to use for my own needs. Several people I know suggested I formalize it and publish it in the app store. After much thinking and code refactoring I decided is was feasible to do it. When designing this app I wanted the following features.

• Three States for Items in the List
• Per Store Price and Aisle Information
• Selection Between iCloud Storage or on Phone File (iCloud required if using the iPad app as well)
• Both Quantity and Units for Items
• Status Bar With Counts and Price Totals for a Store
• UI Looks Good in Light or Dark Mode
• Managing the List Page Features:
• Search on Manage List Page
• Filter on Manage List Page (Favorites and in Need List)
• Change Long Press Action Between Toggling Favorite Status or Item Editing
• Brief in App Help Page
• Backup and Restore List Data Feature
• Clear All List Data
• Notes per Item
• Duplicate an Item
• Go Shopping List Page Features:
• View Crossed-Off Items
• Inline Store Aisle/Price Editing
• Complete Shopping Menu Item
• Specific Store or All Stores selection
• Sort by Category
• Sort by Store Aisle
• Sort Alphabetically
• Collapsible Category and Aisle Sections
• iPad Optimized Editing Version (No Shopping Page)

This was job #1. In the programs I have tried from the app store most have only 2 states for an item or an undo stack. The item is in the list to get or its not. When you accidently check or cross-off and item it moves directly into the unneeded pool. This makes it hard to recover and items get missed at the store.

With 3 states like in Family Groceries, if you accidently check off an item you can view it and put it back on your list reguardless of when it happened. This is much better than using "undo" features which may require undo-ing items you wanted checked off to get back the one that was accidental.

This feature lets the user update prices and location for each item in multple stores. This is how I personally save time at the store and have an idea before checkout what I am spending. Hint: You can use store's websites to fill in prices before going shopping. The shopping page also allows editing this specific information while at the store.

This was also a must! I used other apps that attempted to use one view for all list features. I found them confusing and much more difficult to use. When at the store I want to focus only on shopping.

This was mostly an after thought but for those with an iPad the App behaves as a list editor only. The design used the iPad's extra screen for a decent list manager. There is no shopping mode right now for iPad.