Designing the attendee app

Every event has an attendee app that guests open on their phone. The Event app page is where you share it, change how it looks and post alerts. It has three tabs, Overview, Appearance and Alerts, and it is marked beta. Attendees see their own travel and hotel in the app, and you can read what they see in The attendee app.

Everyone in the organisation that owns the event can change the app and post alerts. People the event is only shared with see the page with a View only. note and can look but not change.

Check that the app is on#

The line under the page title says what the app is and when it closes. The status next to the title shows one of these.

• Live means attendees can sign in now.
• Off means your plan does not include the app for this event. Under Share with attendees, press Switch on the attendee app. The page shows how many HAPR credits it uses, and the app then stays open until 90 days after the event ends. See Quotas and credits.
• Read-only means the event is read-only on your plan, so the app is offline. Use Keep this event live on the Event overview to reopen it.
• Closed means the 90 days after the event have passed. Attendees can no longer sign in, and no new alerts can be posted. Your past alerts stay on the Alerts tab.
• Status unavailable means HAPR could not read the state just now. Refresh the page.

Share the app#

There is no publish step. Registered attendees can use the app as soon as it is live.

1. 1
   Open your event and choose Event app.
2. 2
   On the Overview tab, under Share with attendees, press Copy link next to App link, and send it to attendees.
3. 3
   To share it on a poster or slide, press Download PNG under Scan to open the app.
4. 4
   To hand out a printed sheet, press Print card. Press Install guide for the page that shows attendees how to add the app to their home screen.

app.thehapr.com/hub/…/mobile-app

1. 1Open the app as attendees see it.
2. 2Copy the app link.
3. 3Make a short event code.
4. 4Download the QR code as a picture.
5. 5Print the get-the-app card.

Attendees open the link, type the email on their attendee record and sign in. See The attendee app for the steps they follow. The code goes only to that address, so an attendee cannot sign in with a different one. Attendees have no HAPR account and cannot open the hub.

Give attendees a short code#

The Short event code is for attendees who cannot tap a link. They type it at the join address shown under it. It only leads to the sign-in, and they still need their registered email.

1. 1
   Under Short event code, press Make a code. If there is already a code, the button reads Make a new code.
2. 2
   Give the code to attendees. It shows in groups, as on screen.

A new code stops the old one working at once.

Preview the app#

Press Open the app at the top right. A phone frame opens with the real app, as attendees see it. It shows the saved settings, so save your changes first. Press Open in a new tab to try it full size. Check it on a real phone before the event opens, not only in the preview.

Change the look#

1. 1
   Choose the Appearance tab. A live preview of the home screen sits beside the form and changes as you type.
2. 2
   Under Colours, set Accent for buttons, the active tab and highlights, Background for the page behind everything, and Top bar for the bar at the very top. For each one, pick a suggested colour, use the colour picker or type a hex code. A light background keeps text easy to read. The top bar text turns light or dark by itself.
3. 3
   Under Name and logo, type an App name of up to 30 characters. It shows in the top bar when there is no logo.
4. 4
   Upload a Logo. PNG or SVG works best. Move Logo size between 50% and 200%.
5. 5
   Under Home screen, write a Welcome message of up to 240 characters. It shows as a greeting under the attendee's name.
6. 6
   Upload a Cover image, the banner across the top of the home screen. Use about 1200 × 675 px, as a JPG or PNG under 1 MB.
7. 7
   Under How the cover fits, choose Crop to fill, Fit whole or Stretch. With Fit whole, set the colour that shows behind the picture.
8. 8
   Press Save changes. The bar then reads Saved, and All changes saved after that.

app.thehapr.com/hub/…/mobile-app/appearance

1. 1Open the app as attendees see it.
2. 2Colours for the accent, background and top bar.
3. 3The app name and logo.
4. 4The welcome message and cover image.
5. 5How the cover fits the banner.
6. 6Save your changes.

Press Discard to put back what was last saved. Press Reset next to a colour to return it to the default.

If your organisation has set app defaults, the page says so. Each field you leave blank follows the default, and a change to one field changes only that field for this event. A logo or cover from your defaults shows as "Using the logo from your defaults" or "Using the cover from your defaults" until you upload one.

If you try to leave with unsaved changes, Leave without saving? asks you to choose Stay or Leave and discard.

Post an alert#

Alerts are short messages that show on the Alerts tab of the attendee app, for changes on the day such as a new shuttle time, a room change or a reminder.

1. 1
   Choose the Alerts tab.
2. 2
   Under New alert, type a Title of up to 80 characters, for example "Shuttle times changed".
3. 3
   Type the Message, up to 500 characters, in plain text. Say what changed and what attendees should do.
4. 4
   Leave Also notify phones on to send a phone notification too, or turn it off to show the alert in the app only. Under it, the page shows how many phones have turned alerts on for this event.
5. 5
   Check the Preview, which shows the notification and the alert row in your app's colours.
6. 6
   Press Post alert.

app.thehapr.com/hub/…/mobile-app/alerts

1. 1The form for a new alert.
2. 2The alert title.
3. 3The message attendees will read.
4. 4Post the alert.
5. 5The history of alerts you have posted.

On a phone, press New alert to open the same form. After posting, a message tells you how many phones are being notified. Pressing Post alert twice by mistake posts one alert.

An attendee gets phone notifications only after they turn alerts on in the app. The number under Also notify phones is the count who have.

Follow and manage alerts#

The History list shows each alert with who posted it, when, and how many attendees have read it. Use Live, Removed or All to filter it, and Search titles to find one. The status on each alert is one of these.

• In the app only means no phone notification was asked for.
• Sending means phones are being notified.
• Sent to a number of phones means the notification went out.
• A number missed means some phones did not get it.
• No phones had alerts on means nobody had turned alerts on.
• Removed means it has left the app.

Use the options on each alert.

• Press Notify phones on an alert posted without a notification.
• Press Retry missed to try only the phones that missed it.
• Press the three dots, then View history to see each step, who did it and when, including what an edited alert said before.
• Press the three dots, then Edit to change the title or message. Press Save. A notification already on a phone cannot be changed, but the app shows the new words, and the old ones stay in the history.
• Press the three dots, then Remove from the app and confirm with Remove. The alert leaves the app at once. Notifications already on phones cannot be recalled. It stays in the Removed list with the name of who removed it.

The Overview tab shows Phones with alerts on, Alerts posted and the latest alert, with Post an alert to jump to the Alerts tab. The Alerts tab shows a count when notifications are still sending or need a retry.

What comes from elsewhere#

• The gallery shows the photos from the Gallery section of your published Event website, up to 40, with their captions. It stays empty until the website is published and that section is on. The preview shows the Gallery tab only when there are photos.
• Travel, hotel and registration details come from each attendee's own record. See Attendee manager.

Good to know#

• The app closes 90 days after the event ends.
• You can post up to 60 alerts an hour for one event, and send phone notifications up to 12 times an hour. If a notification is held back, the alert is still posted and shows in the app.
• Alerts reach the attendees of this event only.
• A person with view-only access does not see Open the app, the forms or the save bar.

If something looks wrong#

• Only the event owner and HAPR staff can change the event app. You can see the page but not change it. Ask the event owner.
• Could not switch the attendee app on. Try again. If it keeps failing, contact support. If your credits are short, the page shows the price and a link to top up.
• Could not make a new code. Press Make a new code again.
• Give the alert a title. Type a title before you post.
• Write the alert message. Type a message before you post.
• The title can be at most 80 characters. Shorten the title.
• The message can be at most 500 characters. Shorten the message.
• This event app has closed, so it takes no new alerts. The 90 days have passed. Nothing more can be posted, edited or removed.
• Too many alerts were posted for this event just now. Please wait a little. Wait, then post again.
• Too many notifications were sent for this event in the last hour. Try again later. The alert is posted. Press Notify phones later.
• Phone notifications are not set up on this server yet. The alert can be posted in the app only.
• That alert no longer exists. Someone removed it. Refresh the list.
• The alerts could not be loaded just now. Press Try again.
• The latest alert could not be loaded just now. Refresh the page.