State Quiz App

STATE QUIZ APP

START HERE
In this
This tutorial is an example of using GeoJSON files to tutorial, you will
create a FeatureCollection on a Map.. make an app to
test people’s
geography
knowledge of US
1⎼ Open a new project in App Inventor states!
and name it “StateQuiz”.

2⎼ Add a new Map component

in the Designer. Then drag a b
FeatureCollection
component onto the Map.

a
❏
3 Set the Height and Width for the Map to
“Fill Parent”.

❏
4 Download this GeoJSON file to your
computer, the upload it as Media for your app.

GeoJSON is a format ❏
5 Set the Source for
for encoding a variety FeatureCollection1 to the
of geographic data uploaded
structures. usa-new-england.json file.

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 State Quiz App

SETTING PROPERTIES

6⎻ Update the ZoomLevel for Map1 to 5. You

may have to move the center of the map,
but you should see the outline of the New
England states in green. This is based on
the GeoJSON file. You will also see the six
New England states appear as Features in
the FeatureCollection.

❏
7 Add more UI components to complete the
layout, as shown to the left.

You can
search online for
readymade GeoJSON
files for states or
countries.

2
 State Quiz App

CODING THE APP

❏
8 Switch to the Blocks Editor.

❏
9 Add two new variables, one for states, and
one for capitals. Initialize them to lists for
the six states and their matching capitals.
Make sure they are in the same order!

❏
10 Add two more variables to hold information
for which quiz (states or capitals) and to
make a copy of the appropriate list for the
test. We’ll need a copy as we’re going to
remove items as they are answered
correctly.

❏
11 Let’s make a procedure to setup up the
chosen quiz. Drag out a new procedure
block, and drag two input parameters. b

x2
c

❏
12 Name the procedure “setupQuiz”, with
parameters “which” and “startPrompt”.

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 State Quiz App

SETUP THE QUIZ

❏
13 Set the StartOfPromptLabel to the input
parameter startOfPrompt.

❏
14 Set the global variable whichTest to the
input parameter which.

❏
15 Let’s set the testList, based on which quiz
we’re presenting. We will make a copy of
the appropriate list.
b

❏
16 Copy the appropriate list, states or
capitals, based on the which input.
c
Use an if-then-else block to
append the appropriate list.

e We make
a copy of the list to
preserve the original list.
If we set one list to the
f
other, any changes to
one would affect the
other.

4
 State Quiz App

CHANGE THE BACKGROUND COLOR OF STATES

Let’s reset the colors of each state to the dark green

(or choose your own favorite color). As users get
correct answers, we’ll change the background to a
different color.

❏
17 Drag out a for each item in list
block and add it to the procedure.

❏
18 The list will be
FeatureCollection1.Features
which is a list of features (states).

❏
19 Use the Any Component drawer
to use the Any Polygon component d
(each state is a polygon).

c
a

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 State Quiz App

CALL SETUPQUIZ

❏
20 Drag out a StateQuizButton.Click block and
add the call setupQuiz block to the event
block.

❏
21 which is “states” and startOfPrompt is
“Click on the state of “.

❏
22 Duplicate the entire block, and change
“StateQuizButton” to “CapitalQuizButton”.

❏
23 Change which and startOfPrompt.

❏
24 Let’s make another procedure, called
pickNext to randomly pick a state/capital from
the testList.

❏
25 Add call pickNext to both the quiz button click
events.
‘

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 State Quiz App

CLICKING ON A STATE

The last thing we need to do is to handle when the user clicks on one of the
states, to answer the quiz question.

❏
26 Drag out a FeatureCollection1.FeatureClick
block.

❏
27 Add a local variable, called answer, and if the user
a
is doing the state quiz, set it to the state name, which is
the Feature (Polygon) title.

b c

d
❏
28 If the user is doing the
capital quiz, get the index of the state from the states list,
then use that to index into capitals to get the matching capital.
‘
a c

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 State Quiz App

TESTING FOR CORRECT ANSWER

Now test what the user clicks on matches the state or capital.

b
❏
29 Drag out an if-then-else block.
Check if the answer matches
PromptLabel, and set the Notifier
message appropriately. c
a

❏
30 If the user is correct, we also want to remove b
the item from testList. Use PromptLabel a
to find the correct index in testList. d

c
e
❏
31 And then, optionally, signal a correctly
answered state by setting the color of
the polygon to a different color.

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 State Quiz App

CHECK FOR EMPTY LIST

❏
32 Last thing is another if-then-else to check if the testList is empty, which
means the quiz is over. If the list is not empty, pick another state for the next
question. Otherwise, let the user know the quiz is over.
‘