Potty Timer is officially live on Google Play.
This is a pretty big milestone for Cedar Harbor Studios because it is the first app I've taken all the way from an idea, through development and testing, and into a real public release.
The idea behind Potty Timer was simple: potty training is difficult enough without having to constantly remember when the next trip to the bathroom should happen.
For me, consistency was one of the hardest parts. It was easy to get distracted, lose track of time, or realize too late that we had gone much longer than planned between attempts.
That became the problem I wanted the app to solve.
Small Reminders, Real Progress
Potty Timer started as a straightforward repeating timer, but it gradually grew into something much more useful.
The app now includes:
- Custom potty reminder intervals
- Tracking for pee, poop, both, and attempts
- Child-initiated potty tracking
- Progress history and calendar views
- Milestones and consecutive-win tracking
- A potty training roadmap
- Custom alarm sounds
- An optional one-time purchase to remove ads
The reminders were the part that made the biggest difference for me.
They helped turn something I was constantly trying to remember into a routine. That routine created consistency, and the consistency started creating actual progress.
When you're potty training a child, even small wins feel pretty significant.
Getting to Google Play
Building the app was only part of the process.
Getting it onto Google Play meant going through internal testing, closed testing, tester requirements, app signing, release bundles, billing setup, store listings, policy declarations, production-access approval, and more than a few rounds of "why does Google need another form?"
Along the way, the app received a first-run walkthrough, improved navigation, updated graphics, purchase restoration, release optimization, and a much smaller production build.
Eventually, Google granted Potty Timer production access.
And now it is actually out there.
The First Cedar Harbor Studios App
Seeing Cedar Harbor Studios listed beneath an app on Google Play makes this one feel different.
There are already other projects being built here, and there will be more software released in the future, but Potty Timer gets to be the first.
That's something worth documenting.
The next challenge is no longer figuring out how to publish an app.
It's figuring out how to help the people who need it discover that it exists.
And that should be an interesting problem to solve.