Anyone know how to make android widgets? Clock synced with the SimRail server time idea

[Gazz292]

I'm not the only person trying to go totally HUD'less when i drive in SimRail, and to do this we need to know the time to the second so we can know when to leave a station, or just to keep to the timetable between stations / posts etc,
I have the time displayed on a digital clock widget (which shows seconds) on one of the tablets i have mounted next to my laptops screen for this purpose:

You can probably see the other blue bar is a world clock widget i've set up to cycle through the server times, but that doesn't show seconds and it takes my brain a while to compute the actual server time with this method... plus waiting for the server i'm running on to show up as i have 8 server time zones, but it can only show them on 4 rows, so they cycle up by one every 5 seconds.... the digital clock widget on the left is a separate widget that does not show world times, it's hard to find a world time clock that shows seconds i found)

 

But one of the 'issues' with using a clock on a tablet / phone is it will not be in sync with the SimRail server times, ok it will usually only be out by upto 5 seconds, but then you need to remember the time difference and leave ~5 seconds later than the timetable says to avoid getting a 'early departure' penalty thing.

 

So i was thinking that it would be nice to have the time displayed as a widget on a phone / tablet that is synced to the SimRail server time that you are driving on, could possibly be used as a watch face thing for those who use those smart watches too?

Sometimes when it's night time here and i want to drive a train during the day, i will go on the Australian server which is 11 hours ahead of UTC, so my clock widget is off by +11 hours (and 5 seconds 🙂 
I know i could change the timezone, but that is a pain in the ass to keep doing, as it will also change reminders i have set throughout the day to take my medication etc. 

 

So i was wondering if someone who knows how to make an android widget had thought about making a 'SimRail server time clock' 

A digital clock with seconds that syncs to the SimRail server time you are driving on (a decimal minutes option would be awesome, but maybe pushing things?... but i mention this as drivers timetables don't show departure at say 21:52:42, they show:   That 7 is 42 seconds in decimal minutes.

 

I imagine you'd first need to tell the SimRail  clock widget the server you are on, then it occasionally pings that server to sync the times up... or maybe it can ping your username like the live map does when you set it to track you, and automatically get the server time you are driving on but only when you are driving... so reducing the load on the servers when you are not driving (TBH i'd think a single ping when you start driving would get the server time and then it'd keep in sync normally?.. sorry if i'm using ping inappropriately, you can tell programming is not my thing)

 

And i mention an android widget, as those can be placed where you like on a phone, tablet etc, like in my first picture i have a remote system monitor showing on that tablet most of the time, monitoring my laptops performance and temps, so i just added a clock widget that shows seconds to it's dashboard, but i could set it as a floating always on top widget if i wanted to.

 

Edited March 5, 2023 by Gazz292