Setting up the project

1. If you don't already use git, install it and take a crash course on using it.
2. Create a github account if necessary, then fork the project on github. Make a local clone of your new fork and import the project into Eclipse. Create a new branch to do your work in, push it to github and switch to the new branch (see these instructions, up to but not including "Create a pull request"). At this stage Eclipse will complain bitterly about missing dependencies and other problems.
3. Set up the Google Play Services SDK.
4. Use the Google API console to obtain two API keys, one for Android apps and one for browser apps. Before generating the keys make sure that the following services are enabled: Google Maps Android API v2, Google Maps API v2 and Places API. See the documentation for instructions on using the keystore tool to generate hashes of your real and debug certificates.
5. Paste the Android API key into ApplicationManifest.xml.template (this key is used for the Maps API) and the browser key into src/config.properties.template (this key is used for the Places API), then make a copy of each file in the same location but without the .template extension.