Thursday, September 27, 2012

Almost there, 0.50 beta and more!

Hi guys,

    I've been updating Fabrik Reader almost every day since 0.40 beta, with new features as well as bug fixes. And today, I finally got the 3D page turning animation working, and I decide to move up the major version number, so, 0.50 beta, here we are.

    As always, let's summarize what's been added since 0.40 beta, but I'm not going to get into too much details this time. Here is the list:

    1. Tablet optimized UI, including multi-column bookshelf and  two-column landscape reading model. I know I promised a full redesign of tablet UI. I had an idea last week when I wrote that post, and I actually did implemented that a couple of days ago. But unfortunately I don't think it's good enough when I actually see it on my nexus 7. So, I'm gonna put that on hold until I had a better idea.

2. Add a lot more customization options, like hiding status bar, change font, change line spacing, change animation speed, etc.

3. Justified text align.

4. Book search function, also voice search is supported thanks to google's excellent voice recognition engine.

5. 3D page turning animation.

    At this point, Fabrik Reader is relatively function complete. Also the session error ratio is dropping continuously, so it's more or less stable too. I think we are very close at graduating beta phase. So I want to talk a little bit about my monetization plan here. I don't have a lot of experience, and for now my plan is the classic ad-supported free version plus ad-free paid version way. The free version will have the exact functionality as paid version, but with an ad banner on the bottom of the screen. There will be NO ads in the reading view because that'll make the free version completely useless. I know many of you guys probably prefer a donation supported strategy, but unfortunately I'm a guy who still has to pay for his student loans, so when I see a chance to earn some extra cash, I damn well won't miss it! God forgive me!

    As always, let me know what you think, and enjoy!


22 comments:

  1. OK, no worries... I'll buy it. ;-)

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  2. Looking good, the search works perfectly, so thanks for implementing that (was surprised instead of filtering the book shelf it listed books, but either way it works).

    I think the ad-supported free version sounds like a good plan.

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  3. I'll pay for the reader when it gets hyphenation so the text flows optimally. Would looove to see a good pdf text reflow and font size.

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    1. Hyphenation.. ok, I'll look into that. Let me get something clear first, do you mean that we should always hyphenate the last word in a line instead of moving it to the next line? Do you still want hyphenation even that we got the justified alignment now?

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    2. Depending on font size and word lenghts there can be ugly gaps in justified mode which makes relaxed reading very hard. Especially with small display widths. I have no idea how hyphenation technically works, maybe it takes more than hyphenating the last word programatically. :-)

      In my opinion a reading software should make reading as comfortable as possible :-)

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    3. Just look at the last sentence of my second but last paragraph on a smartphone: if the word 'programatically' had been hyphenated there would have been more characters in the second but last line ... and less bigger gaps. :-)

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  4. Love it.
    Just a request: adjustable margins down to completely filling the screen

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    Replies
    1. Adjustable margins should be coming within the next 24 hours.

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  5. Do you plan on supporting Adobe Drm?

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    Replies
    1. Thank you for your response elsewhere on your blog. I understand the cost to you is too big a factor for now.

      I was also wondering if you are planning on adding page numbers instead of percentages?

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  6. I'll instantly buy the pro version, the latest updates have been great. I just hope you revisit the page turning animation because it doesn't feel as nice as the Play Books app where the page turning follows your finger rather than the current implementation where it's just an automatic turn. Also if you could add the Georgia font that'd be amazing, thanks!

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    Replies
    1. The reason it doesn't work like that is Fabrik use finger scroll on page to adjust screen brightness for now, so page turning follow your fingers would be conflict with that. I think I'll give brightness adjustment a button instead of finger scroll and then we can have finger-following page turning.

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    2. I'm glad you're on top of it, the more options the better!

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  7. Any chance to get OwnCloud / WebDAV-Sync soon? Would be really useful..

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    1. OwnCloud is already on my list. Never heard of WebDAV though... added to my list! For now my priority is Google Drive because that's the most requested one, and owncloud will come next.

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  8. First off you have a bloody fantastic reader, it looks gorgeous on Galaxy Nexus (I am very particular and really prefer Holo themed apps)

    Being a cloud phone with limited storage it would be great if you could open up books from Dropbox and keep it temp and not download to the SD card

    Keep up the fantastic work, I've bought your paid version just now after reading your warning on the free one.

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    Replies
    1. SD Card as in being internal storage on the Galaxy Nexus.

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    2. Thank you for buying the paid version! Some people has requested this feature before, so it's already on my list and will come soon.

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  9. Hi, great job, the app is unique in Android ecosystem, by elegance and confort to read, the landscape view is amazing, i love the book name on top, i'll love to see this:

    1) instead the percentage count, put a number page count (i'm old, i think)

    2) please, please: in library, allow in same way (sttings, i guess) an option to use the standard book cover (the one in the epub, sees?) i use high resolution ones and they don't appear!

    3) an integration with Colordict will be super

    4) an widget? maybe in the same way the book appears in the library

    Great job!

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    Replies
    1. 1.) Page number count is a bit tricky, I'll explain in my next post.

      2.) That's a good idea! Will do that ASAP.

      3.) Dictionary support is already planning.

      4.) Also a good idea! Will do after I got other important stuff done.

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