New Android App for iGenii Coming Soon

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Richard Kaufman
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New Android App for iGenii Coming Soon

Postby Richard Kaufman » October 22nd, 2014, 11:47 pm

I just tested a new Android app that is infinitely better than the current version. Now that I've okayed it, they will build and submit the app. Should be on Google Play by next week, and Amazon a few weeks after that. Those of you with Android tablets please let me know when it shows up and how it works.
As I mentioned earlier, it is an interim step to try and increase functionality until a better version is built in November or December.
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Re: New Android App for iGenii Coming Soon

Postby Chris Aguilar » October 23rd, 2014, 12:44 am

Great! Really look forward to downloading/testing it out.

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Re: New Android App for iGenii Coming Soon

Postby Chris Aguilar » October 23rd, 2014, 1:35 pm

The updated android app just appeared on the google play store.

https://play.google.com/store/apps/deta ... prod&hl=en

What's New

- This is a major update of the overall app performance!
- Faster initial online reading
-Significant responsiveness improvements
-More native gesturing and navigation for tablets and phones
- Reorganized layout, updated icons and labels
- Improved high resolution device support
- Swipe between articles to see the previous or next story
- Improved article sharing through social media
- Pinch to zoom or double tap to zoom in and out
- Stability improvements and general bug fixing



Will download and test in the next day or so.

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Re: New Android App for iGenii Coming Soon

Postby Richard Kaufman » October 23rd, 2014, 2:37 pm

Chris, please share your impressions here (the developers will read it). As I said, this is not the final product, but something to improve things in the short term. It seems to work very well on my XYboard.
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Re: New Android App for iGenii Coming Soon

Postby Chris Aguilar » October 23rd, 2014, 6:46 pm

Had a short time with the new app during my lunch hour.

I strongly recommend completely uninstalling the previous version, then installing the new one fresh. Intially allowing Android to do the update seemed to give me some login issues. A clean install fixed that.

Responsiveness is much improved, but still (on certain screens) somewhat lacking. There are a few issues that I see where I'll need to post up some screenshots, likely tonight or tomorrow.

But overall, a huge improvement. I think theyr'e on the right track.

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Re: New Android App for iGenii Coming Soon

Postby Richard Kaufman » October 23rd, 2014, 6:57 pm

Good!
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Re: New Android App for iGenii Coming Soon

Postby Evan Shuster » October 23rd, 2014, 9:03 pm

Chris,
What device are you using? I am on Kindle, and so far no update. I can Side-load the android app (with some risk), but I'm hoping that this may work for me.

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Re: New Android App for iGenii Coming Soon

Postby Chris Aguilar » October 23rd, 2014, 9:10 pm

I'm using a '13 (second edition) Nexus 7 inch tablet. It runs completely stock android so I consider it a good test bed.

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Re: New Android App for iGenii Coming Soon

Postby Joe Pecore » October 23rd, 2014, 9:22 pm

Chris Aguilar wrote:Had a short time with the new app during my lunch hour.

I strongly recommend completely uninstalling the previous version, then installing the new one fresh. Intially allowing Android to do the update seemed to give me some login issues. A clean install fixed that.

Responsiveness is much improved, but still (on certain screens) somewhat lacking. There are a few issues that I see where I'll need to post up some screenshots, likely tonight or tomorrow.

But overall, a huge improvement. I think theyr'e on the right track.

I had same login issue after update. Did a "clear data" and was able to log back in. Works good so far.
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Re: New Android App for iGenii Coming Soon

Postby Richard Kaufman » October 23rd, 2014, 10:00 pm

Evan, the Kindle Fire app won't appear on Amazon for a few weeks (due to their lengthy process of review--it has already been submitted). I would wait for it, and just go through your browser until it's released.
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Re: New Android App for iGenii Coming Soon

Postby Chris Aguilar » October 23rd, 2014, 11:57 pm

Doing some major testing now. Even with improved responsiveness, the app is really buggy. Lots of locking up, freezing up and even a force close or two. Will post up some screen shots either later tonight or tomorrow. This might be related to be particular mode on using, which is online reading.

I did notice that it looks like all the issues might be posted now, which is great.

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Re: New Android App for iGenii Coming Soon

Postby Chris Aguilar » October 24th, 2014, 11:47 am

Here's a question pertaining to the web version of iGenii.

Has the ability to print out a page (or portion of a page) been removed? Or am I just not seeing it?

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Re: New Android App for iGenii Coming Soon

Postby Richard Kaufman » October 24th, 2014, 12:19 pm

The blue square icon is at the upper right corner of the current issue (between the issue and the black tool bar on the right).

The way it works is that if you click on it, you should be able to download a pdf of that page and then print it out. Unfortunately it's not working at the moment.

I instructed the company to devote their manpower to getting all the back issues up, and they've been doing a great job--every issue from 1936 to 2001, and 2010 to 2014 is up. We've got only 9 years left to fill in, and that should be done by the end of next week at the latest.

When that is finished, they will go back to work on fixing the save/print function and the search function, both of which aren't working.

Then I can go back and add the audio and video to the issues from 2011 and 2012.

I hope you understand the enormous complexity of all we've done as a small company on a limited budget. Look at our competition: no back issues online for subscribers, and not even a "digital issue"--just a pdf download. Everything else is just plopped on a website.

Even though we're a small company, but I'm very pleased with the way our product is shaping up. It just takes time to get it all fixed and functioning properly.
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Re: New Android App for iGenii Coming Soon

Postby Chris Aguilar » October 24th, 2014, 12:52 pm

I certainly think the archive is a huge selling point for Genii and I personally love it.

What I'm hoping for (and believe will happen) is for the app to at least match the android functionality of the previous app. The "print page" feature can certainly wait until the larger issues (and uploads) have happened.

Currently, if one downloads an issue completely before reading it (important for those with slow connections) and stays in "flip mode" reading via the app is a bit rough, but usable. Improvement to responsivity of "pinch and zoom" has really helped out here.

I've got a lot of screenshots uploaded that I'll annotate and link to from this thread in hopes of identifying some other issues for the developers to look at once they've handled your priorities first (i.e. getting all the issues up). Even with the less than optimal current app, having more issues available (and being able to download them for offline reading) is fantastic.

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Re: New Android App for iGenii Coming Soon

Postby Chris Aguilar » October 24th, 2014, 1:15 pm

Here is an image illustrating two issues.

When zooming to read text in "flip mode" the algorithm (even when the issue has already been completely downloaded) will chop up the text. On some pages, this "chopping up" is even worse and really hurts the ability to read the page. Zooming in/out again, sometimes fixes this, but not always.

Also, the tool bar (interface) icons overlap (bottom of image- "flip", "pages", "content" "search" in a way that I suspect makes selecting/using them to be problematical. For me, selecting these options (per the screen shot) is an issue.

From a technical view, I'm pretty sure this happens because I'm using Androids built in ability to size interface text a bit larger to make up for poor vision. I suppose I could set/unset this option every single time I want to use the Genii app (which would mess up the text of my other apps) but that's an annoyance that could probably be mitigated with a bit of programming on their part.

....More to come later.


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