offline access on the iPad app

Discuss aspects of the new digital access to all back issues of Genii and anything therein.
Scott M.
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offline access on the iPad app

Postby Scott M. » March 18th, 2015, 10:44 pm

I feel like I must be the only one with this problem or else others would have posted by now...

But does anyone else find the iPad app completely impossible when it comes to offline access? I click the "offline" mode on the settings page, download an issue until it gets to 100% and note the download arrow over the issue cover on the menu page. And then I'll be on a plane without internet connection and the issue is simply not there. Maybe the cover and a few pages are, but nothing else. Often, none of the issue is there, apparently having been dumped from the cache, perhaps when the app is closed.

The app works fine -- well, sort of fine -- with an internet connection. But, at least for me, I can't seem to download an issue and then keep it available on the iPad. (An iPad Air running the latest OS, by the way.)

Does anyone else have this problem? Any fixes? Or maybe "the company" can take note...

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Richard Kaufman
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Re: offline access on the iPad app

Postby Richard Kaufman » March 19th, 2015, 1:45 am

I will report this to the company. Thanks.
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Richard Kaufman
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Re: offline access on the iPad app

Postby Richard Kaufman » March 19th, 2015, 1:49 am

Scott, I just realized that you can set the number of issues that will be retained by the iPad.

Tap the issues button on the bottom.

Tap the settings tab on the top of the new window that opens.

Choose a number from the dropdown menu: the iPad will retain up to--I believe--10 issues. The default might be set to zero, and that might be your problem.
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Bill Marquardt
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Re: offline access on the iPad app

Postby Bill Marquardt » March 19th, 2015, 10:41 am

I am experiencing the same thing. I alluded to this in the other thread.

Yesterday, I uninstalled and re-installed the iPad app. I went online and downloaded the latest three issues for offline viewing. (My settings allows for storing three issues,; I was aware of that setting.) When I then went offline and viewed the three issues, they appeared to be intact and functioning correctly.

However, just now, a day later, I took my iPad offline and attempted to read the three issues. The April issue has only three pages visible, Pages 13, 14, and 15. The March and February issues appear to have all pages visible except for Page 4 of either issue.

Weird.

At least the login problems appear to have been fixed, so I can view the magazines anywhere with a WiFi connection. Thank you for getting that fixed.

I also just bought a tablet that uses Android 4.4. I will check that out.

Scott M.
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Re: offline access on the iPad app

Postby Scott M. » March 19th, 2015, 3:35 pm

Richard Kaufman wrote:Scott, I just realized that you can set the number of issues that will be retained by the iPad.

Tap the issues button on the bottom.

Tap the settings tab on the top of the new window that opens.

Choose a number from the dropdown menu: the iPad will retain up to--I believe--10 issues. The default might be set to zero, and that might be your problem.


Thanks, Richard, but, like Bill, I am aware of that setting. Have it set to five with only three "downloaded" -- in quotes because, although the covers are tagged with the download arrow, the pages (or at least all of them) don't show.

Scott M.
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Re: offline access on the iPad app

Postby Scott M. » March 19th, 2015, 3:56 pm

Bill, I just read your post on the other thread, and I experience all of that too -- particularly the times when some elements of the page are there but the text itself is missing. And the blurry pages too. I hadn't thought that the 100% indicator might be inaccurate. That seems like it could be a possibility. I still think that the app itself is somehow not retaining the material it has downloaded and stored.

PickaCard
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Re: offline access on the iPad app

Postby PickaCard » March 19th, 2015, 4:06 pm

I have also had this problem on my iPad Air 2. Since I mostly read Genii in a Wi-Fi environment, I have not given this bug too much thought, but it would be nice if I could carry 10 issues.

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Richard Kaufman
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Re: offline access on the iPad app

Postby Richard Kaufman » March 19th, 2015, 4:38 pm

Thanks very much for your comments. We don't know about the bugs unless you tell us. ALL of your comments have been sent to the company and we have to have some answers soon. Perhaps even the latest version of the OS app will fix them?
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Bill Marquardt
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Re: offline access on the iPad app

Postby Bill Marquardt » March 19th, 2015, 6:35 pm

The good news is:

So far, both of my Android devices, a smartphone Samsung Note 3, and my brand new Acer Iconia One 8, seem to be working just fine, including reading issues offline.

Scott M.
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Re: offline access on the iPad app

Postby Scott M. » March 19th, 2015, 9:29 pm

Interesting.

I downloaded the latest update to the iOS app and the offline problem is still there. Bill, I'm leaning more to your theory because the percentage counter quickly races up to 100%; it's clear that that material is not being downloaded.

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Richard Kaufman
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Re: offline access on the iPad app

Postby Richard Kaufman » March 19th, 2015, 11:46 pm

The percentage counter does not "race" to 100% on my iPad. It takes its sweet time to reach 100%--several minutes.

All of this has been reported to our company who provides the service for this and hopefully will be addressed sooner rather than later.
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David Kaplan
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Re: offline access on the iPad app

Postby David Kaplan » March 20th, 2015, 8:58 am

Here's what I find curious: I'm having the same problems as others have described here... But only with recent issues. No problems with the Alex Elmsley and Billy McComb issues from several years back.

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Richard Kaufman
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Re: offline access on the iPad app

Postby Richard Kaufman » March 20th, 2015, 1:26 pm

Thanks, David. That's important to know!
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Bob Plaut
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Re: offline access on the iPad app

Postby Bob Plaut » April 7th, 2015, 8:25 am

I have the number of issues set to 4. When I download issues and try to play content I get an error message that says external content not available offline.

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Richard Kaufman
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Re: offline access on the iPad app

Postby Richard Kaufman » April 7th, 2015, 1:40 pm

The issues themselves should download to your device and can be read offline, but the audio and video content do not download to your device. You need to have a wifi connection to see or hear them. I asked the company to please work on a version of the app that will allow people to download the AV content. This is a BIG company, and I was the first customer to ever make this request because of the space the AV would take up on someone's device.

Long story short, they have been working on a new version of the app that will allow the AV content to be downloaded with the rest of the issue, but no promise of delivery date.
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Bill Marquardt
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Re: offline access on the iPad app

Postby Bill Marquardt » April 9th, 2015, 2:10 am

Richard, just so you know, I waited until today to delete the app and reload it in order to give the team time to fix the earlier discussed problems.

I downloaded the last two issues, went offline and opened the app. There were no missing pages, and no missing or blurred text. Looks like the app is finally working properly.

Thanks for getting it done.

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Re: offline access on the iPad app

Postby vogler » April 11th, 2015, 8:22 am

I have exactly rhe same problem. Sometimes the issue is there, sometimes half of it and sometimes nothing...

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Bill Marquardt
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Re: offline access on the iPad app

Postby Bill Marquardt » April 11th, 2015, 6:43 pm

Well, since I had this problem for awhile but now it has been fixed for me, I suspect that if you delete the Genii app and then download it again, the app will work for you, also. If you have already done that, then there is still a problem.

Try this and see.

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Richard Kaufman
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Re: offline access on the iPad app

Postby Richard Kaufman » April 21st, 2015, 3:31 pm

As promised, the company we use has been testing the app to see what the problem is with offline access. Here are the results (written by the tech):

These are the steps I completed:
1. Opened the Genii app.
2. Selected the "issues" icon on the black navigation bar
3. Selected the "Settings" tab at the top of the page that loads
4. For the "Choose your network settings," Selected the "Offline"
mode."
This automatically downloads the entire edition at start up for
offline reading. However, it is NOT instant. There are many pages in
each edition, so you NEED to make sure the download wheel that appears
on the black navigation bar reaches 100% before you disconnect from
the internet.


When I tried this, I made sure the wheel finished spinning. Then I
went to the thumbnails page and made sure all pages were showing up. I
then disconnected from the internet by selecting airplane mode in the
iPad settings. I flipped through every page of the 11/01/14 edition
and they were present.

I then completed the same steps for the 5/01/15 edition. However, I
skipped waiting for the wheel to reach 100%. I then disconnect from
the internet. I found pages 3 and 4 were missing.

I reconnected to the internet and opened the edition back up and
flipped to those pages. I then disconnected from the internet again
and the pages were there. I did the same for the 1/01/15 edition. When
I disconnected from the internet, I found that page 3 was missing. I
connected back to the internet, flipped to that page and then
disconnected. It showed for me when I was later offline.

Readers should follow steps 1 through 4 above. For now, they can
double check before they loose access to the internet by switching to
airplane mode on their device and checking for the pages.

Chief Genii again: Please check whether this solves the problem of off-line reading for you!
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mwolfire
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Re: offline access on the iPad app

Postby mwolfire » April 26th, 2015, 11:46 am

A related problem ? On my iPhone none of the network settings options appears unless I switch to airplane mode. The only thing that shows is "Number of editions to store". Is that as it should be?

Scott M.
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Re: offline access on the iPad app

Postby Scott M. » May 14th, 2015, 11:08 am

So, I decided to try again saving the new, suprisingly-covered issue using Richard's steps above. Did everything correctly, checked that all the pages were there, had the download option enabled, etc. Went to airline mode, scanned through a few pages, all seemed good. This morning, turned on the iPad, again in airline mode, and only a handful of pages are there with the rest blank.

I'm pretty tech savvy, and, on an iPad Air running OS8, have simply never gotten the download function to reliably work. The interface is laggy and non-intuitive, but even working around that, there just is something broken in the functionality. At least for me. When renewal time comes up, I'll be sticking with the paper issues.

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Richard Kaufman
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Re: offline access on the iPad app

Postby Richard Kaufman » May 14th, 2015, 12:41 pm

Scott, I will forward your problem to the tech company and see if we can better the service.
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Richard Kaufman
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Re: offline access on the iPad app

Postby Richard Kaufman » May 14th, 2015, 3:50 pm

The company stated that their developers will look into the problem, and also informed me that an updated app will soon be ready for release.
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