I’ve uploaded a video preview of PocketBible for iPad to YouTube at www.youtube.com/user/laridianinc. Because the video resolution isn’t as good as the iPad screen resolution, I’ve reproduced some representative screen shots below. Click on the screen shot to see the full-resolution image.
We reserve the right to make changes to the user interface (UI) and to functionality before we ship. In fact, there are a few things still in flux and at least one major feature that hasn’t been plugged into the new UI yet. So expect changes from what you see here.
We’re especially excited about the flexibility the control panel gives us for new features and for giving you instant access to search results and bookmarks. We also have enjoyed just reading the Bible in full-screen mode.
While the iPad is faster than the iPhone, we’ve also made changes to the code that have really sped up the display of text, making scrolling by verses and even chapters significantly more useful. The nice thing is that the iPhone and iPad code is the same at this level so the improvements will spill over to the iPhone.
Having said that, it should be obvious that not all the features of PocketBible for iPad will find their way to the iPhone. We’ll probably add split-screen, but not more than two windows.
One thing we’re concerned about is app approval times on the App Store. We submitted Romans Road for release on the April 3 iPad release date. We followed Apple’s instructions for making sure our app was available on April 3, but then we never heard anything further from them so we’re not sure what the status of that app is. We’ve heard the same thing from other developers.
We don’t have a schedule for releasing this version of PocketBible yet. As you can see it’s very nearly complete but there are some big features that need to be plugged in.
so sweet! I have an appointment with surgeon a week from Monday for frozen shoulder syndrome, maybe I’ll see what they’ll give in exchange. I’m thinking an iPad with PocketBible! Hey I’ll still have the right one, right????
wow awesome thanks for the speedy progress!
will there be separate apps for the iphone and ipad in the iTunes store? i just cannot see how a lot of the new layout (e.g. the control panel, 2 page layout, etc.) you demo’ed will be able to fit in an iphone screen.
btw one comment i have is that there seems to be a lot of wasted blank spaces on the edge margins which means less text per page. is there a way to adjust that margins to be smaller?
it does look much faster than on the iphone! cant wait!
thanks and great work!
Personally I’d be perfectly happy with the iPhone app as it is but at the iPad resolution if it had meant getting it earlier. I hate these indefinite timeframes. I use PB multiple times a day and could really use the iPad version now.
Exciting, very exciting.
Now I’m going to have to go buy an iPad just so I can have this app!
George0: The application is what Apple calls a “universal binary”, which means it runs on both platforms. However, it detects the screen size and gives you the iPhone interface on the iPhone. As I mentioned in the article above, we’ll probably let you split the screen into two windows on the iPhone but you won’t have the control panel. It’s possible that Apple will present it as two apps — they have iPad apps in their own section on the App Store. So to you it might look like two apps but to us they’re the same.
With respect to the margins, did you watch the video or just look at the screen shots? The extra margin and line leading are only present when you have just one book open. It significantly enhances readability in that mode, where you’re obviously not studying and cross-referencing, but rather just reading. We may make it so you can eliminate the margins and the leading but it will be ugly and difficult to read. You probably don’t have an iPad yet or you’d recognize the “Zen of iPad” in this feature. Go look at iBooks or Kindle if you have an iPad.
John Davis: We thought about doing a “giant iPhone app” for the iPad but decided the negative publicity of such a horrible iPad app would’ve been unbearable. We took the opportunity instead to do what you’re supposed to do with the iPad, that is, re-engineer the user interface to take advantage of the additional space.
As far as indefinite time-frames, writing a program isn’t like baking a cake. There’s not a timer that goes off when it’s done. So we can’t just look at the timer and tell you how long before you can eat it. I could give you a date, but I’d only be making one up for the purpose of giving you a date. I literally don’t have one in mind. I can tell you we’ve been working 10-12 hour days and quite a bit over the weekend in the last month to get this out and it will be uploaded to the App Store just as soon as it’s ready.
Thanks, everyone, for your comments!
Thanks for all of your hard work Craig, Im so looking forward to the new iPad version! You had mentioned before that we would be able to synchronize our notes and highlights from our iPhone to the iPad, will this only be a one time sync, or will we be able to keep the iPhone and iPad in sync automatically like Bento for the Mac, iPhone, and iPad works?
I don’t know if you plan on making the iPad version free or not, but personally I don’t have any problems paying for it, and I think you should charge for it. Sometimes when apps are free, people tend to think they aren’t worth downloading, but when it cost something, then they figure it must be worth it. Maybe you could have a free limited addition, and then charge for a full-blown version or something like so many other apps are presented.
Ron: You will be able to sync your user-created data as much as you’d like. It’s not automatic — you have to ask the iPad to sync to the server, then ask the iPhone to sync to the server, then ask the iPad to sync again to pick up changes from the iPhone.
This particular version of PocketBible will be free. In the future we will bundle the program with some content and charge for it. We were waiting to have user-data synchronization done before we did that.
Very cool! I’m really looking forward to this (and if you need beta testers, I have 10 years of Palm underlines, hilights, and notes to stress the conversion process =) )
I do cringe at the closing line, “it’s very nearly complete but there are some big features that need to be plugged in”. Those are contradictory statements ime. =) Or at least statements that lead to further 10-12 hour days!
I hope it goes smoothly and the iPad submission queue thins out. Thanx for keeping us posted.
Marc: Given that an entirely new UI layer has been slid in under the existing iPhone UI and that everything has had to be verified and fixed with the new UI all while making sure the iPhone UI still works, having notes be the remaining big feature is not inconsistent with saying “very nearly complete”. Compared to where we were three weeks ago it’s very nearly complete.
And it’s just the UI that has to be implemented. Nothing about the underlying storage of notes changes. But yeah, I’ve left it til last because it’s more challenging than highlights, bookmarks, categories, and reading plans.
As a longgggg time user of all your products, from pre-phone Jornada, Windows Mobile, and for the last three years the iPhone, and a purchaser of the iPad on day one, I am VERY excited to have PocketBible on my iPad.
May I assume that there will be a promotional email about its release, rather than our needing to check your web site every day?
We don’t get a list of all our iPhone users and we don’t know who owns iPads so it’s difficult for us to email them. Since you already have PocketBible on your iPhone, you’ll get a notice that there’s been an upgrade, just like with any other iPhone app. The next upgrade notice you get will be the one. (That doesn’t mean it’s coming soon, just that we don’t intend to release an iPhone update between now and then.)
Hi Craig! One of the features I’ve been hoping for is the ability to change the font and background colors. Will this be added in the next update? Thanks!
Timothy: Probably not, though I’ve experimented with just changing the background color and I’ve seen it work. The basic capability is already in the program (there’s one place in the code where we tell all the text windows to use black text on a white background) so the task is just creating the user interface. It sounds easy but every time you add something you run the risk of breaking two other things you haven’t thought of.
For example, we could let you change just the background color, but if you use a dark color you’ll want to change the foreground (text) color, too. So we have to add that. Then there are the “special” colors we use, like search hits, words of Christ and links. You’ll need to be able to change those when you change the background, or some of those will disappear.
So say we did all that, then you open up the Ryrie Study Bible Notes and discover all kinds of tables with their own background colors. If you’ve changed the text color, the text could disappear against those backgrounds. So maybe we should automatically change the text color to contrast with the background color. Now we have a bit of a challenge, as we have to not only calculate a contrasting color that maintains any uniqueness about the original color (which may have been yellow text on a red background — not just simple black on white or even black on red), we have to do so on the fly — examining each color change as it happens. Or maybe we won’t want to do that because in some books the color of the text means something.
So as you can see we go from a simple way to set the background color to needing to examine every use of every color in every book on the fly as we render the text. The obvious answer is to make some simplifying assumptions but even those can get complicated.
Every feature is a can of worms, so we don’t take any of them lightly. We’ll eventually let you modify the colors but we need to get this first iPad release done before we expand the feature list any further.
Very exciting! If you need a beta tester let me know.
Bruce: Apple limits us to 100 testing devices per year (that includes our own). We have a small number of testers so that there’s room for them to upgrade during the year and for us to add new testers as we release new products.
We’ll probably add no more than 4-5 testers for the iPad release since we already have several beta testers with iPads. When we’re ready for testers we’ll post an article here in the blog. It will be taken down as soon as we have an adequate pool of applicants from which to choose, so you have to be watching for it. Yeah, it’s not “fair” etc. but we have way more people who want to be testers than we have time to review, let alone actually need.
I do appreciate your interest in the program, though.
Thanks Craig. I understand the limitations of beta numbers. I just really appreciate your work, and having used the products for years just wanted to offer to help.
Hey, Craig, how about if you just use those who are posting so far in this thread as the beta testers? You know we have interest. Can’t speak for the others, but I am holding an iPhone and an iPad, so I could meet whatever criteria you have that way!
Looks great.. I’d love to offer my iPad services as a test pad
You are doing a wonderful jod… and in my opion a very fast one at that.
I have just watch the You Tube video and must say it looks good. I have to agree with GeorgeO comment thou, is there anyway for us to be able to adjust the margins distance (to about half) but being from the UK – still waiting
- I know that I haven’t seen how it looks and feels in the hand but just wanted you to know my thoughts.
Tony