PodTrapper 1.9.0 PreReleased

[marwatk]

Hi guys,

Sorry for the lag in responding to some forum posts and emails this week. I've been working furiously to try to get in the App Store (with no luck so far, <sigh>).

To that end, here is 1.9.0.. Let me know if there are any issues you encounter, otherwise I'll get that pushed out as version 2.0 this weekend.

Some minor UI changes and bug fixes in this release. Let me know how it works for you.

As always, the changes are listed on the download site.

-Marcus

[ScanAmerica]

Working great for me. I really like the new color scheme/skin. I also like having the amount of time left displayed on the right-side of the progress bar.

Thanks!
Gordon

[Lion]

The new UI is excellent work. Thanks for tackling it, this looks like a slick app now.

Only one minor problem .. black-on-dark blue text that's impossible to read (esp on low backlight) on podcast feed selection, individual podcast selection, and playing screen. I'm certain it's just a minor issue.

Great work Marc, thank you.

[diffused]

I definitely agree with Lion, on all parts. It can be difficult to see the lettering on a dark background.
Nice work though!

[arkolbus]

Very nice! GUI looks very slick.

I'm not getting the same visibility problems as others. All my text is white-on-blue and very clear.

[marwatk]

Hi guys,

What does it look like for you guys, and what OS are you on? (My guess it's a switch in how they render stuff in a certain os).

For comparison, it's supposed to look like this:

mainscreen.png (29.11 KiB) Viewed 40068 times

-Marcus

[diffused]

Hi Marcus,
I'm on 4.3 with my 8330. I have the above, dark blue but when I scroll, it is black band. I have the white letters though. The 'listened' bar is lt. grey and when it progresses it is dk. grey; kinda hard to see. My App Store has the black scroll band also so must be my OS, huh?

[marwatk]

Can you grab CaptureIt and grab a screen shot for me? All of my testing is done in the simulator on 4.3, which is where that screen shot is from, so I'm not sure I'll be able to reproduce. But if I can see a screen shot of what's happening hopefully I can fix it without being able to.

-Marcus

[diffused]

Here ya go. I sent 3, to the developer address.

[marwatk]

Hmm, interesting. I'll see what I can do.

For anyone interested, this is what they're seeing:

blackbar.jpg (14.31 KiB) Viewed 40082 times

(The black focus bar)

Lion, you seemed to be saying the text was black or dark blue as well, though, are you seeing behavior other than this?

-Marcus

[delorean]

Wow - loving the new UI!

Looks great on my Bold.


Thanks!

[dmajm]

Using storm it looks great but have an issue when I touch an item but don't select it the item turns white until i slide then they all go back to blue except the one that I touched last. Could you make the status bar with the times and percentage larger for those with week eyes . Other then that it looks great!

[Neuroxic77]

Wow what a change!
He is my 2 cents.
As always thanks for all the hard work you put into PT.

The Good
I cant tell you how happy I am to see the Podcast length instead of the #MB before I play a podcast
Now has a time remaining no more math trying to figure out how much time is left
Looks a lot cleaner
File Playback is on the bottom!

The Bad
My Storm is having the same problem as the post above
The Icons are gone on the front screen and replaced with the words Ready and Not Down Loaded
I cant tell a deleted episode from one I haven't Dled yet
The picture of the podcasts have been shrunk and are too hard to see.

My Suggestions
1) Thin up the gray borders a pixel or two on the power/vol/mem indicators.
2) The lines separating Podcasts are not visible enough
3) Bring back the icons all 4 of em but put them next to the number instead of on top like they were in 1.86.
i.e 10 # 4 @ 2 ^ 49 &
4) Double the size of the Red star, the gray trash can, green play, and yellow pause icons on the Left side of the main screen. Then center them and move the Podcast title over so the Icon and Title don't overlap

[Lion]

[delorean]

How weird, not seeing this on the Bold - must be a Storm only issue?

[diffused]

My husband asks, "Do you use CSS when rendering the screen, some people may have this turned off on their device". This would be under the Browser Configuration.

[delorean]

My husband asks, "Do you use CSS when rendering the screen, some people may have this turned off on their device". This would be under the Browser Configuration.

It's not a web page or web application so I would be sure CSS is not used...

[diffused]

Some programmers leverage the web application to render their pages, this is why my husband asks.

[marwatk]

Hi guys, thanks for posting the screen shots, they definitely help.

I should be able to get these all fixed, except maybe the black bar. I'm not sure what's going on with that one.

Note, though, that the icons of old are out until I can figure out how to make them fit with the new style (the colors definitely don't fit). I'm open to suggestions, though.

-Marcus

[FragU]

Marcus -

I'm running a Nextel (I know... I know...) Blackberry 8350i with OS version 4.6.1.204, and am an AVID audio book listener. I've congratulated you before on the strides you've taken... but here's the problem.

Some of the audio books I am listening to have files that may be bigger than what PodTrapper thinks should be allowed. For instance, the MP3 tag editor I use (Tag & Rename), shows this file being 4:00 (4 hours) in duration... yet PodTrapper only shows it as

[

As you can see the total size is 44 minute long. Further, once you get past the time it thinks the file should run, you can't fast forward/rewind... and after 10 or so minutes you can't even pause the playback. The only way to get the thing to stop playing is to do a battery pull, which, in my eyes, is bad. At this point the only option I have for completing this file is starting back where it thought it should end (re-listening to 15-minutes or so) and letting it run continuously without pauses or any kind... which means I'd have to get my wife off my back for 3+ hours (highly unlikely).

Overall, I think the issue here is that you are attempting to make a high quality application for multiple operating systems/phones... and they are not all working the same way. Perhaps you should get some private beta testers (one for each type of phone... Storm, Bold, Curve, Pearl, 8350i, etc.) and have them run the beta's and review the results.

Please let me know if there is anything you can do... and again, thanks for all you've done for us so far. If the private Beta is an option, I would be happy to volunteer as a 8350i / OS 4.6.1.204 user.

- Larry

[arkolbus]

Larry,
A similar problem has already been documented here: viewtopic.php?f=3&t=238
The problem is similar, but you are seeing the behavior at much shorter playback times. The problem might be with BBMP itself. What happens when you play the audiobook in BBMP?

I think the prereleases are a sort of beta test, albeit broad and informal. Anyone who wants to risk dealing with bugs is free to download and use, and some decide to give feedback on design, performance, and bugs. What's the difference between someone who volunteers to be a designated beta tester and the people that already report bugs and give other feedback on the forum? I like the present system, as the prereleases cast a wider net for bugs, and it means I get to offer my own feedback .

[marwatk]

Hi Larry,

I've had this issue with some other users as well. The easy way to test to see if it's PodTrapper is to try to play it in the BBMP, if it does the same thing there then PodTrapper won't be able to correct it unfortunately. If it doesn't, then PT may be able to.

Via some emails with users experiencing this, it seems to be a file *size* limit as opposed to a length issue. If the Podcast falls under some limit (which seems to vary by model) you'll be fine, but if it crosses that you get the 44 minute thing.

In one user's case it was 400mb, but I imagine yours is smaller than that? Definitely let me know, I'd love to have a handle on exactly what the cause is. (It very well could also be length, but the other use was able to re-encode the same file at a different bitrate and get it to work, as long as he was under 400mb).

Hope this helps.

Much like arkolbus says (who is often bailing me out in the forums when I get bogged down ), the pre-releases are as close to a beta as I have. I think I'll probably relabel them as such in the future. Either way, they're basically releases that adventurous people can test, and they can't blame me if it melts their phone. (Though I try not to enable that checkbox in the deploy script).

Also, just a note, I released 1.9.1 beta for the UI issues, can you guys check it out and make sure it looks proper? (I haven't fixed the other issues yet, been working on the help system).

-Marcus

[FragU]

Thanks ARKOLBUS & Marcus for taking a look at this. My file size is only 7.49mb... WAY under the 400 listed elsewhere.

I'll try out the new version and give updates.

[arkolbus]

Thanks ARKOLBUS & Marcus for taking a look at this. My file size is only 7.49mb... WAY under the 400 listed elsewhere.

I'll try out the new version and give updates.

Did you try playing the file in Blackberry Media Player? That would be more interesting, as 1.9.1 only contains user interface fixes.

[diffused]

Hmm, interesting. I'll see what I can do.

For anyone interested, this is what they're seeing:

blackbar.jpg

(The black focus bar)

Lion, you seemed to be saying the text was black or dark blue as well, though, are you seeing behavior other than this?

-Marcus

Hey all,
I found out why the scrolling focus bar was black and not blue. It depends on the theme. My stock Verizon theme gave the black (which was very hard to see and use) but another will give the blue. This is on my 8330 with OS 4.3.

[marwatk]

Thank you so much for letting me know!

I was racking my brain to figure out how I was going to solve that one (I really didn't want to have to reinvent the wheel by reimplementing the focus stuff that BB provides).

-Marcus