Suggestions and feedback

[Guest]

I use your app for my GRE Vocab and TOEFL use...

I recently switched iPods, and used the dropbox full import/export method to transfer my cards... Everything is transferred, but some my View preferences are not transferred... (e.g. 'Hide Bottom Icons' is back to default)

The 300 GRE words that you got... what's your source? I wanted to make such a list but for the master word list (3500+ words)... with Audio pronunciations, non-IPA pronunciation guide, usage, antonyms, synonyms and meanings... So if you could just point me to your source and maybe the script that you used to scrape it it would be of great help!

This is a feature request:
Increase the number of text fields please. Currently, I can have upto 5 Text fields and 5 Category fields... But my wordlist has a lot of intricacies... I have, the word, it's meaning, it's type (adj/noun/et al.), it's antonyms, it's usage sentences (2 separate uses so two fields)
I can merge the columns into one and make do, but I usually have a different layout for different studies... so more than 5 text fields *are* necessary...

Also, I love how you haven't ditched the iOS 3 users and increased minimum OS level. A big thank you for that! I use it on iTouch 1G, hence iOS 4 can't work on my piece. I appreciate you not bumping the requirement unnecessarily.

[Ernie]

Global options are not currently stored in the database, only on the device, so they don't get transferred over. Fixing this is on my to-do list.

300 GRE word list was from a book I bought a few years ago. All the other pieces were from probably 5 different online sources, which took a while to bring together; it was kind of a painful one-time process. I really don't have that information anymore.

Wow, more than 5 fields? I don't think I'm ever going to support more than 5 fields.


I'm sorry I can't be of much help today. I will try to fix the global option / database thing though in the not too far off future.

Ernie

[Guest]

300 GRE word list was from a book I bought a few years ago. All the other pieces were from probably 5 different online sources...

Can you atleast list the sources? the sites that's all?
atleast the audio and pronunciation source (because I couldn't find the superb pronunciation format you have on popular dictionaries)


Thanks for the quick reply!

[Ernie]

Try these two:
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/catalyst
http://nhd.heinle.com/Definition.aspx?word=catalyst

As for sounds, my App has TTS so you can create "computer" voices for text. It's not quite as good the real thing, but it's still pretty good.

Finally, google has sounds, which may be the way to go as it's easy to grab. Just change the URL to the appropriate word. They have a lot of words.
http://www.gstatic.com/dictionary/stati ... talyst.mp3

[Guest]

That was what I wanted. Thanks!

Another feature request...

A log of all actions on each flashcard...?
Basically, in statistics of the card, if there'd be an all action 'timeline' of the card
eg.
New Wrong Timestamp
New Right Timestamp
New Right Timestamp
New Right Timestamp
Active StrongRight Timestamp....

This is per card...Though this might be tedious for you, It'd be nice if you'd just make a global log, atleast of all actions... (the log must have the card data (atleast one field), timestamp, and what was the answer given... you can even log the time taken to give an answer... that can help...)
Then I could import it into my scripts for some data visualization (graphs etc)

[Guest]

The data analysis app that i make will anyways be webbased. You can even host it on your website and add this as a feature of your app!

(your app will just have to upload the log onto your server, and the stats will be generated on-the-fly)

[Ernie]

Improving my statistical reporting is on my to-do list. I'm not sure what exactly I'll want to do with this, or whether I'll be up for creating a log like you are describing. Thanks for the idea. I'll make a note of it for a possible future update, but I've got a lot of things on my list that I would currently put at higher priority, so I wouldn't expect anything on this for quite some time.

[Guest]

Can you post the list of upcoming features?

[Ernie]

I can say a few things that are on my near-term radar: custom fonts, multiple-choice, and pushing back due cards for "vacation". I have hundreds of possible ideas to work with and just have to choose things that sound interesting and useful to a hopefully wide audience.

[Guest]

So even a global log would be difficult to implement?

[Ernie]

Every little update takes time, and usually more than you'd guess. With so many things to do, I need to prioritize. That's all. I'll let this idea settle a while in my head. Sometimes a lower priority item gets moved up because of seeing it in a new or expanded way. I'm just trying to be honest with you if you were expecting something quickly. I do my best to take in new ideas and implement them, but you can probably imagine how many ideas I get. I will consider this idea when I get back to focusing on statistic reporting updates.

[Guest]

I know how you feel!

You need any help in developing?
Since it's a study project, it will be mighty useful to port on other platforms... (I've dabbled with Java ME making ReadManiac)

[norbert]

What I don't get is the use of this mega-log per card? Can "guest" describe what you would gain?

[Guest]

Yeah norbert sure...

The log helps in generating statistics... Also, it helps for archival purposes...
You very well must be knowing the possibilities of such a data trove...

(most memorable cards, least memorable cards, most retentive time of the day, most productive day of the week, most productive hour of the day and many many other trends...)

These trends might be tedious to develop, but atleast once we have the data, some one can ease things along...

What say, norbert?

[Ernie]

Yes, I can see a possible use for the data. Again, I will revisit this idea at a later date. Feel free to ask for an update in 3-4 months.

[Guest]

How about help in development?

[Ernie]

I'm not looking for any development help at this time. Sorry. Thanks for the offer though.

[Guest]

Any chance of opening up the code? atleast partially?

[Ernie]

No, I'm not interested in opening up any code right now. Sorry.

[Guest]

Okay, thanks!!

[Guest]

Ok, I'm back.

I just remembered a few more suggestions.

Since, you wouldn't increase the number of text fields, I used the 'Notes' field for my extra data (metadata actually, ie. not necessary to be displayed while studying)

But the problem is, the small 'n' cannot be disabled from showing. You have a nice option to disable flag visibility, but nowhere is there a note visibility option.
ie. I want to be able to disable the visibility of the 'n' shown when the card has a note field.

Now as a consequence to the above dilemma, I tried inserting that data as 'Category' field.
There's another problem, you seem to have a limit on the number of categories possible.
I have ~3500 cards in my deck, and so, ~3500 different unique data in the 'Category 1' column... But what I noticed is that you have some artificial limit on the number of such unique categories which is not documented anywhere.

so in a nutshell,
1. the option to toggle visibility of 'n' of notes field.
2. increase (or atleast state) the number of unique categories possible in one deck in one 'Category 1' column.

thank you.

this is to pass your spam filter: '!!'.

[Ernie]

I will plan on an option to hide the "n". I like that idea.
I won't be increasing the number of categories. I think the limit is 200. Sorry on this.


Ernie

[Guest]

Nice. thanks.

!!