Development and publication of the Alt Reader application
Hello everyone, this time I want to tell the story of the emergence of our new product for Nokia smartphones based on Symbian, PDF / DjVu-reader Alt Reader.
This product is an excellent illustration of the fact that it is best to study any subject area (in this case - programming for mobile devices), taking on a real project. In this case, the learning process itself is interesting, and the result is tangible.
The developer of the program, Vasiliy Kharitonov, bought one of the first Nokia touch devices (Nokia 5530) in November 2009, hoping to adapt it to read various books in PDF and DjVu formats. It turned out, however, that the software that allows you to view PDF files was extremely small, and there were no programs that worked satisfactorily on sensory Nokia. Vasily suffered a week with Adobe PDF Reader, until he came to the conclusion that it is not suitable for comfortable viewing of documents.
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In search of the DjVu-viewer, this article with Habra was discovered, describing the donationware project of our compatriot. Unfortunately for Kharitonov and fortunately for us, this project did not develop and did not support Nokia touch smartphones, but inspired Vasily to take the reading room himself.
Previous C programming experience gave hope that the development process for Symbian would not be a problem, but the features of Symbian C ++ and the OS as a whole resulted in spending several months studying Forum Nokia, as well as various books and articles in English. The process of learning the principles of programming for Symbian, however, greatly accelerated after the publication of the book by Alexander Trufanov “ Symbian C ++. Programming for mobile phones ", which is the only sane book in Russian devoted to mobile development on Symbian C ++.
After a few months of hard work, in April 2010, the first build of the AlternateDjvu program appeared, which allowed you to read DjVu files. Vasily decided to place it on the Allnokia.Ru resource, giving all users free access to the program. The application aroused great interest in the Symbian user community, since it solved a real and needed task, so requests for adding new features and bug reports were not long in coming. The main request was the addition of the ability to read PDF, after which it was implemented in May 2010, the application became quite widespread outside the CIS. In this variant, the program was already called Alternate Reader and it is this program that all old school symbian users who have ever been puzzled by the ability to read PDF files on their phone are well aware of.
Despite the initial goal - the creation of a reader for its own needs - an attempt was made to monetize the application, since the work on it took quite a long time. As is customary in such cases, the author decided to make a donationware product from the program, giving everyone the opportunity to transfer any amounts to different wallets. As a result, the program brought 800 rubles in total from four users (by the way, we are now looking for them to donate registration keys for the full version of Alt Reader). Meanwhile, the application was distributed randomly on the Internet, its reviews appeared on various European and domestic websites, and various assemblies were laid out in different catalogs. As a result, it was often not clear where to download the most current version of the application. In order to solve this problem, a page was opened on SourceForge - sourceforge.net/projects/alternatedjvu , which to this day remains the official Alternate Reader page and contains its source code. To date, the program has been downloaded more than 390000 times:
The distribution of the application, however, did not contribute to generating income from it, and, accordingly, did not stimulate the desire to develop it. Not so much enthusiasm also caused Nokia’s decision to choose the WP7 platform as a priority for developing its future products. The only incentive to continue development was an unexpected gift from Nokia to all Nokia Launchpad members in the form of the Nokia E7. After receiving this unit, Vasily decided to continue development.
At this cheerful moment on the basis of mobile development, our acquaintance with Vasily happened. After learning about the existence of Altenate Reader, I proposed to modify this application and make a commercial product out of it. The potential of the application was visible to the naked eye, but its distribution model severely limited its audience (the program was distributed unsigned and was virtually inaccessible to ordinary users - not geeks). In addition, the program required improvements to meet the specificity of modern requirements for mobile applications (I wanted it to match counterparts on other mobile platforms, where traditionally with PDF support more and more safely). After compiling a list of improvements and suggestions for the program, we agreed to release a new, already commercial, version of the product. At the same time, Vasily acts as a developer and author of the program, and Tarasov Mobile - as a publisher and promoter of the application.
After 3 months of emergency development, the first version of Alt Reader came into being, which, although based on AltenateReader, is in fact a completely redesigned application containing more than 100 internal and cosmetic improvements.
In particular, among the distinctive features of its predecessor:
We are satisfied with the result, and further development of the program is planned. Here are some more examples of the application:
As for the price of the program, we will not succumb to the temptation to set the price for the application on a level with Adobe PDF Reader (10 Euro), but dwell on the standard for us 5 Euro (190 rubles for the CIS). However, for the first time after the release, an application exclusively in the Nokia Store will be available for 2 Euro for all users. A free trial version is also available.
Exclusively for habras-users with Nokia N8 and Nokia E7 phones, the application is available absolutely free of charge in the Nokia Store for two weeks at this link:
store.ovi.com/content/216564
Background of the program
This product is an excellent illustration of the fact that it is best to study any subject area (in this case - programming for mobile devices), taking on a real project. In this case, the learning process itself is interesting, and the result is tangible.The developer of the program, Vasiliy Kharitonov, bought one of the first Nokia touch devices (Nokia 5530) in November 2009, hoping to adapt it to read various books in PDF and DjVu formats. It turned out, however, that the software that allows you to view PDF files was extremely small, and there were no programs that worked satisfactorily on sensory Nokia. Vasily suffered a week with Adobe PDF Reader, until he came to the conclusion that it is not suitable for comfortable viewing of documents.
')
In search of the DjVu-viewer, this article with Habra was discovered, describing the donationware project of our compatriot. Unfortunately for Kharitonov and fortunately for us, this project did not develop and did not support Nokia touch smartphones, but inspired Vasily to take the reading room himself.
Previous C programming experience gave hope that the development process for Symbian would not be a problem, but the features of Symbian C ++ and the OS as a whole resulted in spending several months studying Forum Nokia, as well as various books and articles in English. The process of learning the principles of programming for Symbian, however, greatly accelerated after the publication of the book by Alexander Trufanov “ Symbian C ++. Programming for mobile phones ", which is the only sane book in Russian devoted to mobile development on Symbian C ++.
First step - Alternate Reader
After a few months of hard work, in April 2010, the first build of the AlternateDjvu program appeared, which allowed you to read DjVu files. Vasily decided to place it on the Allnokia.Ru resource, giving all users free access to the program. The application aroused great interest in the Symbian user community, since it solved a real and needed task, so requests for adding new features and bug reports were not long in coming. The main request was the addition of the ability to read PDF, after which it was implemented in May 2010, the application became quite widespread outside the CIS. In this variant, the program was already called Alternate Reader and it is this program that all old school symbian users who have ever been puzzled by the ability to read PDF files on their phone are well aware of.Despite the initial goal - the creation of a reader for its own needs - an attempt was made to monetize the application, since the work on it took quite a long time. As is customary in such cases, the author decided to make a donationware product from the program, giving everyone the opportunity to transfer any amounts to different wallets. As a result, the program brought 800 rubles in total from four users (by the way, we are now looking for them to donate registration keys for the full version of Alt Reader). Meanwhile, the application was distributed randomly on the Internet, its reviews appeared on various European and domestic websites, and various assemblies were laid out in different catalogs. As a result, it was often not clear where to download the most current version of the application. In order to solve this problem, a page was opened on SourceForge - sourceforge.net/projects/alternatedjvu , which to this day remains the official Alternate Reader page and contains its source code. To date, the program has been downloaded more than 390000 times:
The distribution of the application, however, did not contribute to generating income from it, and, accordingly, did not stimulate the desire to develop it. Not so much enthusiasm also caused Nokia’s decision to choose the WP7 platform as a priority for developing its future products. The only incentive to continue development was an unexpected gift from Nokia to all Nokia Launchpad members in the form of the Nokia E7. After receiving this unit, Vasily decided to continue development.
Appearance of alt reader
At this cheerful moment on the basis of mobile development, our acquaintance with Vasily happened. After learning about the existence of Altenate Reader, I proposed to modify this application and make a commercial product out of it. The potential of the application was visible to the naked eye, but its distribution model severely limited its audience (the program was distributed unsigned and was virtually inaccessible to ordinary users - not geeks). In addition, the program required improvements to meet the specificity of modern requirements for mobile applications (I wanted it to match counterparts on other mobile platforms, where traditionally with PDF support more and more safely). After compiling a list of improvements and suggestions for the program, we agreed to release a new, already commercial, version of the product. At the same time, Vasily acts as a developer and author of the program, and Tarasov Mobile - as a publisher and promoter of the application.
After 3 months of emergency development, the first version of Alt Reader came into being, which, although based on AltenateReader, is in fact a completely redesigned application containing more than 100 internal and cosmetic improvements.
In particular, among the distinctive features of its predecessor:
- Support for two document viewing modes - continuous and per page
- Quick access to full screen mode with one touch
- Flexible zooming with your fingers (pinch-zoom)
- Convenient page turning (several modes)
- Correct support for large files
We are satisfied with the result, and further development of the program is planned. Here are some more examples of the application:
As for the price of the program, we will not succumb to the temptation to set the price for the application on a level with Adobe PDF Reader (10 Euro), but dwell on the standard for us 5 Euro (190 rubles for the CIS). However, for the first time after the release, an application exclusively in the Nokia Store will be available for 2 Euro for all users. A free trial version is also available.
Special gift for habras-users
Exclusively for habras-users with Nokia N8 and Nokia E7 phones, the application is available absolutely free of charge in the Nokia Store for two weeks at this link:
store.ovi.com/content/216564
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/132198/
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