Has FocusPad died?
Erik Westra
I'm a great fan of FocusPad, and really like the way it works.
Unfortunately, it seems to be quite unreliable on my iPhone 3G,
regularly crashing out while flicking between pages. I've also heard
great things about the beta version 2, which doesn't appear to be
available anywhere. Since there haven't been any postings to this
mailing list for three months, I wonder if this project has basically
died -- which would be a great pity.
One of the folks on Mark Forster's forum has described a great TM
system he's built using FocusPad's fluid page format, but that isn't
available on the non-beta version of FocusPad. Is there any way of
obtaining the beta, or has this program basically died from lack of
time, interest, or sales?
The concept is so good, I'm almost tempted to write my own version (I
spend my days developing iPhone and iPad apps) just so I can get the
extra features I want. But it'd be much better if Tony could pick
this up again (or keep going) with the existing app.
Cheers,
- Erik.
Tony Mann
Back in July, I had a terrible tragedy occur in my life. I am still
picking up the pieces. I tried to keep working on FocusPad, but I soon
realized that 2.0 code base was not converging on a stable release,
and it needed some serious rewriting. I started in on the task, but
quickly ran out of steam. Dejectedly, I put the project aside, and
waited for motivation and inspiration to return.
Lately I have felt ready to work on the project again. But I decided
that this time I would get the UI working in a web app first, so I
could verify usefulness and usability in a more nimble development
environment. I have been making some progress and am excited about
what I have come up with so far, but it will be a little while before
I have something solid enough to port to the iPhone.
In the meantime, I do feel bad that I have left my users hanging. I
will see if there is anything I can do to make the app more usable in
the interim. Unfortunately version 2 is not reliable enough for
release in its current form, so I need to decide what path forward
makes sense.
Erik, I am happy to meet another iPhone developer who is interested in
time management. I would be extremely interested in collaborating with
you on this project. If you are interested, let's discuss this idea
further.
I have always found FocusPad users to be loyal, interesting and full
of great ideas. Thanks for your patience. I hope we can keep this
thing going one way or another.
..tony..
Erik Westra
> Back in July, I had a terrible tragedy occur in my life. I am still
> picking up the pieces. I tried to keep working on FocusPad, but I soon
> realized that 2.0 code base was not converging on a stable release,
> and it needed some serious rewriting. I started in on the task, but
> quickly ran out of steam. Dejectedly, I put the project aside, and
> waited for motivation and inspiration to return.
>
> Lately I have felt ready to work on the project again. But I decided
> that this time I would get the UI working in a web app first, so I
> could verify usefulness and usability in a more nimble development
> environment. I have been making some progress and am excited about
> what I have come up with so far, but it will be a little while before
> I have something solid enough to port to the iPhone.
>
> In the meantime, I do feel bad that I have left my users hanging. I
> will see if there is anything I can do to make the app more usable in
> the interim. Unfortunately version 2 is not reliable enough for
> release in its current form, so I need to decide what path forward
> makes sense.
>
> Erik, I am happy to meet another iPhone developer who is interested in
> time management. I would be extremely interested in collaborating with
> you on this project. If you are interested, let's discuss this idea
> further.
>
> I have always found FocusPad users to be loyal, interesting and full
> of great ideas. Thanks for your patience. I hope we can keep this
> thing going one way or another.
I am so sorry to hear about your tragedy. Of course, it's completely
understandable that things would stop for a while when something like
this happens, and you should take as long as you need to heal before
worrying about things like this mailing list!
I would love to help you with the FocusPad development if I could.
Your web prototype sounds intriguing, though I'm not really a web
developer so I can't help you with that. But if I can collaborate
with you on the iPhone app itself, I'd be more than happy to do what I
can...and I can certainly help give ideas and advice with your web
prototype. We should probably talk more off-list (ewestra at gmail
dot com) to see how we could proceed with this.
Oh, I'm attaching a device log from the FocusPad crashes I've been
having. One of those confounded EXC_BAD_ACCESS exceptions, I'm
afraid...
All the best,
- Erik.
Tijl Kindt
Thank you so much for the update. Of course it is perfectly
understandable that you take your time to restart the projects you had
invested in. Therefore I'm grateful for the renewed sense of assurance
that we, the users, are not investing our time in a dead product, but
that with time, it will be picked up again and further developed.
For the moment, there are no killing problems with the version (beta
12) that I'm using, so for me it is not a problem that it is taking a
while to restart the projection. There are some annoyances though
(active page on a pad not being remembered, crashes from time to
time,...), which will need to be addressed at some point, but nothing
urgent.
Wishing you the best,
Regards,
Tijl
--
Tijl Kindt
Rooseveltstraat 7A
2321BK Leiden • The Netherlands
+31-(0)6-1033-9865 • ti...@kindt.me • http://tijl.kindt.me
Christopher
Very sorry to hear about your tragedy. I pray that you receive peace
and consolation.
Cordially,
+Christopher Esget